If I made cameras

I would make one for people to shy to ask for a picture. We sat beside a group of Visual Kei boys yesterday. My friend was certain that they were members of a band and really wanted a picture of them but was too shy to ask for one. That’s when I invented a special camera that looks like a normal one but it takes pictures on the side with a hidden lens. So you can pretend to take a picture of your friend but then it’s actually the boys next to you who are the target. I don’t know how big the market is but my friend needed one yesterday.

Today it’s Halloween and Tokyo is preparing for celebrating. We are going to buy a costume for the night and go crazy celebrating with our Japanese friends.

Internship interview

I went to my interview at IKEA today and met the store manager Gordon Gustavsson. What an inspiring man, he really managed to give IKEA in Funabashi a real touch of Sweden and the feeling of the brand and at the same time adjust to the Japanese costumer. There are some differences between IKEA in Sweden and IKEA in Japan and it was fun to walk around and discover them. For example the measure system in Japan is different so they have adjusted both some furniture’s and the show rooms. And everywhere around me peopled measured furniture’s, I guess their small homes needs a perfect fit. This IKEA had a pretty unique thing, their own daycare for their employees. The biggest difference was of course seeing people trying to eat meatballs and potatoes with chopsticks.

IKEAs slogan “Home is the most important place in the world” is hard to implement in a country where work is the most important place. But they succeed with that challenge in my opinion, though there is still room for development in that area. I would like to see IKEA revolutionize the Japanese’s way of thinking when it comes to work and implement a healthier attitude.

I love brand fusions

Mix Absolut Vodka and the Jukkasjärvi Icehotel and you get an Absolut Icebar. I have just discovered there is one in Tokyo. I think it’s so fun when companies cooperate because totally new things get to see the daylight.

And now H&M is going to lend a hand from IKEA when they start up I Japan. I can’t wait to see what will come out of that.

"Eww, it's squid and it touched my tounge!"

Being a vegetarian for more then 7 years and then trying new food in Japan can be an adventure...

But so is going on the subway in rush hour, walking new streets up and down, see things I never seen before and meet new people. Everything seems so different to Sweden and a few times we have whispered "only in Japan" to eachother about amazing stuffs. Can you love a city?

Finally in Tokyo

So many people, so much to see and such a different culture.

On the way here we traveled with British Airways and I saw a funny thing. When I traveled to Thailand a couple of years ago I spend my time on the plane by thinking of how to make flight chairs more comfortable to sleep in. One of my ideas was to put a small pillow on the side of the big pillow on the seat. So when your head falls aside when falling asleep you can rest it on the small pillow.

And someone has been thinking just like me! Because there was two small pillows on each side of the seat and I slept well on my trip to Japan by using them.

Set yourself impossible high standards

Just because you can and because it’s fun to try reach them. I believe there is a way to accomplish anything.

The cybernetic process concerning my internship is continuing. Yesterday I decided to let a subtenant rent my apartment. And two hours later it was done. Now I’m ready to leave and explore.

On Tuesday I’m going to Tokyo and today I met a man with contacts there that I might use for a future internship. In three weeks I’m going to Oslo for my final project in school. I have some adventurous weeks ahead of me. Since I believe that my future dream job could be anywhere in the world I got a big cybernetic process going on. I will see where it takes me.

If I worked at Nintendo

and made the Wii remote I would put a microphone port on it. Just like the microphone on Nintendo DS. Imagine talk, scream or sing while gaming. Why not put more interactive functions in games, maybe blow away stuff in adventure games or hold conversations with characters in role playing games. And karaoke games could take a totally different way on the Wii console. Sometimes companies could make things even better by combine their products.

Have you ever heard about the cybernetic process?

Well, so have I and it’s fascinating. It’s an often used word in goal coaching that describes the conscious and unconscious process of the brains ability to experience.

When you decide a goal a cybernetic process starts, sort of a reprogramming of your brain. You start to think in a new way without being aware of it and you change your brains experience ability. You discover new paths and take different ways. Every choice you make is, in on one way or another, a step on your journey against your goal. And other people get involved in this process as well since you cross them on your way to your goal.

So hereby I start my cybernetic process by telling you that I’m looking for an internship at a creative thinking company, with a lot of fun project and a good atmosphere. I might cross you on my way to my goal. Let’s sit down and talk more about the cybernetic process then.

What you do every day is a part of the journey to your goals

This is what we talked about yesterday in school. We worked with a model and wrote all the things we did during a normal day. Then we compared how these things took us closer to or goals in life or not. We made goals in our future health, private goals and careers and wrote down where we wanted to be in five years.

And what really hit me was how a normal daily task like walking the dog could take me closer to achieving goals in my career. For example my career goal is to become desired as a project manager and be able to choose fun things to work with. When I walk the dog I get ideas and this is a part of the journey to this goal. The best part of the model is that it “approved” me playing video games, it’s giving me relaxing, and some ideas for my blog.

So look around and discover how thing in your life either leads to you goals, or away from them. Then take action.

Feed your ego on feedback

My group and I held a lecture about feedback at a company today. What really stroked me was how starving of feedback people really are. When it comes to feedback are we untrained, not used to either give or take and sometimes clumsy when we actually do it.

We gave them some models about feedback and then trained to give and receive feedback. It went well and it was so fun to see their reactions when they got positive feedback from their co-workers.

I see feedback as a present, when I get feedback I get it from people who, in one way or antoher, cares about me. They want me to either continue with something or develop by changing something. They care about me enough to tell me this. It's up to me how I "open up" this present and how I choose to take care of it.

Think the opposite

My new course Coaching & Mentorship has been running for two weeks. Today we had a very interesting lecture about goals in life and how to coach people to reach them. We learned how to make an action plan to reach these goals. The funny thing about this action plan is that you start from the end when making the plan. First you imagine your goal and picture it. Then imagine what happened just before it came true, and then you visualise every step by step backward until you get to the first step. Of course you have to learn how to ask the right questions. It’s so funny and educating to learn the goal coaching and I will have a lot of use of it in my life.

I can’t wait to implement this way of thinking when I’m going to make a project plan in my next project in school, I think there can be a totally different and good result. Because there isn’t just one right way of making things in life, there are many!