Leadership & Change – Part 3: The Personal Journey

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What the heck does it personally mean to be a leader? To be someone who demonstrates leadership? How do you get there? What are the leadership behaviors that could impact a team in a negative manner? Is leadership a natural born trait or a developed skill? Can anyone be a leader? In this third part of the series, I want to explore the individual leadership role.

Let’s begin with confirming my definition of a leader. A leader is someone who demonstrates leadership qualities. That may sound “damn obvious” to many, but it needs to be said. Let me explain. In many cases the leader role is labeled to indicate its position and the owner’s level of organizational power that aligns with that label. The role may say Director, Senior manager, Vice President or Chief Operations Officer; and there are many more labels you could probably name; and the expectation (often just a hope) is that the person in this role demonstrates leadership qualities. As we all know, this is not always the case!

Manager vs leader

I use this cartoon when I do my CCA® program to demonstrate the difference between leadership and management and it has relevance for this post. Although I don’t agree 100% with all the statements on either side, it gives a good essence of each area. Take a moment to reflect on the words you see and how you might interpret their presence within each side.

The title of the cartoon leads me nicely into the core of my discussion: Manager vs Leader – which is your best position or role? Have you taken a self evaluation moment to consider which is your better role? You can do this simply by considering the things you enjoy doing (which are usually where you are willing to invest time). Where do these sit in the graphic or the general essence of each of these roles above? Be honest, are these management or leadership activities?

  • Do you prefer to be task focused or people focused?
  • Are you someone who provides guidance or likes to instruct?
  • What is your natural tendency and comfort space for risk taking?

I want to make one thing very clear – ITS OK TO BE A MANAGER. Without great managers, many things would never get done. We need managers. Although I personally prefer leadership to management, its not about there being a competition to be a leader and not be a manager. The goal is not that everyone becomes a leader. Too many organizations are making this assumption and giving greater credibility to leaders and belittling the manager role, placing expectations on the manager to be a leader without the support, competence or basic alignment to the role.

Lego LeadershipWe’ve all had those eye rolling moments, when a new and/or ill-fitting leader is trying to demonstrate their forced leadership skills. It often comes via control, fear, threats and other equally negative activities. This demonstrates that they are probably natural managers who are not doing well in their new leadership position, but because of the bureaucracy of the organization around them, they are now cornered into taking this role on, whether it’s a good fit or not. They may have a myriad of leaders that also use these techniques so the only example available to them is to follow suit.

Now this is where my challenge to individuals and organizations comes into play. I ask you as the person, or you as the employer to assess leadership capability in an accurate way.

self awareOn an individual level, this means demonstrating your Emotional Intelligence or EQ and being honest again. If you can develop sufficient self awareness you can recognize when you are doing a bad job as a leader. Recognition is not the same as responding to it. This is the time for courage, to say “this isn’t for me” and find a pathway back or forward into the managerial role you are best suited to undertake. If its not for you, then don’t go there, you will regret it. If your organization is encouraging you to go there, consider if you have the potential to move there, but need the support to get there. Which takes me to …

On an organizational level, if you recognize potential or want to move a manager into a leadership role, then you need to give them the support systems to enable their competence to grow accordingly. If they are not “leadership competent”, continuing to push forward down that pathway will make them and all around you more and more emotionally instable. Its not a good place to be and both physical and mental health will likely suffer! Develop leadership mentoring schemes, educational support programs and competency frameworks to enable the new and developing leaders to realise their potential.

My final summary comments for this post are these two statements.

  • Recognize yourself as a manager or a leader and recognize each for their contribution not as a competition.
  • Encourage organizations to develop their leaders, not just anoint/appoint them!

Capillary consulting offers a number of leadership development opportunities – robust programs and focused coaching opportunities. Get in touch to see how we can help you and your organization.

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Leadership & Change – Part 2: Leadership teams, egos and humblebragging

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I’ve faced several challenges writing this second article in the series about leadership and change. To fully explore this next area, I’m going to need to say some things that many “leaders” don’t like to hear. However, I think its right that I pose these challenges as recognition is the first step in a cultural movement away from these failings. I will try an put positive light where I can but you can be the judge on the balance I’ve given to each side of this equation.

I shall begin exploring “the leadership team”. In most organizations, this will be those at the top of the tree in the power and influence hierarchy. The ultimate team in charge – typically the “C-suite” or similar. This “top team” as I shall call them, are easily defined using the phrase “the buck stops here”. Now that last quoted phrase takes me nicely into my challenge with such leadership teams – Accountability.

true leadershipAs stated in my previous article, the position of leadership and the attributes of leadership are not one and the same. Many want to have the title but don’t want to take the accountability or responsibility that it requires. Discovering that they are expected to act strategically, make important decisions and retain a level of organizational authority can be a surprise to many; frequently rejecting such requirements or at a minimum, taken with immense reluctance and not very effectively. Recent news about leadership style at Uber, may be good evidence of this inability to take on this professional leadership role successfully, but I don’t want to spend paragraphs on that disaster!

