Category: Leadership
Terrorists are cowards. Whenever terror has struck in any part of the world, we have heard people say it is an act of cowardice. A coward runs away from action but harbours all negative feelings and does it surreptitiously.
This is exactly what happened to Arjuna. Arjuna was angry, upset, sad and wanted to run away. In the Bhagawad Gita, Lord Krishna said not to be a coward. So, it is an antidote to terrorism. Shri Krishna said bravery is the way – face the war when it is inevitable and do your duty.
A terrorist is stuck in his identity – he hides it, has no rationale and inflicts pain. Whereas Bhagawad Gita helps one to transcend one’s identity, encourages reason and infuses wisdom. In this sense, it could be called the antidote to terrorism.
The duty of a policeman, a soldier or a king is to be impartial for the sake of the nation, whether it is their mentors or relatives. Terrorists are never impartial. A soldier is brave and a terrorist is a coward. A soldier is protecting and preventing violence and a terrorist is inflicting pain and suffering. The Bhagawad Gita is the scripture of bravery in both realms of physical and metaphysical.
Terrorism is deeply steeped in hatred. An act without hatred is what Gita propounds. The Gita epitomizes the correct action – of righteousness, of upliftment of spirit and an action or duty that ought to be performed even in the most compelling situation.
In the last 5149 years of the existence of the Gita, there is no evidence of someone becoming a terrorist after reading it. In fact, Mahatma Gandhi wrote commentaries on the Bhagawad Gita and it was an inspiration for his non-violent movement. The Bhagawad Gita is a unique scripture which caters to the entire range of human evolution, comprising every level of this vast existence.
Gita stands for poise and equanimity and for performing one’s designated duty. Krishna does not encourage everyone to take the weapons and fight but a soldier cannot sell bananas in the market. He has to take his weapon to bring security to his people. If Bhagawad Gita is a terrorist scripture then all military academies in the world are nothing but terrorist organizations. Doesn’t this sound strange? Would the courts ban Lenin, Marx and Mao Tso-Tung, who to stay in power inflicted terror on millions?
A terrorist or a coward hides and inflicts pain on others whereas a soldier sacrifices his own life to bring security and peace to people. They both may take the gun but their intentions are poles apart.
Gita encourages reasoning and dialogue while terrorists are blind to any reasoning and are closed to any form of dialogue.
Interestingly, in any military training all over the world, the soldiers are asked to see the enemies as dangerous objects which need to be eliminated. The psychology behind indoctrination of such an idea is that when they think the enemy is a human being the soldiers are unable to raise their arms. There are many such survival tactics where the army men are desensitized.
A similar situation happened to Arjuna. Lord Krishna went step by step to deal with Arjuna’s emotions, ego, mindsets and concepts. He finally touched on the nature of his spiritual being; revealing him the highest knowledge and making him realize his eternal nature. This brought him enormous strength and then propelled him to perform his worldly duties. A doctor cannot be taken as a dacoit just because he opens up the stomach of the patient.
Krishna says, no sin begets him whose intellect is unattached and free from cravings and aversions, even if he kills the whole world. Now, the condition of an intellect free from cravings and aversions itself counters terrorism. Terrorism is done when the intellect is deeply attached and is hateful. The metaphors and the high standards of humanism exhibited in the Gita are unparalleled.
Jesus had said, “I did not come to bring peace, but a sword. For I came to set a man against his father, and a daughter against her mother, and a daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law; and a man’s enemies will be the members of his household.” In the Quran, there are many verses which talk about striking terror in the hearts of the infidels and cutting off their fingers. By these standards if you still call Gita a terrorist scripture then you have to precede such statements by Bible and Quran.
The fact is that it is not the scriptures that inflict terrorism; it is the mis-interpretation of an ignorant and stressed mind which justifies their actions quoting scriptures.
By Sri Sri Ravi Shankar
This article is to cater to the common man. This piece was written in December 2011, in the midst of a Russian court case against the Bhagawad Gita. The case ended with the Russian court rejecting the ban.
