MAGIC

We had a truly magic session this Wednesday !

We had close magic, pickpocket tricks, escapology and mentalism. Joan Marc, the toastmaster, started the session by making a spectacular magic trick. Everybody thought of a number between 1 and 10, and did some calculations on it. Joan Marc predicted the outcome of the calculation.

The first speaker of the session was Carla. She made her ice breaker speech. Carla showed us some pictures of her friends and asked the audience to guess where the people from the pictures came from. It was not easy to figure it out, and Carla explained that most of the time people rely on stereotypes about nationalities. This can be harmless or harmful depending on the situation. Carla has traveled a lot and she has done a lot of couchsurfing and for most people from many countries the stereotypes don’t fit. We are all the same (same hopes, same dreams). How come a catholic person is on average considered to be more peaceful than a muslim for instance ? Carla has fought stereotypes before, now and she will keep doing it in the future.

The second speaker was Michael. He made a Mentoring training that will certainly be helpful for both actual and potential mentors. Michael started by telling us the history of mentoring and education. Mentoring started with the industrial revolution, which is the time when mass education was started. Nowadays we live in a rapidly changing time. New employees must learn quickly. This can only be done through mentoring. Therefore business need to recover and enforce the skills of mentoring. Learning to become a mentee is also a skill. If we are not receptive then we are not good as mentees. In this sense TM is a safe environment. We can make mistakes and it really does not matter, we get constructive evaluation and we learn from that. We also learn leadership skills and how to interact with fellow members. Mentoring needs practice all the time. It’s like making speeches. Michael got knowledge about mentoring when he met a businessman who advised him on how to improve the way he did things, he gave him constructive feedback. Michael continued explaining that at BCN pride TM they promote extended mentorship (not just for the three first speeches) and they usually change mentor every three speeches. Michael also explained that it is also important to give feedback to the mentor. The general rule they have at BCN Pride TM is that what we say is for your help. Finally Michael explained the benefits that mentoring has for the club and for everybody:

- We become better mentees. If we learn to become a better mentee at TM then we learn it at work as well. We become self-available and accept suggestions.

- We learn to be mentors

- We learn how to recognize when we need help. We may promote the concept of mentoring at work. We also bring it home with our family.

-  There are reduced speech cancellations thanks to mentoring.

- We develop closer relations.

At the end of the Mentoring training there was some time for questions.

The mentoring training was followed, as Joan Marc described it, by a section for escapology, this is: the impromptu speaking. The courageous speakers had to convince the audience that they could read their minds, they had to persuade the audience to be hired as a magician for a wedding, they had to travel in time with the audience and they had to inspire the audience to join the school for magicians in Barcelona.

Finally there was time for a final trick: mentalism. This is where Joan, the general evaluator came in. As the general evaluator pointed out it was overall a very relaxing and wonderful session.