Table of Contents Introduction A Brief History of Civilization Four Dimensions and Four Portals of Perception Contracting, Consulting, and the Personality Traits that Support Success The Mixture of our Dimensional Perceptions Summary: Contracting and Consulting as influenced by our Dimensional Perceptions Who are you? Thinking Through Your Dimensional Perceptions How Personality Relates to Stress in our Careers Should I or shouldn't I … the Final Analysis

A Brief History of Civilization

Let's take a slightly deeper look at what happened to society between the Age of the Cave Person and the Age of the Consultant/Contractor. From the African veldt to the Gaulic countryside, from the outer reaches of Mongolia and Siberia to the islands of the South Pacific, from the Alaskan islands to the Southern tip of South America, our nomadic forebears concerned themselves with one overriding factor: their relationship to the physical world. Prowess in the physical world ensured survival, and humankind valued this trait above all others.

About 10,000 years ago, a change began to occur. Humankind discovered trends, cycles, and schedules. With cycles in weather and animal gestation understood, people could cultivate plants and breed live stock. Food no longer presented itself as a moving target.

To paraphrase the commercial, "This changed everything." For the next few thousand year the ability to gain control of at least some of what happened in the "present" through planning and scheduling allowed us to stop roaming the countryside, and supported the development of farms and marketing centers: basic civilization.

As history progressed, humankind began to store facts and knowledge. The resulting body of knowledge from past experience grew and grew, and eventually gave rise to speculation about the future based on our knowledge of the past.