Episode 2: Root Cause Resolution
Show Notes
Hey fellow journeyers - Today I want to dive into a subject that is so personal and important to me. I would say near and dear to my heart, but it’s more like near and dear to my mind.
I believe this is one of the most important discussions I will be leading for the rest of my life:
It’s about the role that root cause analysis and resolution plays in my practice, and what that means for each of us, for the collective consciousness and for creating world peace. We’re also going to diving into what healing really means, and what empowerment actually looks like in practice, too.
So, my lens is a little unique. I was raised by an entrepreneur (my father), and was privy to the mindset and decision making process of an entrepreneur since I was a child, but I also spent a decade as an active duty military member, in the US Air Force, and then essentially had a whole nother entire career managing engineering and production ops in commercial industries following my time in the AF.
Military experience was characterized as you might expect by structure, strategic planning, and big operations that run like a machine, but mine stands out even from normal military service due to the fact that I was an aircraft maintenance officer on the flightline and in the backshops of Langely AFB – home of the F-15’s and F-22A Raptors. Here the rigor of managing everything according to metrics – everything – was really engrained into who I am as a person.
When it comes to aircraft operations, a misplaced screw, or a single piece of debris can cause millions of dollars worth of damage. Missing one line of instruvtions in the technical orders when doing maintenance can literally cause death to a maintainer or a pilot. As a maintenance officer I was accountable for our performance, as well as for the safety of everyone involved. These two objectives, safety and performance, often challenged each other.
On top of this, because the F-22’s were just becoming operational when I arrived at Langley, the stress and pressure was especially high. Flight time was so hard for pilots to come by, and everything was constrained. Pressure to produce sorties had to be balanced against safety by those who managed and executed the maintenance ops, so risk assessment was a part of life, and something we did daily for the 5 years I was there.
Fast forward to my time in corporate industries outside of the DOD, medical device manufacturing, and commercial aircraft parts manufacturing and sales: here I met a different type of operations. Our manufacturing operations were regulated by the FDA, and then by the FAA. What did this mean, risk analysis, root cause analysis, and the 5 Whys weren’t just buzz words – they made the difference between maintaining our FDA and FAA registration and the required certifications to stay in business.
Root cause resolution is the reason I do what I do with people today. It’s something that’s really missing in the mental health space as it turns out, and it one of my greatest gifts.
Do you remember I told you about the depression and anxiety that I was managing for as long as I could remember? Poor self confidence, persistent anxiousness, relentless low-grade sadness, brutal inner critic, self doubt… I was living these experiences all my life. But no one provided me with any hope of shifting them. Why not?
Well: Automatic problems like these are under the control of the subconscious.
To shift subconscious problems, you need to use subconscious tools. If that sounds inaccessible, you’re not alone in thinking so. But there’s an easy way to bridge the gap:
By utilizing one of the languages of the subconscious to get in contact with the problem and shift it.
Conscious techniques don’t do that, but that’s what the world was offering me.
All I could find were methods for managing my pain. Invitations to cope better. And when I looked at medicine alone, something didn’t feel right – because I knew that there was pain from my storyline that would continue to create imbalance. Medicine alone couldn’t fix the parts of my personal narrative that were making me so sad, and that reinforced a feeling that I was not good enough to keep any joy I stumbled upon. Medicine alone couldn’t heal codependce that I knew was driving people away from me. I knew it wasn’t about giving myself a pep talk, or changing my morning routine. I had tried meditation. By this point I had become a yoga instructor, and practiced 4 times a week or more. I was avidly climbing rock, ice, and mountains in the pacific northwest. My career was on an upward trajectory, I was getting raises year after year, but that didn’t help my self doubt or the sense of disconnection that my anxiety caused. I just couldn’t find the tool to deal with something like self sabotage anxiety and self worth, where so many parts of me wanted something lasting and good, but I could plainly see that unconsciously I was pushing those experiences away, and I didn’t know why or what to do about it. It felt like I had tried everything, and coping was the best offer on the table.
But I’ll tell you what, I’m great at coping. And that was part of the reason I was in so much pain.
My friend, automatic problems are perpetuated by the subconscious. That’s how they work. That’s where reflexes, reactions, instincts, triggers, associations, beliefs, and muscle memory live. In the subconscious.
To shift subconscious problems, we use the language of the subconscious.
Same with creating root cause resolution – It’s possible, but how do we do that? The same way as any excellent engineering manager instills in their team, or as an F-22A error troubleshooting tree is designed:
Root cause resolution needs a number of things:
1. Identification of the why of the why of the why. The real cause. (You need to run a process rigorous enough to uncover the true root of the problem. To release that pattern, you need to know you’ve identified the core reason it exists.)
2. Then you need to be able to affect that cause – plain and simple, you have to be able to contact the problem. Otherwise it’s like trying to do surgery from another room. For subconscious problems, this is done by using the languages of the subconscious, which are imagery, hormones, emotions.
3. Then you persist to do the work to actually release the cause fully – not just touch it, or identify it, or move it aroumd like a shell game, but actually to resolve it.
Knowing all this places control right back where it belongs – in your hands.
I also find this info unloads the sense of blame that often accompanies the experience of failure people have after trying “everything” but still not seeing a change.
There are so many ways to change subsconscious information: to the extent that it’s possible to share them through this show, I plan to! Both through education / information, and experience. It is one of three of the values that guide my life’s work: keep power in clients’ hands, do no harm, and create true, permanent, root cause resolution healing for good.
You can probably see for yourself by now, that when I fully began to understand my purpose (and gifts) in this life, it was natural for me to apply the principles of my professional and personal rearing directly to my work. In fact, it was impossible for me not to.
What I also hope has become clear now, is that the very nature of the tool that I use really lends itself to healing subconscious problems – it’s one of few which can. This, in a nutshell, is why people who want profound swift lasting positive change always eventually find their way to a trauma specialist, or someone who understands embodiment through the use of alterd states of consciousness.
I truly hope that this episode has helped you to decipher a bit what lanes for healing and change-making exist, and how to choose which one may be right for you, depending on what you’re dealing with.
My invitation to you is to email me if this has made you think, if it generated a question in your mind, or if it gave you an “aha”, write my team an email and let us know! care@palladiummind.com
Before we part, I want to give special thanks today to Adrienne Dorison, who during the summer of 2019 facilitated my own process for uncovering that Root Cause Resolution is actual my company’s core Why. Adrienne co-Founded the company Run Like Clockwork with Mike Michalowicz, who is author of the book Clockwork. Adrienne also founded Good Businesses Do Good. Generosity is a core value of hers, and it’s evident when you interact with her. Thanks Adrienne.