Pythia Peay- Author and writer on spirituality, psychology and the American psyche
Those who despair over the gap between their vision of a more environmentally sustainable, just and peaceful planet and the world as it is can find inspiration in Corinne McLaughlin’s call to become practical visionaries: Those activists, she says, who remain steady in their work over time by keeping their “eyes on the horizon, their feet on the ground, and their hearts on fire.”
McLaughlin, a spiritual and political activist who has taught politics at American University, is coauthor of “Spiritual Politics” with her husband Gordon Davidson (author of the forthcoming “Joyful Evolution”). They are as well founders of The Center for Visionary Leadership and The Sirius Community, and are fellows of The World Business Academy and The Findhorn Foundation.
The following is an edited version of my interview with McLaughlin on her recent book, “The Practical Visionary: A New World Guide to Spiritual Growth and Social Change”.
Pythia: I’d like to start with a simple question. What is your definition of a “visionary”?
Corinne: A visionary is someone who sees the future with both insight and foresight: Insight into the deeper causes and meaning of events in the world, and foresight, or an intuitive grasp of the big picture, such as the trajectory of politics and popular culture.
Pythia: You write in your book that you’ve seen many visionaries fail to manifest their inspiring visions. What do you find is the biggest obstacle most visionaries face?
Corinne: The problem I find with a lot of visionaries is that they’re too far ahead — perhaps their vision won’t happen for another hundred years. That’s why I like to help people focus on “next step” visions that are more doable.
Pythia: Why is being too far ahead of one’s own time a problem?
Corinne: Thinking that something that is far in the future can come sooner leads to unrealistic expectations, as well as rigid and dogmatic perspectives. It can also prevent visionaries from seeing what’s possible right in front of them. Our work is to translate what we might receive from a flash of insight into things that are useful today.
Take for example the recent uprising in Egypt. I could hold a positive vision of how this could all turn out, but I know it’s not going to be as simple as that. It’s one thing to get rid of a dictator. The harder part is to create a viable democracy that empowers people. But what I found inspiring in Egypt is how, during the revolution, the people organized their neighborhoods, created street clinics to help the wounded, and cleaned up after their demonstrations. These may seem like small things, but to me they are examples of practical, effective visionaries at work.
Pythia: You write that as a young woman in the sixties you were inspired by people in government and their dedication to public service — such as President Kennedy and Robert Kennedy — to enter government service yourself. You then went on to work at various Federal agencies, such as the Social Security Administration and President Clinton’s Council on Sustainable Development; you’ve even taught meditation to some government agencies. How did these first-hand experiences shape your development as a practical visionary?
Corinne: I believe strongly that social change isn’t just about demonstrations in the street against the wrongs in society. There is also the path of the social innovator who creates new institutions and the path of the reformer who goes within an institution and makes incremental changes. Based on my own experience, I learned that implementing a vision in an institutional setting involves working with conflict resolution and a whole systems perspective. It’s important, for instance, to have a multi-stakeholder perspective — in other words, you can’t just go charging in with your own ideas, you have to appreciate people’s different perspectives, then work to find common ground and bring the various parties to the table in a respectful dialogue.
Because I frequently encountered obstacles such as old, entrenched ideas, ongoing power struggles, or the lack of staff and money, I also learned to develop patience and detachment. In federal, state and local governments, administrations, philosophies, and policy initiatives change. If your vision aligns with the values of the current administration you’re working with, you can make some progress — but that could all change in four or six years.
Pythia: Together with your husband, Gordon Davidson, you’ve also taught the path of “Ageless Wisdom” for many decades. What has this spiritual perspective brought to your calling as a practical visionary?
Corinne: What I’ve taken from my spiritual study is the wisdom of living a balanced life. My spiritual path has also helped me to be more emotionally centered, to be more understanding of those that disagree with me, and to learn how to let go of some of my power issues so that I can be more effective and bring a sense of humility to my work — while still having the self-confidence to be effective.
Pythia: You write about how easy it is for activists to burn out, and list different ways that they can stay “spiritually sane.” What contemplative practices do you teach activists that can help prevent disillusionment?