In my opinion, there are three types of leaders and they are all present in the top team.

  1. Those that have taken the role because they want the importance, to stroke personal ego and feel special on a personal level. Let’s call these blimps – puffed up, sitting high in the organization but with no real ground lines.
  2. Those that are lost and frightened by the role, jumping aimlessly from one thing to another, hoping not to look too stupid and praying to have something click sometime. We can refer to these as puppies, jumping about without meaning to harm anyone, but not capable of being a fully functioning adult and understanding the expectations of the role professionally within the organization (think Uber again).
  3. Those that embrace responsibility, lead by example and understand how to empower and enable their organization to succeed through clear and considered direction. These are the true leaders, who demonstrate leadership in every way possible.

What is the balance of each in your leadership team? If there are more combined blimps and puppies than true leaders, its won’t be the best performing leadership team – and you will most definitely know it! Sometimes the sheer determination of true leaders can overcome the drag of the others to push forward what is needed, but emotionally this is very draining on the energy levels of said true leaders. If not it’s a constantly disagreeing group that never does anything productive enough to take the organization forward and may drive out the true leaders to seek alternative roles with other organizations.

blimpsBlimps are difficult leaders to work with. They inflate themselves with self importance, feeding a need to feel vital to the organization, but see their role as more about who will do the job for them rather than doing anything themselves. They are figurehead leaders who probably have instinctive command and control approaches, and readily farm out all their real work to others, badly using delegation and empowerment as cover words for their dumping. In organizations where promotion and professional expertise is measured by appearance, sweet talking and externalized displays (peacocking) then these people quickly rise to the top. They are those that talk the talk but never walk it. There is very little that can be done to educate these people and prevention is the best cure. Preventing them requires the culture of the organization to change and that can be a whole scale change initiative in itself.

puppiesThe puppies are those that somehow landed in a leadership position. They often refer to themselves as managers or senior managers because this is where their approaches lie. They landed in a leadership position because nobody else would take it, or they got rapidly promoted within the organization, potentially because of technical or managerial skills but never assessed on leadership competency. These people can be seen as victims of being in the wrong place at the wrong time. Sometimes they are victims of lazy managers and leaders who rather than work to develop their skills, want the quick fix of “if in doubt, promote them out”. In a leadership position, they are a fish out of water. They may have some management capability, but that’s as good as it gets.  Unfortunately, puppies are poorly supported, and although they may have the potential to become really great leaders, they are not given the development, mentoring or other support mechanisms and just expected to “hit the ground running”. Without true leadership development programs, these people are destined to fail.

Now beyond the “top team” we can see leaders throughout the organization fitting into these three groupings and demonstrating success or otherwise within each category. The team led by each of these types, become a microcosm of the leadership style. The blimp, does little work, delegates everything and reminds everyone how important their position is. They may even do this with the humblebrag approach “I don’t know if it was my leadership, but we really got the results on that sale….”; “its not for me to say we are amazing, but the results speak for themselves” – you get the idea. The puppies are just trying their best to perform and hoping that they can fake it till they make it.

We really need to have a better way of getting the right people into these positions and supporting those that are placed here. We hiring structures to reflect leadership competence as a demonstrated behaviour – not assess it by a list of titles previously held. To have truly great leadership in organizations, we need to have development and support mechanisms to enable those in leadership roles to truly release their potential while embracing the responsibilities that go with that role.

Capillary Consulting offers a range of leadership development opportunities that can be tailored to the needs of your organization. Let’s discuss how we can help your puppies, prevent your blimps and support your true leaders.

Coming next … Leadership & Change 3: Stick or twist? Navigating the personal journey.

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Leadership & Change – Part 1: The Leadership Word

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Leadership is not about a title. Individuals may be appointed, anointed or otherwise installed in positions of power, authority and decision making but that doesn’t mean they are able to exercise true leadership. It isn’t a competence that plugs in by virtue of the situation.

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Revisiting Change Agents and their Networks

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holding handsIts been a little over 2 years since I first posted about Change Agent networks, the role of Change Agents and their relevant benefits. They are popular articles and I’ve seen readership reach thousands across them all, prompting me to realise that there is appetite out there for their purpose and the topic worthy of an additional visit.

One of my frequent mantras is that successful change is done with people, not to people. When you have a cohesive groups of people all experiencing the change together, they can mutually support and carry each other through the ups and downs of the change. They feel part of the change, have a sense of ownership and are far more readily inclined to engage with the change on a personal and thus professional level.

