How to channel your inner cheeky monkey part 1

Hello everyone

What does it mean to channel your inner cheeky monkey?

To hold true to a childlike state, free of inhibition, playful, even mischievous. To celebrate what it is to be you, touch those around you with infectious energy that lifts even the most reluctant in the crowd. To be sassy, confident, and live life with an honest confidence that defines a permanent state of happiness and is open to the vulnerability that brings.? Your smile says it all.

It has been the biggest compliment from those of you who have seen my new office wall, and have said that it’s 100% me. You won’t believe how happy that makes me. Thank-you.

I created Cheeky Monkey in 2004, my ambition wasn’t to grow a business (that was a happy accident) it was to make a statement that change in the workplace could be fun.? Designed by imperfect humans for imperfect humans, our tag line “a human approach to innovation and change”.

Honestly, in 2004, people genuinely thought I was crazy. My first client said, “we can’t go to the board and say we are working with Cheeky Monkey on our most important projects, we won’t be taken seriously”.? I knew that if they didn’t take the essence of what it is to be a cheeky monkey seriously, they wouldn’t like our philosophy, our methods or me. I was happy with that, and the rest is history.

My proudest achievements haven’t been the awesome change outcomes that I’ve delivered over the last 19 years, my measure of success is always, how is the team around me performing.? Can I see them channel their inner cheeky monkey? Have I been able to influence creativity, curiosity, and a cheeky sense of fun and happiness in those around me.? Right now, I can see it filtering through in those working with me right now, and I love it, and I want to share it further.

We are stressing the cognitive load of everyone.? New stats out show that globally burnout rates in 2022 were 42% higher than the previous year (Future Forum) and even more worrying that 48% of people under 30 felt burnt out!

This isn’t just about work life balance, although that’s important of course.? This is about our attitude, our lust for life, our pursuit of happiness, our desire for those around us to be happy.

Obviously, the best thing is to have me infusing this energy into your business change, or personal change for those who have coaching, but if you can’t, I’m encouraging you to take the inner cheeky monkey challenge through this newsletter.

For those of you who share your experiences with me on LinkedIn, you will be the first to receive some very cool channel your inner cheeky monkey merch!

This takes a bit of practice, so we are going to be releasing our inner cheeky monkey one giant leap at a time, starting with attitude, the sass, the va-va-voom that we all have, sometimes we just forget it’s there.

In other exiting news, The Change Troubleshooter Podcast Season 5 is live!? I’m chatting to people who absolutely channel their inner cheeky monkey, starting with the fabulous Shirley Hughes.?Catch it here if you’ve not tuned in before https://www.buzzsprout.com/954817 or wherever you get your podcasts search Nina Dar The Change Troubleshooter.

Come on, changemakers, let’s play our part together.

Nina x

Are you ready to take the channel your inner cheeky monkey challenge?

Our first giant leap; ATTITUDE.

This is about being playful, confident, and bold. ?This must come from place of honesty; you must genuinely feel it before anyone else will sense it from you.? This is about you releasing the inner cheeky monkey in you first.?

• Don’t worry about what people think.? People actually spend less time thinking about us than we think. We build an idea of what people are thinking in our own heads.? This doesn’t make it less real. It doesn’t stop our, sometimes out of proportion reaction when we recognise a judgment moment from others, but we have to practice brushing it aside.? It makes no difference to your life to ignore it and carry on. This is super important because doing it gives you a real superpower – the power to carry on regardless – it’s where our inner confidence comes from and it’s the foundation of channelling your inner cheeky monkey.? Seriously, what’s the worst that can happen by doing this?? Look back at your practice moments and laugh at yourself for worrying and reacting to things that genuinely didn’t matter and no-one else was thinking about.
• ?Be playful.? If you don’t feel playful, your challenge starts here. If you don’t feel playful, no-one else will want to play with you and you can’t fake it.? Almost (check-in with the almost here) everything has a funny side to it.? Look for it, connect with it, engage in it.? Observational comedians are successful because we find normal life funny.? It is. Embrace it. Lighten your load by seeing the humour in life everywhere and laugh at it.? Then see how you can be playful with what you see.? Practise with friends, when you are at the check-out in shops (choose the human option), at the bar, in the gym, then at work.? People will let you know if you are coming across playful, funny, or just plain weird, fine tune accordingly.? Laugh at yourself when you play back these things in your head.
• Be bold, be prepared to say what everyone is thinking, but for some reason not saying it. If this is something that you’ve never done, your heart will race, you will over think it in your head, you will try and get all your words in the right order before you say it and may just miss the moment. Or you might just blurt something out, in your race to actually do it.? All of those things are ok, this does get better with practice. ?Laugh at yourself with this one, it really does help.
• ?Let yourself be sassy, feel the va-va-voom, be audacious, all of these things are the path to being cheeky.? This is smart, intelligent, sexy and creative.? It’s not crass, insensitive, blundering or mindless.? Everything you say, is said with love, from a position of love.? You might get a little close to the line sometimes (I still have to apologise when I realise, I may have overdone it) but our intention here is never to be hurtful, bring someone else down, make another human feel smaller, but you can. This you have to be very careful of, even when it comes from a position of love.? Always, always, always, smile.? The smile makes this authentic, gives people the feeling they can trust you, puts people at ease, makes them want to smile back (one of the best gifts you can get).? Practising this should give you a right chuckle, please laugh at yourself here, it’s priceless.
• Laugh at yourself.? When you have nailed that, you’ve got your second superpower.? There is nothing to fear, you faced into your own demons, and you’ve seen the humour in it.? You’ve learnt how to lighten your own load, which means you can help others lighten theirs, what a gift to be able to pass on.? When you feel able, share the experiences you’ve been able to laugh at with others. It makes others see the human side of you, it makes you vulnerable, and beautifully imperfect.? That’s what we all are and when we celebrate that together, the challenges of life feel much more manageable.

For those of you who share your experiences with me on LinkedIn, you will be the first to receive some very cool channel your inner cheeky monkey merch!

If what I’m writing about is of interest to you, feel free to contact me https://calendly.com/nina-change/let-s-chat

Part 2 coming soon...