When everything is aligned.
I totally fell for this job.
You know? Just like you fall in love with someone. Something super quick, totally obvious, intense, sincere, and addictive!
The flow, the subjects, the people I was meeting, the mind-blowing contracts I dealt with, the classy working spaces, the luxurious hotel rooms I slept in, the almost unlimited opportunities I forsaw.
One day I was scribing for a big retail company, the other one for a national bank. One day for an association of journalists, a school, or the French train system, the other for Microsoft. One day for Unesco (where my mother worked! – that felt so crazy), the other for the conflict between Russia and Ukraine. One day for the environment, the next on gender equality at work. One day in Paris, the other in Spain.
Along the way, I was meeting many different mindsets and impassioned brains working in various field of the economy, eating canapes and petits fours at break times, and returning home by taxi, train or plane, exhausted but ecstatic – and a little groggy, just like after a night of love.
It was just : thrilling.
I got a lot of applause. When I started, we were just a few and a lot of companies were discovering this tool. I was genuinely helping people that were thanking me for it. And for me, that was huge.
But the more I dove into the corporate system, the more I saw myself gradually loosing little bits of me.
A company is like an army. It has its style, its aim, its generals and soldiers. Plus… tons of different unities and levels that function together like an octopus. Sometimes the idea can be really sharp, but because of the pressure, it looses all its essence by the time it is actually released. Sometimes the idea is lame, but because of this same pressure, people forget and gather around, to simply… survive.
I thought I could resist those who had only seen the shiny part of scribing. I deeply wanted to serve thoughts, intentions and emotions. Wherever it came from top managers or employees.
But I forgot the overheating factor.
I got drawn under work. It was crazy. And soon, without noticing, I became… a DRAWING MACHINE. Talk about anything as fast as you want, I will illustrate it live and even make you laugh.
Impressive, heh?
Yes, but exhausting and draining.
Soon, pressurised by the eternal circling rush, I forgot the people, and exactly why I was there. My body started yelling – I was a reck. And soon after of course, boredom came around…
I had been swallowed by the machine.
Go back to people Alexia ! Listen!
My task is to reveal what is hidden behind those masks and patterns. That’s what scribing does – in a gentle but focused way, by using emotions, humour and “art” thus revealing intelligence. So to say : the real ideas hidden behind the fears. The hope and dreams behind the “NO(s)” and numbers.
It’s like a necessary return to the soul. A necessary transparency that helps people understand where they stand, how to re-align, go forward, invent and decide.
So If I can give you a piece of advice – you new scribe entering this wonderful world of graphic facilitation – don’t become too exclusive. Try to remain outside the big system. Continue engaging in your artist, family, traveler or dreamer life. This could be a way of remaining “clean” and humble and maintain the ability of seeing what exactly is said or hidden.
Because, behind our egos, big titles, agendas and stressed out life, hey…we are all just people.