Corinne: Many activists just see what’s wrong: they want to stand up to injustice and educate people about it. But I think it’s equally important for activists to hold a more positive vision of what’s right with their country: what’s going well, and what they’d like to grow or see more of. I also like to encourage activists to take some time each day to sit silently or take a walk in nature as a way to be in touch with their inner wisdom and peace — and to remember why they are on this path in the first place.
Pythia: Many people have the desire to bring about a better world, but don’t have an outlet for their visions or ideas. You say one place they can start is with their job.
Corinne: It’s important to keep in mind that we never know how something as simple as passing along an idea or asking an important question might impact someone. A first step on the path of being a practical visionary, for example, might begin by having conversations with co-workers, or by simply creating a better atmosphere at work. It could be setting up a brown bag lunch and bringing in speakers. For some people bringing spirit into the workplace means doing good quality, honest work, or finding a way to give back to their local community; if you’re the boss, it could mean finding ways to support your employees; for others it’s about protecting the environment.
If you’re not within an institutional framework, there are other things that you can do: You can begin by giving more support to those around you, such as your own family. You can bring more of your ideas and visions into your neighborhood and community, such as inviting people into your living room for a monthly dialogue. I did something like this around an area called “transformational politics.” I’ve also organized neighborhood gatherings where we’ve examined how we can better support each other, such as watering each other’s gardens during vacations, exchanging childcare or by borrowing each other’s tools.
I also encourage people to go on the internet and expand their vision by pursuing new ideas and learning what other people around the world are doing. These days it’s so much easier to find a support group around any idea you could dream of — just Google it! Inner work also helps by identifying those old attitudes that keep us stuck in the belief that there’s nothing we can do.
Pythia: Underlying everything you describe is the fundamental idea of inter-connectivity — that we’re all linked.
Corinne: Yes, at heart this is the spiritual perspective that we’re one human family, and at our core we all want the same thing: a good family, a healthy neighborhood and society where we can have meaningful work and pursue our dreams, and where we can have a sense of security. The media is making this sense of interconnection very tangible — it’s not some abstract idea anymore.
Pythia: Indeed in your book you refer to “the world’s that’s to come,” or the “new world that is being born.” Can you say more about what you mean by that?
Corinne: To me the “new world” is the world of practical visionaries creating solutions to the problems we’re facing today, whether it’s poverty, violence, environmental pollution, regulating corporations or the way we treat criminals in our social justice system. But it also refers to a set of common values, or “new world values”: This includes compassion; a sense that we are all in this together; the search for common ground and mutually beneficial solutions; a sense of a whole system and how each issue is interconnected with all the others; and honoring the good of the whole and the greatest good for the greatest number. There’s a sense of the value of long-term sustainability and prevention, versus fixing a problem after it’s occurred, like the BP oil spill. Over the years, I’ve found that when we examined what worked in all three sectors — non-profit, federal government or business — it was these kinds of values that contributed to an effective outcome.
I also describe these values as part of a “new world” because there is a sense of mutual recognition and support among people from different fields who share this common set of underlying principles, and who are helping to create these new solutions.
Pythia: You also write that one of the places we can catch a glimpse of this new world is in reruns of “Star Trek: The Next Generation”: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Star_Trek.
Corinne: The spiritual principles (in Star Trek) aren’t dated at all! For example, because of plots involving interspecies communication, the show dealt very cleverly with problems of racism, and different cultural customs around marriage and mating. The crew had to draw on principles like cooperation in order to accomplish things; they solved problems between themselves by using a mix of courage, patience and tolerance. There were episodes based on spiritual themes like loyalty, the willingness to sacrifice and to give support to the next generation. The writers also raised issues around psychic phenomena, and how some of these powers could be misused. In fact, it would be great if someone could categorize the lessons so someone could go directly to one of the episodes!
Pythia: Going back in time, do you believe the Founding Fathers were practical visionaries?
Corinne: Yes: They had a vision for a better world, and their visions have withstood the test of time. Indeed, when you say “the new world,” people usually think of America — it was even regarded as the new world at that time. The Founders also faced incredible obstacles, and had to be very practical politicians as well as diplomats.
Pythia: Do you have a favorite Founding Father?
Corinne: I would say Thomas Jefferson, for his connection to the earth and the way he understood the importance of the agrarian aspects of society, his sense of democracy and the way he challenged the established order, and his visionary writings that still inspire us. James Madison was also brilliant in the way he sought common ground among the Founders.