Change initiatives are generally driven from the top. A strategic delivery, business realignment or improved operational activity is cascaded into the business. For the groups of people at the sharp end of these changes, they frequently resist, push back or become disengaged with the change because they feel it is done to them. Unfortunately, this is often the delivery model organizations follow. These approaches are driven from a focus in project management or technology implementations which focus on deliverables, outputs, Go-Live dates and other such key goals. These are key indicators for the delivery of a change, but not the reflective of the true success needed, that of gaining employee, consumer or stakeholder adoption.

I’ve said before that Change Management is not a one size fits all approach. Driving change management as some side piece to delivering the new initiative or encasing it the same old methodology as every other change, is just asking for failure. Focusing on the people is at the heart of change and Change agents are key to navigating that successful pathway of both head and heart.

lego connectedThe simple truth is that successful change needs many people to play the part of Change Agent where that Change Agent is a role beyond that of the change manager or change lead person for the project, initiative or activity. Change Agents can of course be these full-time roles, but my view defines them as being anyone with responsibility for enabling the people in the organization to engage, accept and move forward with the change as it affects them and those around them. So, for me, Change Agents are people throughout the business who connect the top to the bottom, the process to the people and the operational to the strategic for any change event.

Change Agents may be senior managers, team leaders or front-line staff. Some of the best placed Change Agents will be the go-to people in the organization who readily show they have an informal leadership within their workplace. Connecting all the Change Agents provide us with the network. A network that functions beyond the typical cascading communications and project dictated control processes. These people operate in multiple directions outside the traditional hierarchal structure. Their role is to support each other and work with everyone to help them understand the change and how they are affected. The Change Agent is far more than a champion for the change. The Change Agent is a connector that allows 2-way communications between the delivery focused team and the people at the front-line of the change. All organizations that have these networks in place are far more successful in delivering change.

Why are Change Agent networks successful? Three key reasons:

  1. The Change Agents are supporting the business from the inside out, working with the people affected by the change;
  2. The network has 2-way interactions. The Change Agents are key subject matter experts for their function and providing feedback to the delivery team, yet they also provide a fast and direct access route to those at the frontline.
  3. The Change Agents are trusted advisors to all, understanding the business, its people and with quality education, able to expertly navigate emotion driven responses that go with any change within the business area.

When it comes to the success or failure of a change, the label is often defined by the way we measure it. In my view a change is only a success if it has realised the benefits that were foreseen at the point of origin. Those benefits can only be truly arrived at, when the people are performing the new or different activity in the business. Changes are ultimately successful because of the people, not because of the process applied and people help people to deal with change.

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Brain Bursting in Berlin

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I’ve recently returned from the great Berlin Change Days event. An awesome couple of days over a weekend focused on exploring the art of disruption, with lots of arts and lots of disruption from people, places and the insights they bring.

I’ve been following the evolution of Berlin Change Days over the years with eager anticipation as to when I would make the trip. Ironically given that I had to move from the UK to Canada, to put myself in the position to attend.

explosionI had prepared myself for a heart, soul, ego and more to be twisted, turned and shaken inside out. This would be a group of people who spoke my language but were equally capable of keeping me true to my own self exploration of change and disruption.

I’m honoured that Nik Beeson and I had the opportunity to deliver our Disruption & Dis-Chord session on the first night and get a group of attendees clapping and conjugating the relationship of disruption to change through the analogy of beats. I won’t spoil the content for those that may attend or experience a future session but I pose this thought to you: Culture of an organization is its heartbeat – how do you travel to the new beat of the business heart when a disruption occurs?

I’ve always believed that the best change facilitators have a fluid connection between their creative and analytical sides. Connecting emotion and logic for the benefit of navigating a pathway forward. Its partly reflected in my own company name having a human and scientific reference (see capillary motion for the scientific reference). This conference brought that in loud and clear for me to experience and see others joyfully enthuse over.

Sessions used creative art, music, movement, dance, improvisation and many more incursions within the world of the liberal and creative arts to see disruption. We even started by putting disruption in trial with some awesome for and against arguments as to its “buzzword” multiple usage.

As I’ve said before, with any conference the depth can be measured by the side conversations and when you realize that your conversation has moved into international development being supported through pathways of choice – you truly are freeing your intellect to respond in its best way. I loved sharing my insights of curiosity and I loves being able to discuss the geographic perception differences of change management, leadership and organizational development.

Thank you everyone for massaging my synapses, challenging me and making me see with so many different lenses and making me part of the family. Thank you to Holger, Inge and the team, Berlin Change Days is my best conference ever and I look forward to many more!

If you attended, what were your thoughts, takeaways or insights of the experience?

Thanks to the participants at our workshop below…

disruptionanddischordbcd2016

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The Double Layer Conference

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brainpathI attended the ACMP Regional Conference Canada in Toronto just over a week ago. It’s probably taken that much time for me to let the content sink in, my brain to digest it and to make sense of the many conversations that abound at such gatherings. Any conference is more than the presentations, its second layer is the connections with other minds, thoughts and insights. I’m so pleased to see this gaining traction at more and more similar events.

