Walking On Broken Glass Part 2: Making Sense & Lessons Learned

Just in case you missed it, here is the not-so-flattering picture of me. Yesterday I described my experience of walking on broken glass. Now, I want to reflect on it with you and share what sense I make of it and how I integrate this experience into lessons learned that I can apply going forward. It I asked and answered a number of questions for myself….

Why would anyone propose such an exercise?
Because that is what it is – an exercise to get at your fear – so you can face it and overcome it.

Does this really translate to other situations?
It’s up to me to reflect on it and extrapolate the learnings. It will only have the meaning that I choose to give it. Otherwise it was just that, an experience in the past. Navigating life and business can feel (metaphorically) feel like walking on broken glass at times – afraid of the sharp edges, getting hurt, not making it through or embarrassing myself in front of others. In our vulnerable moments, we need to lean on others while we keep our vision as there is lots to distract us.

Isn’t this insane – why go to such lengths?
Yes, it is extreme. The objective is to give you a visceral experience that you feel/anchor in the cells of your body so you can recall it more immediately and powerfully than if it was an intellectual exercise.

Aren’t there other more, rational ways, to get at the same learning?
Perhaps, but this is the one that was offered to me at this time.

Would I ever do this again?
I don’t know. But I do know if I do, I need to keep my eyes fixed straight ahead at my vision and not get derailed by “listening to my feet.”

What really got me to do the exercise?

1. Wanting to overcome what is holding me back. Hoping for that breakthrough, to be different afterwards.
2. Seeing the leader do it unscathed.
3. Seeing my peers do it unscathed.
4. Wondering what if I didn’t do it, how would I feel?
5. What if I did do it, how would I feel?

There’s much to be mined and to mind.
Lessons learned:

1. You really can meet most challenges that come your way – with enough focus, breath, and support.
2. Know when you really do need a visceral experience to remind yourself that you can overcome your fear.
3. Follow a leader who shows you they have been where they ask you to go, particularly if it’s a scary place. Do as they do, not as they say.
4. Watch others who have mastered what you want to master and learn from them.
5. When you feel vulnerable, you need to keep a positive mind and lean on others for support.
6. The greater the challenge – real or imaginary – the greater need for community.
7. Listen to your body. It holds the wisdom.
8. When your first impulse is to run or say no – get curious, move closer and explore that space. Even if you land in the same place, it will be a fuller, more enlightened no.
9. Always have Epsom salts, tweezers and bandaids on hand when doing this exercise. Do not do at home without expert supervision.

© Copyright 2016 Sage Leadership Strategies, LLC. All rights Reserved.

Magic Monday: Focus on What Works

Where can you find the magic at work today?

Since our brains are wired for survival, we typically focus on the glass being half empty versus half full. We are always measuring and calculating how far off we are from our goals or what we desire. At the root of this behavior is our built-in hard wiring to ensure we are safe or okay in some way – whether it’s a roof over our heads, the raise we want, or the recognition we feel we deserve.

Measurements are important so we can gauge what else or more we need to do to get what we want.
Sometimes this focus on not having enough, doing enough or being enough can be exhausting and discouraging. Since we live in a consumer-oriented society, these messages can barrage us constantly daily. We are told we need some new product to be okay – or we didn’t measurement up in our performance review at work in the way we thought.

My invitation this week is to measure what’s working and notice why. Be in the half full glass. This energy can help build ease, momentum, and get you where you want to be in a different way. Appreciative Inquiry is a technique used to positively manage change in organizations. It’s about “the coevolutionary search for the best in people, their organizations, and the relevant world around them.” When leaders embody these positive behaviors themselves it has a big impact on the people around them. In the words of appreciative inquiry – engage in “unconditional positive questions.”

This week’s reflection question: What do you appreciate about what is present and working, not what is absent or dysfunctional?

© Copyright 2016 Sage Leadership Strategies, LLC All rights Reserved.

Magic Monday: Looking at What is Or What Could Be

This is the week when college kids come home for the holidays. For those who celebrate Christmas, they embark on last minute frenetic shopping or gift wrapping. For those in business, it means tying up the year as strongly as you can. For those in education, it means a deserved break from students. For those in healthcare, it can mean more emergencies – or quiet time where you can really focus on one patient at a time.

Depending upon your beliefs, practices and places of work, you might look at these last ten days of the year differently.

I always notice a different energy in the air this time of year. Some of it is because of the holidays and some of it is because we are coming to the end of a yearly cycle – an ending and a beginning. Reflecting and planning.

Generally people are either more stressed and closed or more open and curious. Even if you still have presents to wrap, many miles to travel, cookies to bake, or financial books to close, I invite you to step back, breathe, and notice what is currently working and what could be a blessing. Live into the gratitude of what you already have. Open to the question of what could be. It is in this space of positive energy that all things are possible.