Corinne McLaughlin & Gordon Davidson speak with the Dalai Lama about Politics
Corinne McLaughlin and Gordon Davidson (Visionary Leadership Experts) speak with the Dalai Lama about Politics and Governance. This scene is taken from the DVD: “Dalai Lama Renaissance Vol. 2: A Revolution of Ideas,” which is the follow up to the Award-winning documentary film “Dalai Lama Renaissance” (narrated by Harrison Ford).
Dalai Lama: Inner Peace, Happiness, God and Money
The Dalai Lama (in an excerpt from the film “Dalai Lama Renaissance”) speaking about Inner Peace, Happiness, God and Money. http://www.DalaiLamaFilm.com. “Dalai Lama Renaissance” is produced and directed by Khashyar Darvich
Alan Seale talks about his work as a Leadership and Transformation Coach.
The fog of war has become the fog of life. Chaos, Conflict, and Complex problems are emerging everywhere. And the same old fixes don’t seem to help.
The Rules of Victory Chaos, conflict, and the escalation of complex problems seem to define our experience, whether we’re an army commander, a business leader, a community organizer, or a single parent. Because the ordinary approaches don’t work when things are complex and because the stakes are so high nowadays, people everywhere are motivated to find more effective ways to deal with the conflict that arises when things get tough.
The Art of War is timeless, and it is tailor-made for our times
For 2500 years the Art of War has provided people all over the world with skillful strategies for working with challenging situations, conflict, and war. This text succeeds because it views the world as an interconnected whole and takes a deeply systematic approach. In fact, the Sun Tzu text is perhaps the world’s first whole-systems handbook.
The Rules of Victory shows how the Sun Tzu Works for us
The Rules of Victory demonstrates how the skillful actions from the Sun Tzu text can apply to you and your life. The Art of War is not about an ancient approach from a foreign culture. Rather it presents inherent human wisdom about a way of viewing and being in the world that gives rise to skillful action. The strategies of the Art of War are based on common human faculties and the ways we already do things. More than anything, developing this skill requires a shift in view—in how we see things—leading to effective action and a different result.
skillful action that can make a difference
From The Rules of Victory we learn:
* How to work more effectively with resistance, reaction, conflict, and chaos, when your role as a leader requires you to encourage change
* How to create momentum and bring about the tipping point in your project
* How to employ shih—seeing how energy moves, gathers, focuses and releases in any natural or human-made system and how to use that to advantage
* About a kind of knowing that helps one to look at what others don’t, see what others can’t, go where others won’t
* About finding a way to win the battle and the war, and the peace too
Description
Leadership is the most crucial choice one can make—it is the decision to step out of darkness into the light.
Bestselling author and spiritual guide Deepak Chopra invites you to become the kind of leader most needed today: a leader with vision who can make that vision real. Chopra has been teaching leadership to CEOs and other top executives for eight years, and the path outlined in The Soul of Leadership applies to any business, but the same principles are relevant in every community and area of life, from family and home to school, place of worship, and neighborhood. “At the deepest level,” Chopra writes, “a leader is the symbolic soul of a group.”
With clear, practical steps, you are led through the crucial skills outlined in the acronym L-E-A-D-E-R-S:
L = Look and Listen
E = Emotional Bonding
A = Awareness
D = Doing
E = Empowerment
R = Responsibility
S = Synchronicity
After identifying your own soul profile and the core values you want to develop, you can use these seven skills to allow your potential for greatness to emerge. Only from the level of the soul, Chopra contends, are great leaders created. Once that connection
is made, you have unlimited access to the most vital qualities a leader can possess: creativity, intelligence, organizing power, and love.
The Soul of Leadership aims to fill the most critical void in contemporary life, the void of enlightened leaders. “You can be such a leader,” Chopra promises. “The path is open to you. The only requirement is that you learn to listen to your inner guide.” In this unique handbook you are shown how to do just that, in words as practical as they are uplifting. The future is unfolding at this very minute, and the choice to lead it lies with each of us, here and now.
