Do you have a moment? That is the question Phil Ainsworth wants you to answer in this motivational mind-reading experience.
Adopting techniques from mind readers, motivational speakers and magicians, Ainsworth wants to help you change your attitude towards your life and your life goals, and introduces techniques to help you facilitate that change.
Parts of the show were easier to buy into than others, and while I definitely appreciate his intentions, and the heart-touching reason for doing the show, I felt once too often it straddled the line between motivational and awkward. One such part was where he had us visualise our own motivational word, and then 'let the emotions wash over us'. I think the intention was to allow our creativity to take over, but for me I couldn't move beyond the fact that I was just sat in a room with my eyes closed clenching a fist. No divine inspiration came forth. Others did seem more able to engage with it, so your milage may vary.
By the same token though, a lot of what he said stuck with me. The use of 'but' to immediately close down the conversation, and subsequently stop the process of coming up with solutions. I am incredibly guilty of doing this (eg. I could go to the gym, but it's cold) and changing the sentence to then force creativity is a great technique.
In this particular show his grand finale didn't work at all, which is a shame because he had been doing so well up to that point. I guess it does at least demonstrate that there is indeed skill behind such tricks, rather that some infallible cheating.
MoMentum has a great concept and a lot of positives, but they were somewhat outweighed by the less convincing parts. Perhaps a little less of the 'use the power of your imagination' and a little more of the impressive magic and mind-reading.
"Use the force my child"
Am I doing it right?