“Like any traveller knows, things change and evolve.
Decisions are taken, the territory changes, priorities change. What seemed
important when home, becomes irrelevant. What was considered a given, becomes
worth fighting for. For each one of us, the time away from our life partners
and our children brought us closer to them. Closer to them and the realisation
that they are central to our lives, our journeys, our ability to do everything
else with energy, balance and purpose.”
19 Aug 2011, Santiago de Compostela, Spain
I stumbled across this old blog post today and it resonated with me strongly...
Living life as a pilgrim means many things to me, but love, roots and dear ones are central to it, no matter where I am and what I am busying myself with.
Love in this context is not attachment nor need for physical proximity, but a more active kind which requires both attention (as in mindfulness) and continuous action and nurturing.
Observing myself, I see that whenever I am practicing this kind of love I am more in flow, more balanced, less stressed about the daily facts and happenings of life and for sure less tempted to take myself or others too seriously.
Sometimes I do forget about it and fall in the trap of being very busy. The 'recovery' road in these moments comprises of a few simple steps:
- first become aware that I have gone astray from my good habits,
- at that moment I book time with myself to reflect on this for whenever I can block a couple of hours without interruptions,
- in that time then I deliberately reflect and focus my mind on one of my family members or friends that I have not paid attention to lately. I usually ask myself questions like "what is going on for her at the moment?", "what is she preoccupied with?", "what does she need?", "what is she afraid of?", "what kind of space and time is she longing for?". I then go to ask myself questions like "how can I be more present for her?", "how can I help?", "how can I create quality time and connection for us?".
What usually happens as a consequence, is that the answers to these questions translate into effortless action later on.
What's this got to do with leadership?
Well, resilience is key to leading yourself and/or others, and a primary ingredient to building resilience is one's ability to connect and stay rooted with sources of energy and safety. Two of the most important sources are the self and the loved ones.
Also, bringing active love and compassion into your leadership can transform yourself and those you lead. So, enjoy practicing it!