About the Author
DEEPAK CHOPRA is the author of more than fifty-five books translated into over thirty-five languages, including numerous New York Times bestsellers in both the fiction and nonfiction categories.
The Soul of Leadership – The Best Leaders
BNET Editor-in-Chief Eric Schurenberg talks to “The Soul of Leadership” author Deepak Chopra about how to reveal the visionary leader inside us all. Learn what questions you need to answer to help tap your own potential and hear his take on why Apple and Nike have become such business greats.
Description of The Mindful Leader
A new generation of business leaders is turning to mindfulness as a cutting-edge leadership tool. Scientific research suggests that the practice of mindfulness (a technique for learning to live in the present moment) can help individuals to gain clarity, reduce stress, optimize performance, and develop a greater sense of well-being.
In The Mindful Leader, Michael Carroll explains what mindfulness is and how to develop it in the hectic and often stressful environment of the twenty-first century workplace. He focuses on ten key principles of mindfulness and how they apply to leading groups and organizations. Along the way, Carroll addresses a range of topics, including how to:
* heal the “toxic workplace,” where anxiety and stress impede performance
* cultivate courage and confidence in the face of workplace difficulties
* pursue organizational goals without neglecting what’s happening here and now
* lead with wisdom and gentleness, not just with ambition and power
* start a personal meditation practice to develop your innate leadership talents
Full of engaging stories and practical exercises, The Mindful Leader will help leaders in any field to discover their innate intelligence, bravery, and joy on the job.
Michael Carroll is the author of Awake at Work (Shambhala 2004) and The Mindful Leader (Shambhala 2007) and over his 25 year business career has held executive positions with such companies as Shearson Lehman/American Express, Simon & Schuster and The Walt Disney Company. Michael has an active consulting and coaching business with client firms such as Procter & Gamble, AstraZeneca, Starbucks, Lutheran Medical Center, National Board of Medical Examiners and others
Michael has been studying Tibetan Buddhism since 1976, graduated from Buddhist seminary in 1982 and is an authorized teacher in the lineage of the Tibetan meditation master, Chogyam Trunpa. He has lectured at Wharton Business School, Columbia University, Swarthmore College, St. Mary’s University, Kripalu, Cape Cod Institute, Zen Mountain Monastery, Omega Institute (assisting Pema Chodron) and many other practice centers throughout the US, Canada and Europe.
Meet Author of The Mindful Leader, Michael Carroll
Author Michael Carroll discusses his book, “The Mindful Leader: Ten Principles for Bringing Out the Best in Ourselves and Others” as part of Northeastern University Libraries’ Meet the Author Series. Michael Carroll, a Buddhist-trained HR executive with many years of experience in both the corporate world and the world of Zen, draws attention to the benefits that can result from taking time out to reflect in the workplace. In “The Mindful Leader,” Carroll addresses ways to enhance productivity when working, focusing on ways to open communication and break the limitations of routine. By the end, stressed-out employees and students may be willing to give meditation a try as a way to connect with and open up to their colleagues.
Duane Elgin explores our existence and the idea of living in a living universe. He discusses both scientific and spiritual perspectives, from cosmological dark energy to Native American beliefs.
As a futurist and author of Promise Ahead: A Vision of Hope and Action for Humanity’s Future, Awakening Earth, and Voluntary Simplicity, Elgin has anticipated some of the most important trends of our time. According to a 1997 Trends Research Institute report, “voluntary simplicity. . . is now spreading throughout the industrialized world. . . . Never before. . . has a societal trend grown so quickly, spread so broadly, and been embraced so eagerly.”
More related speakers on big ideas and big issues here:
http://www.ecospeakers.com/future-wor…
We are living in extraordinary times. We face challenges on all levels: economic, environmental, educational, corporate, governmental, personal, and spiritual. Experts and thought leaders in all of these arenas put forth ideas and models for the way forward. However, great as many of those ideas and models may be, if we are going to create a world that works, there must first be a shift in how we think and how we “show up” to life each day. We must learn to look at challenges from the perspective of potential and opportunity rather than thinking of them as problems to be solved. We must become co-creators of a new and different world rather than trying to fix an old one.