This week’s reflection question: What do you notice when you step back from the task at hand and notice the positive of what is or could be?

© Copyright 2015 Sage Leadership Strategies, LLC All rights Reserved.

Shifting Your Conditioning: Flowing in Your Spiritual Domain

All week we’ve been exploring how you rewire your conditioning to better serve you in what you want to have in your life. It requires changing your thought pattern. You can release a negative thought pattern and replace it with a positive one – and sometimes you can just replace it with a positive one and the negative one automatically just falls away.

The key with this entire process is being tuned in, not tuned out of yourself. Notice what has you associating strong, positive emotions to your thoughts and moving them physically through your body.

When all domains – mental, emotional and physical are in sync, then you have, what I call, a spiritual sense of flow in your life. You are in tune, have purpose, meaning and are deeply engaged with, and loving your life. It doesn’t mean that you can’t experience a sense of spirit when things are difficult or you are in struggle. Sometimes these are the most spiritually initiating times in your life. You feel yourself through the pain. The spirit comes through with the work to rise above the challenge and persevere and carry on, even though.

Amidst life, one kind of thought rises above all others. It is like the queen of all thoughts that possesses super powers, working on layers of deeper emotions we aren’t always aware of – this is GRATITUDE. Other similar words are Thankful, appreciative. Any thought or emotion where you bless, recognize or are grateful for what you currently have, who you are or what do you do. When this permeates your entire being, then life flows peacefully within and around you, even if your environment is in crisis or chaos. It’s finding your peace within.

Today, in the United States, we celebrate our national holiday: Thanksgiving. The original intent was to sit around a dining table and feast on the harvest of the season – to share our bounty with family, friends and neighbors. This is my favorite holiday as it is about making and sharing good food. We nourish our body with food, mind with great conversation, emotions with connections, and spirit with an overall sense of vitality even if there is still pain and suffering in the world. We can all pause and say thank you for this one precious life.

Thank you for being part of this journey with me. Regardless of where you live, today I invite you to identify just one person, experience, thing you are grateful for in your life. I guarantee, it will uplift you and shed some of the toxins that are hiding out in one of your domains.

© Copyright 2015 Sage Leadership Strategies, LLC All rights Reserved.

Shifting Your Conditioning: Managing Your Physical Domain

So, we’ve talked about changing your thoughts, getting clear on your emotions and clearing your negative emotions. All of this is connected to, and manifests in, your physical body.

When you notice feelings that you don’t want – such as fear, terror, panic – they show up in your body with tense muscles, a constricted throat or abdomen, clenched fists and furrowed brows. You might notice the bodily sensations before you are aware of your thoughts or emotions. Think of each of these domains as a portal through which you enter to become aware of what is going on with you. Some people are more mentally, emotionally or kinesthetically-oriented.

In the physical domain, all of life happens through expansion and contraction. Negative emotions create tension and contraction. Positive emotions are expansive, relaxing and uplifting.

It’s important to release the tension in a safe way – such as going for a walk, running, punching pillows, lifting weights or some other kind of physical exercise or activity. I know someone who goes on a raging cleaning and decluttering binge when they are angry. Also, what you put in or on your body also plays a role in how resilient your body is in handling the stress and toxins that negative thoughts and emotions create.

With physical activity, the single most important thing you can do is to breathe more deeply. This gets more oxygen to the brain. Movement gets the blood circulating, literally moving the emotions and thoughts through the body. The focus is on release and discharge, not holding onto these thoughts and feelings that are not serving you.

Once the negative emotions and thoughts are discharged, you want to ground the positive ones in your body as well. Going for a walk in nature can be meditative and relaxing, allowing your body to open up to expansive ways of thinking, being and knowing. Stretching your body, specifically rolling and releasing your shoulders helps.

Try closing your eyes and reciting outloud to yourself your new mantra. The example I used yesterday was “I have abundance.” As you take deep breaths in, visualize what this means for you. Allow yourself time and space to be in your body with these positive thoughts and emotions – literally stretch into them to take them in. Allow yourself full expression of the joy, fullness, and excitement of this thought and the emotions it evokes.

When you are happy and enthusiastic you might jump up and down, put a skip in your step, dance, hug someone, clap, hum or sing – even as an adult! The more you can play with this physical way of expressing the new thought and emotion, the more likely it is that you cement the new conditioning. Repetition and having fun help.

So, give it a try: grab a hold of possibility and breathe deeply into it while skipping a beat.

© Copyright 2015 Sage Leadership Strategies, LLC All rights Reserved.