Caroline’s Reviews > Improv Wisdom: Don't Prepare, Just Show Up > Status Update

This book is so good. I have to return the interlibrary loan now, but I'm not leaving it there. I'm going to buy a copy for my own. This book is the kind that I will return to again and again. It's the sort of book you want to read slowly and frequently and absorb the chapters and try to practice the lessons. I'm not perfect and that's OK.

Just show up.

Move your body toward your dreams (gym, office, kitchen, etc.) Be there physically.

Woddy Allen quipped that it is "eighty percent of success".

Inventing proverbs improv game: A group of players who add the next most logical word to what has gone before. Do this quickly without 'thinking' of a good idea. When it is clear that the proverb is finished, all the players... say, 'yes, yes, yes, yes, yes...' affirming the wisdom of the group."
Try this: teach the proverbs game to some friends and play it around the dinner table. Enjoy your combined wisdom.

"Try this: Support someone else's dreams. Pick a person (your spouse, child, boss), and, for a week, agree with all of her ideas. Find something right about everything he says or does. Look for every opportunity to offer support. Consider her convenience and time preferences ahead of your own. Give him the spotlight. Notice the results."

Normally Danielle wouldn't listen in meetings and would instead prepare for what she would say. One day she decided to really focus on the information being presented and LISTEN. She noticed a sales trend in her division and, piecing together this data, formulated a new idea about product development. When she did speak, the ideas were fresh and timely and grew out of what she had just observed.