Create a World That Works: Tools for Personal and Global Transformation by award-winning author Alan Seale is a practical and accessible guidebook to making these shifts. Through this book, you can develop:
* an authentic, dynamic, and impactful personal presence that by its nature is transformational
* a keen awareness of your intuitive intelligence for guidance in life, leadership, and service
* an understanding of how life and leadership work as energy in motion
* tools for co-creation with the matrix of energy that connects all
* an ability to listen to the great potential of our future and let it show us the way forward
Alan Seale shows you how to live, lead, and serve in ways that inform and inspire more enlightened and effective action, creating a world that works for today and tomorrow.
Our world is at a tipping point. We are the best hope for a bright and sustainable future. Create A World That Works lays the groundwork by giving us a foundation of skills for the road ahead.
Alan Seale talks about the quantum nature of Transformational Leadership and meeting the challenges and opportunities of today
Biography
Alan Seale is an award-winning author, inspirational speaker, leadership and transformation coach, and founder and director of the Center for Transformational Presence. His first book, Intuitive Living: A Sacred Path, received the prestigious Coalition of Visionary Resources Award for Best Book in Spirituality 2001. His other books include Soul Mission * Life Vision (2003), The Manifestation Wheel: A Practical Process for Creating Miracles (2008), and The Power of Your Presence (2009). His next book, Create a World That Works: Tools for Personal and Global Transformation, will be published by Red Wheel/Weiser in May 2011.
Alan maintains a full workshop schedule throughout North America, Scandinavia, and Europe. He currently serves on the faculties of the International Coach Academy, and the Master of Arts in Organizational Leadership program of The Graduate Institute in Connecticut. He has also served on the faculties of Chautauqua Institution, Kripalu Center for Yoga and Health, the New York Open Center, Wainwright House, New York City’s Learning Annex, and the Boston Learning Society, as well as been a guest teacher at Coachutbildning Sverige (Coach Training Sweden) and CoachWalk in Malmoe, Sweden.
Alan has twice been a featured presenter at International Coach Federation annual conferences in North America, and has been a guest presenter for many regional chapters of the International Coach Federation in North America and Europe. He has appeared as a featured guest on National Public Radio’s “Chautauqua Edition,” BBC Scotland, the Wisdom Channel, and on many radio and cable television talk shows. Alan is truly a global coach, currently serving clients on four continents who are committed to making a significant difference in their world.
Earlier in his professional life, Alan enjoyed an extensive career as a professional singer and voice teacher in New York City. He can be heard as singer/songwriter on his solo CD recording, “Child of the Moon.” He has appeared in concert throughout the United States and Europe, and as a soloist with the New York Philharmonic, New York City Opera National Company, the Spoleto Festival (Italy and USA), and the Baltimore Chamber Orchestra. His voice students include Austrian dramatic soprano Brigitte Pinter and Broadway stars Marc Kudisch, James Barbour, and Graham Rowat.
Alan is a Professional Certified Coach (PCC) through the International Coach Federation, a graduate of The Coaches Training Institute, The Evolutionary Institute, and The New Seminary. He holds a Master of Music in Voice from Westminster Choir College in Princeton, NJ, and a Bachelor of Arts in Music Education from Transylvania University in Lexington, KY.
What Is Leadership?
At its core, leadership is the ability of individuals and groups to transcend their limited circumstances and to actualize their creative potential. It is a fundamental capacity of all human beings, which cuts across disciplines, levels, and differences. Leadership is the ability to see the transient ephemeral nature of thought, to not entertain negative, limited, or personal thought, and to allow higher order thoughts, insight, wisdom, and common sense to occur spontaneously through one. It is seeing past a fixed and limited view of reality, seeing past the content of thought, to the unlimited infinite potential of experience.
Leadership is the view from the mountaintop, the mile-high view, which is the basis for strategic decision making, effective listening, bringing out the best in people, teamwork, creativity, responsiveness, economy of means, and high level effectiveness. Leadership is the ability to be responsive simultaneously to multiple circumstances, to inspire self and others to greatness, to be willing not to know and to look to the unknown for what is not yet known, and to get to the heart of the matter and do what makes a difference.
