What is Leadership . . . for you?

Along with teaching and practicing the Wisdom Heart Way for four decades, I’ve consulted with leaders from hundreds of organizations around the world. About twenty years ago, it became clear that a new understanding of leadership was emerging – one that had less to do with conventional authority and more to do with listening and responding to a deep soulful calling.

The Call has only gotten louder of the past twenty years.

Now, many people are waking up to this new form of leadership. Many are hearing the Call , , , are you?

This video explains the new Call to leadership. It was originally produced formy  organizational clients, but the content isn’t just for “business” – it’s for life.

Here you go:

When you listen to the Call, these days . . . what do you hear?

Where are you being Called to connect to your own and others greatness in order to enrich and serve the world?

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Our two puppies wake up at 7:50 am every morning. Why? Because they get fed breakfast at 8:00 am.

Their pattern of waking, wagging, and waiting begins automatically 10 minutes before breakfast time. The dogs don’t need to check the clock. What they do is a predictable, conditioned pattern. You have patterns as well.

And your patterns are just as predictable.
These patterns were conditioned into your mind and body in the past. Now, like the waking, wagging, and waiting of our puppies – your patterns run automatically.

Some of these patterns serve you well.
They work for you and support what you want most in your life. But some of the patterns are= outmoded. They may have worked in the past, but no longer. These outmoded patterns need to be upgraded – even transformed.

Patterns can’t be transformed if they’re running on autopilot.
That’s the dilemma of karma.The karmic patterns of thought, speech, and action run on autopilot. They’re unconscious and operate without the need for your conscious consent or even awareness. Spiritual growth is a process of bringing these unconscious patterns into the light of awareness.

The light of awareness is the healing – the transforming – agent.
Whatever is infused with light of awareness begins to transform – to literally take a new form. This new form is an upgrade. The energy and creative capacity of the old pattern is transformed into a new pattern. This new pattern gives rise to new thoughts, new ways of knowing and interacting with life.

The re-newed pattern reflects your current level of awakening.
Thus it no longer interferes with your life. Rather, it aligns with what you want, what matters to you, now. It is freed from repeating the thoughts, speech, and actions of the past and integrates harmoniously into the larger pattern of your life mandala.

You don’t have to design the upgrade.
This is key. You don’t have to figure out how to transform the old patterns. You don’t have to change them. Or fix them.

Such efforts at improvement (because they are based on assessments and judgments of the conscious mind) obstruct the free flow of the light of awareness.

Your work is to become an alert and compassionate witness – and to allow the light of awareness to flow through you into the pattern.

You do this by cultivating your capacity to observe habitual patterns as they arise.
But, how can you do this when the pattern arises unconsciously and automatically? There are two ways:

1) Call a friend.
Talk to someone you trust. Someone who loves you and has your best interest at heart. And ask them, “What is a pattern of mine – that no longer serves me or my life?”

2) Keep an “irritation” journal.
Write down the things, people, situations that irritated you – at the end of each day. After one week, read the entries over. The pattern will be staring back at you from the pages.

Okay. That’s the first step: find the outmoded reactive pattern. So . . . what is the pattern you’re going to transform?
Next time we’ll explore – the Four Stages of Observing.

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Dharma Doodles are available as fine art prints

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You can get this dharma doodle and many others at www.dharmadoodles.com

We’re offering FREE SHIPPING on all prints through Valentine’s Day.

It’s a great way to share the love (and awakening. Send them a dharma doodle. Here’s the link.

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A reader writes:

I wish to have Love in my life… and yes, I know it is close in terms of time. I just have to be ready to receive it. But I am too impatient to get it. So much so that sometimes I start doubting that I’ll get it.

How can I lower my guard and open to life? I think impatience is obstructing my way. Can you suggest any ways to cultivate patience? :)

 My answer:

Your question is brilliant.
And your doubt is very discerning:  the more impatiently you strive for love . . . the less likely it is that love will come into your life . . . harmoniously.

You can have love. You can have wealth. You can have virtually anything . . . at least for a short period of time. Most of us have. But few have sustained that love. And among those who have sustained it, fewer still have done so harmoniously.

The question is: how can you bring forth and sustain what you most deeply want harmoniously?

It’s not really a question of time.
Love is close – but not in terms of time. Wisdom is close. Creativity is close. Every sacred quality is truly close. But close in consciousness not in terms of clock time. You can live for decades and still never cross the chasm that separates you from what your soul longs for. Many do. You’ve seen them.

Just living through time – if that living isn’t done with mindfulness, openness, and willingness – won’t bring you across the chasm that separates you from your heart’s dream.

The chasm is crossed by a shift in consciousness.
To make this shift you need to understand what creates and maintains the chasm.

The chasm is maintained and given life by . . . emotionality. Emotions such as impatience, guilt, and shame – when you identify with them – create the chasm and keep you from experiencing the fulfillment you seek.

Emotionality keeps you on one side of the chasm.
It keeps you seeking and longing for love – rather than opening to and discovering that love is ever-present. The chasm is self-created and thus can be self-un-created. Un-creating the chasm is the shift in consciousness that re-unites what was never separated to begin with.

How do you cross the chasm that is created by emotionality?
Here’s the paradox of spiritual practice: You cross the chasm of emotionality not so much by focusing on love but by loving the emotionality. (Read that sentence again.)

