All in a day’s lesson.
Proactivity defined – “It means more than merely taking initiative. It means that as human beings we are responsible for our own life. Our behaviour is a function of our decisions, not our conditions. We can subordinate feelings to values. We have the initiative and responsibility to make things happen.” So wrote Stephen Covey in The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People – Habit #1.
I was reading this book last week and updating my journal entry halfway (for a couple of days now and still halfway) on Coco’s Crepes and my takeaway understanding on Habit#2 and what I needed to proactively apply. I guess it was a good lesson I did not complete that entry yet, coz I just had a lesson today on Habit #1. And again there is a reason why it is called Habit #1.
Lessons from the book. 1. Between Stimulus and Response is Our Greatest Power – the Freedom to Choose (Self-awareness, Imagination, Conscience, Independent will). 2. Responsibility = Response-Ability. Highly proactive people recognise that responsibility. They do not blame circumstances, conditions or conditioning for their behaviour. Their behaviour is a product of their own conscious choice, based on values, rather than a product of their conditions, based in feeling.
The school was still in partial darkness, the same as last 2 days. For us, class was as per normal at 8.15am. The circumstances – no a/c, no working fridge/freezer, no induction cooker, no familiar pastry lab environment, … we recognised Chef Philippe chose to conduct classes for us and we all chose to turn up day after day.
We did piping today. Chef melted the chocolate for us and all we needed to do was scoop the chocolate from the pot and practise piping. By 12, we were to finish with our practice for the day and clean-up, many of us wanted a breather and fresh air outside. ” … hot water for cleaning“, … nothing happened we busied ourselves with cleaning our own work station and tools. Usually, the hot water is automatic from the tap but the circumstance was that no power = no hot water, or was it really. The next moment, Chef took a pot and boiled the water again, and he did not say anything. Chef had boiled a pot of hot water the day earlier so that we can clean out our stuff of chocolate and for sanitation. What else can I say? We recognised that and that should not happen again.
Act or Be Acted Upon. We faced the reality of the current circumstance … We also faced the reality that we had the power to choose a positive response to those circumstance … wrote Stephen Covey. Sometimes we wonder – for some of us, it may be a quiet thought, for some of us – we wonder aloud – why people react in certain manner to us, many time we fail to look at our own behaviour and our own contribution to those reactions. We recognised again despite our non-action, Chef chose to be patient with us today and said nothing. Moving forward, either we act or be acted upon.
Circle of Influence. “Proactive people focus their efforts in the Circle of Influence. They work on the things they can do something about … Reactive people, on the other hand, focus their efforts in the Circle of Concern – … the weakness of other people, the problems in the environment, and circumstances over which they have no control … results in feelings of victimisation.”
The next part of the lesson. Chef Philippe went through with us the chapters in On Baking… chapter 1 on Chefs and professionlism, chapter 2 on Tools and equipment, chapter 3 on Principles of baking, chapter 4 on Bakeshop ingredients.
Listening is one thing. Hearing and understanding the words is another. In level 1, the focus was on the techniques, the whats and hows. In level 2 and 3, the focus on whys increases. Other than the whys he will explain during hands-on, he encouraged us “… to open the book to read, and understand the whys“. From understanding the whys, we can create our own recipes. When we move into pastry business, we should get and work on the BEST recipes, or understand whys to create our own.
That led him to speaking with us about our future. The reality is soon for many of us. “Think about what you want to do, how you want to live … CHOOSE the way you want to do it.” Again, the word – we indeed have a choice, a freewill to choose. For me, the reality is a little scary, a lot is mental, I have to confront it. For Chef, he chose to teach after 18 years working in the business, mostly in the bakeries in France. He again use the word, he “chose the way it is“.
His advice for our personal good – Buy something to Taste vs buy something to eat… Cut down quantity and eat Good. That again went into our learning of the quality of ingredients we choose to put into our future products.
To sum up the learning in a day – Our Free Will to Choose. Be Proactive. Whatever we choose, love what we do.
On a separate note, he reminded me something indirectly today – in his class, I am his oldest student. In the culinary institute, I knew he was the youngest chef till Chef “New” came along. And we are the same age. But I guess when it comes to learning and teaching, age is but a number ;p
Baking Joys In Houston 