Leadership is based on consciousness, the understanding that what we observe with our senses is thought being brought to life. The degree to which we understand the ephemeral nature of thought, that thought is occurring moment to moment to moment, from the invisible formless which is before thought, and manifesting into form, after the fact of thought, is our level of consciousness or awareness. “Consciousness allows the recognition of form, form being the expression of Thought,” says Sydney Banks in The Missing Link.
The more deeply any individual or group is aware of the transient nature of thought, the lack of power in the content of thought, and the fact that all of the power is in the invisible formless, before the fact of thought, the higher their level of consciousness and the greater their capacity for leadership. As individuals and groups deepen their consciousness, they attain more and more distance or perspective from the content of their own and others’ thinking, from the content of their experience and circumstances. This distance, mountaintop view, space between thoughts, or lack of reaction to content, allows them to be responsive to circumstances rather than reactive.
When leaders see the value of allowing space in between their thoughts, perspective in their thinking, they can see beyond the circumstances and content of problems and situations, to graceful responses and effortless solutions. They are able to look past their limited memory and analysis, and transcend their own thinking into higher order wisdom and insight. They can then participate in the unfolding reality as it occurs through them.
Understanding thought, consciousness, is like understanding the phenomenon of a mirage of water on a desert road. Nothing effortful has to be done to transcend the experience of water on the road, one doesn’t give up driving and attempt to remove the water, or find an alternate route. The key is in recognizing the nature of a mirage, a thought-created sensory image that has no power in and of itself.
As one does not react to the image, and continues driving, the mirage dissolves into the normal road. Recognizing that every experience we each have is thought brought to life by our senses frees us from becoming enmeshed in limited thought, and allows us to look before the formation of thought, to the source of thought, the formless unknown. Creativity and innovation occurs through us as we allow thought to flow through us, and we follow the plan given to us by our insight and wisdom, rather than trying to figure it out and plan based on personal thinking.
As we let any reactive, judgmental or evaluative thinking pass through us, out of a quiet mind free of personal thought comes the answer, which may be action or may be a different perspective. Leadership is unleashing that potential in others. Groups who function with this understanding are able to get past thoughts of fear of failure, fear of what others think about us, our limited thoughts of what our roles should be or shouldn’t be, to function at a high level of teamwork. At the highest level of leadership functioning, a group can reach the one mind that David Bohm speaks about in On Dialogue, where the group thinks as one and transcends any differences.
Leadership comes from seeing that it is not circumstances that need correcting, and it is not an individual’s “wrong” thinking about a person, thing or condition (content) that needs to be corrected. Consciousness is understanding that thought is an impersonal effect, after that fact of thinking, and has no power in and of itself. The only power thought has is the power that we give it, and the higher our level of awareness, the less power we give thought. Whatever thoughts are on our mind will play out in our individual and group experience.
If we want to change our experience, we need to let go of our current thinking in order to see something new. We need a stance of curiosity, of willingness to give up being “right”, in order to see what we don’t yet know, in order for a new reality to manifest through us.
The instant that we see that our experience is created moment to moment via thought, and that our feelings are our compass to the quality of our thinking or the level of our consciousness, we can let go of stressful or negative thinking and relax into a good feeling. Knowing that feelings are a direct result of what’s on our mind allows us to use our feelings as a guide to let go of unhealthy thinking. Into the vacuum that’s left by letting go of limited or personal thought flows insight creativity, wisdom and perfect detached action. That’s why, in times of great crisis like war or disaster, when people’s heads clear, they see what needs to be done and act on it. Often survivors of such crisis describe a feeling of connectedness, which transcends the circumstances, which is analogous to the one mind of an aligned group working together.
Alignment is a form conflict resolution takes when a group is functioning at a high level of consciousness. Listening deeply, and letting go of preconceived ideas and history, a willingness not to know, and a stance of curiosity, allows leaders to develop rapport in a group. Rapport is the basis for agreement and shared understanding. From this base of rapport and agreement, problems and difficult situations are seen as no one’s fault (impersonal), thought-created, ephemeral and mutable; the group can choose not to react to them, try to fix them, or resign themselves to them. Listening deeply without bias or prejudice allows the observation of what is. From the clarity that arises out of unbiased observation, we get new insights, and perfect detached action arises through us.