So, what does this mean? It means infusing the emotional pattern (impatience, guilt, shame etc) with loving awareness.

(For more on loving awareness read this and this.)

Here’s one way:
Start by recognizing and naming the emotional pattern that creates the chasm (separation from what you long for). Let’s use impatience for this example.

1) Consciously realize – even say out loud –
I am not impatient. I am aware of impatience.
I am aware of how impatience arises as thoughts – without believing in those thoughts.
I am aware of how impatience arises as images – without being lost in those images.
I am aware of how impatience arises as inner voices – without being caught up in what they say.
I am aware of how impatience arises as body sensations – without being overwhelmed.

2) Now let go of thoughts, images, and voices – turn towards the body sensations.
Turn towards the place in your body where the impatience arises – and send that place blessings.

Be gentle. Don’t seek to change the impatience. Don’t try to make it go away. Just bless it with loving awareness. Tune into that place of impatience and ask, “What do you most deeply need?”

3) Then listen, sense, open and attune to the answer that comes.
It may come as words, as image, or as a felt sense. Be aware of it in whatever form it chooses.

What were you aware of?

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When you pour tea into a tall thin cup, the tea assumes that tall, thin shape. When you pour tea into a squat, round cup, it assumes that shape.

It’s wonderful that tea does this. It facilitates tea drinking. But your mind needn’t act like tea. Too often it does.

How does the mind act like tea?
Just as tea takes the shape of whatever container it’s poured into, the mind tends to assume the shape of whatever thought, emotion, or sensation captures its attention. But it doesn’t just assume the shape of what is arising– it identifies with the object of attention.

The mind believes it is what it is aware of.
When the emotion of sadness arises, the mind identifies with that emotion and believes it is sadness. Not, I’m aware of sadness but I am sadness.

When anger is present, the mind believes – I am angry.

The mind identifies with whatever condition is most intense at a moment in time.
Whether its an inner condition like a thought or emotion or an outer condition like hitting a homerun or losing 10 pounds – the mind tends to lose itself and identify with what it is aware of.

There’s nothing wrong with being aware of what is arising.
It’s important to be aware of your inner and outer world. But here’s the rub – when your mind is immersed in identification its no longer aware. When your mind is believing I’m sad – it’s no longer aware of sadness.

To become aware, the mind needs to step back.
To dis-identify with what is arising in order to be fully aware. This state of non-identified and fully engaged awareness is called witness consciousness. It’s quite different from tea-like mind. Witnessing consciousness allows the mind to fully experience what arises without being overcome by identification.

It’s a paradoxical state of mind.
It’s neither lost in identification nor separate from experience. The witnessing consciousness simultaneously transcends the object of attention while fully entering into it. It’s this paradoxical quality – of being beyond and fully engaged – that makes witness consciousness such a powerful source of healing.

Witness consciousness is able to infuse all conditions – with the light of awareness.
Through the function of witness consciousness, the light of awareness can fully infuse any and every condition. The mind is thus able to engage with all forms of conditions as a healing presence. It is able to investigate, enter, and experience any condition fully – because of this engage detachment. Witness consciousness develops as the mind simultaneously dis-identifies with conditions while remaining fully present.

How can you access witness consciousness?
The most reliable way is through meditation practice. Meditation practice is ideally – and intentionally – designed to cultivate witness consciousness. Witness consciousness emerges organically as you practice.

When you begin meditating (and by as you begin I mean whenever you sit down) – you become aware of how easily the mind slips away into identification with thought, emotion, sensations. A few mindful breaths, a few mantras, and . . . the mind mindlessly shape shifts, becoming lost in thoughts, emotions, and sensations.

It’s part of the process.
When this shape shifting happens in the context of meditation practice, you (eventually) notice and gently reorient to witnessing the object of meditation. In other words you come back to the breath, to the mantra, to the visualization . . . whatever your object of meditation may be.

Gradually the shape shifting reduces.
And attention stabilizes. As stabilization deepens, witness consciousness emerges. You discover the blissful capacity to be fully engaged and totally free at the same time.

It’s an experience of flow and one that you can intentionally develop and deepen through meditation practice.

It’s not just for when you’re on the cushion.
This capacity to enter into life fully – but without being overwhelmed – isn’t just a meditation thing. It’s a life thing. Witness consciousness allows you to meet the conditions of your life – whether these take the form of emotions, thoughts, people, or snowstorms – with clarity, wisdom, and creativity.

Then whatever cup of tea life pours – you’ll be able to enjoy it fully.

Questions for you:

• Where is your mind taking the shape of your situation?
• What helps you step back and witness?

If you’d like to accelerate the development of witness consciousness check out our Mantra and Emotional Freedom programLiked this post? Here are a few others that might resonate:

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Sometimes the fundamental impermanence of life can seem to throw a wet blanket over your life. Then goal setting, working hard, doing . . . anything . . . becomes pointless. The awareness of groundless-ness morphs into a kind of all-pervading cynicism laced with futility.

But this cynical attitude is still based on clinging. It’s  hoping that not-giving-a-s**t will allow one to be protected, even untouched by Life. It doesn’t work.

There’s a deeper wisdom . . . 

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