If we don’t react to what we judge as our own or other’s “faulty” thinking, we don’t resist it or try to change it, because we know it’s after the fact of thought (content). The space that is created by not reacting will yield a different view of the situation; we will see something new that transcends the situation.
Allowing thoughts to pass through, and attributing no significance to them, not personalizing them, is consciousness. Any thought is after the fact of thought, after the fact of the formless, and it’s content is irrelevant, so that no thinking needs to be done about it. David Bohm describes this as “proprioception of thought”, seeing the intention to think and choosing not to entertain thought, which allows fresh thought to arise through us, as opposed to getting stuck in the “squirrel cage” of already thought thought.
Strategic decision making in leadership is a result of consciousness. Imagine a tennis player saying, “Why does this ball keep coming at meI just finished hitting it, why do I have to hit it again?” As opposed to, “Oh, good, another opportunity to hit it better, to improve my accuracy.” Now translate that to how individuals and organizations approach “problems that keep occurring” vs. “situations that present themselves for responses.”
The ability to listen with the invisible ear to the inaudible word gives leaders the ability to not only respond effectively rather than react, but to participate in the unfolding of a new reality. Listening deeply for the heart of the matter, and then doing what occurs to one out of a quiet mind, is the key to “economy of means” finding the optimal decisions and minimizing the costs.
Conscious strategic decision making might be called “doing nothing”, i.e. doing nothing of a personal nature, nothing through personal fear or personal doubt, doing nothing that is purely our will or our desire, but allowing perfect detached action to come through us. This is “being” leadership, rather than “doing” leadership. In Wisdom Leadership, S.K. Chakraborty describes rajarshis, king/sages of ancient India who “translated the order of the cosmos (rita) into the order of the society.” John Heider describes a similar stance of “being” leadership in The Tao of Leadership, leadership in accordance with natural law. Sydney Banks, again in The Missing Link, says, “All humans have the inner ability to synchronize their personal mind with their impersonal mind to bring harmony into their lives.”
Joseph Jaworski, in Synchronicity, The Inner Path of Leadership, says, “People do in fact create the future through our declarations, our actions, our way of being… The issue of how we can collectively create the future.., how what we see as “reality” is inseparable from our language [thought] and actions.” In the forward to Jaworski’s book, Peter Senge comments, “in a deep sense, my capacity as a leader comes from my choice to allow life to unfold through me.” This is exactly what consciousness does, in allowing us to transcend limited and personal thinking, to allow the creative process to flow from the unknown through us.
Senge says “We search for special individuals with leadership potential, rather than developing the leadership potential in everyone… Leadership exists when people are no longer the victims of circumstances, but participate in creating new circumstances… Leadership is about creating a domain in which human beings continually deepen their understanding of reality and become more capable of participating in the unfolding of the world. Ultimately, leadership is about creating new realities… If we were not making such an immense effort to separate ourselves from life, we might actually live life day to day, minute by minute, as a series of predictable miracles.”
Consciousness allows leadership to flow through individuals and groups. so that they can truly live their lives in service to life itself.
Bibliography
* Banks, Sydney (1998) The Missing Link, Reflections on Philosophy and Spirit, Edmonton: International Human Relations Consultants, Inc.
* Bohm, David (1996) On Dialogue, London: Routledge
* Chakraborty, S.K. Wisdom Leadership:Leading by the SELF, Journal Of Human Values, Vol 1:2, (1995) pp205-219
* Heider, John (1985) The Tao of Leadership, Atlanta: Humanics Limited
* Jaworski, Joseph (1996) Synchronicity: The Inner Path of Leadership, San Francisco: Berrett-Koehler
Marsha Madigan, MD, is an experienced senior level healthcare executive and family physician. Recognized for published research and international presentations, she has well-developed strategic decision-making, executive coaching, and conflict resolution competencies, utilized in internal and independent consulting engagements to industry leaders. Dr. Madigan has a reputation for achieving results utilizing relationship-centered principle-based leadership. For more information, send email: to: mmmadigan@msms.org