With around 200 people in attendance, it was a great learning and thinking experience. I love my change management conversations and my personal highlight was facilitating 53 fellow attendees in an exploration of Change Management: where next? This for me was an experience that not only confirmed the depth of passion we have for growing the field and exploring the opportunities it brings forward but it confirmed the themes that were the foundation stones of the conference in my view.

double-rainbowProbably the most common theme was AGILE. Beyond the Agile project management approach this was truly the use of the verb to be agile. Underscoring some great presentations from people like Jason Little and Sean and Hashmeen at RBC were the conversations around being agile in approaching change. Organizations that want flexibility within their staff and their required learning need to demonstrate agility at organizational and individual levels.

The second theme I took away was CURIOSITY. Now I have a slight bias here as I presented on the topic with Nik Beeson, but before that happened many presentations from Liane’s opening Key note, through the round table discussions and general conversations raised the subject. The desire to investigate, to not fear being curious and to encourage questioning was evident for all. Releasing curiosity is releasing that desire to learn. خطط الدومينو

My third observation was a focus on COACHING. Several conversations I had beside the main conference discussed how to develop others in Change Management capabilities through experienced professionals coaching them. Using Leadership Coaching to develop sponsor engagement and support as well as the opportunity to understand the value of change management.

This leads me to my fourth area, that of the term CHANGE AGENT. Time and again reference was made to people being and becoming change agents in all its guises. I recognize my own passion for this but reflect that it’s frequency of use is a good thing. We all have roles to play as change agents for ourselves and encouraging others.

My final take away is PASSION. Wherever I was, whomever I spoke with, and very evident in the facilitated discussion, attendees had a passion for the profession. This was reflected in senior practitioners wanting to develop more depth, offer support to those new to the field and make it accessible to more people. For the newer entrant just discovering their appetite for the field, a definite hunger for knowledge was present, sometimes overwhelming but so uplifting.

It was a pleasure to be part of this great regional conference. It was a strong follow up to the global ACMP conference. If it set the bar for future regional events, it is a high bar to follow. لعبة اون لاين It’s only a small proportion of the size of the global conference but it punched above its weight. بى اوت بث مباشر Thank you all for a great experience.

I’d love to hear others’ thoughts on the conference please share.

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Change Management is not one size fits all

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blacksmithFar too many times I have conversations that start by asking what methodology I use for change management. Typically, this comes from a client but sometimes a colleague or connection. It’s as if they think I’ve got the secret sauce and three spoons added into the mix will make it all happen wonderfully well. I’m here today to dash those utopian misconceptions. I’m sorry but anyone who thinks they can use the single same approach to every change event is sorely mistaken and doomed to failure more times than they should.

I have many contacts who are certificated in certain methodologies. It’s great they have these in their tool box, but I worry when that’s all I see. The problem is that I see these practitioners forcing their change events to fit their learned methods no matter what the consequences. It’s very naive to think that the change event can be shaped to fit. Do you really think it wise to start your change with a change effort in itself? Fortunately, they often strike lucky and get a change where their approach works, or at least works well enough to satisfy the required change management needs. But I don’t like relying on luck too much.

In a world of continued complex and disruptive change events we need to be able to build the canvas for change activity that suits the change, flexes with it and guides us through the change event. We need to pick up relevant activities to meet the change needs from across a catalogue of approaches as we deploy our strategy. I strongly advocate that change managers who want to truly deliver successful change, should have multiple methods, models and approaches to hand. If you try and make the change fit your preference, then you are undertaking an unnecessary change management activity in itself. Change Management is a multilayered, holistic practice and cannot be undertaken with a cookie cutter approach.

carpenters-toolsSince being part of the founding group and as a longtime volunteer, I’ve been an advocate for the Association of Change Management Professionals (ACMP) partly because of the value it places in being methodology agnostic. Subject to popular myth and conjecture it does not recommend any on approach or methodology. It talks to a likely cyclic experience for change in its Standard® but that is about the journey and activities required not the tools you choose to use for each activity; that my friends is for you to choose.

When I created my certified change agent program I was adamant that the credential would not be about a single approach but about understanding the journey and how to successfully navigate it. Of course it also talks to the whole change agency philosophy I believe is a major contributor to the success of change events in organizations.

By the time I completed my graduate program I had dissected 11 approaches in detail and explored many more. It gave me a multifaceted opportunity to ensure I have more than one set of tools. Like any great artisan, who has some old well used tools together with some new ones; some old reliable that get the job done and some others that are only for those tricky action, my toolbox is much the same. This October marks 25 years in the change field for me – scary times! I’ve had an opportunity to collect like crazy, I just hope that others see the same benefits in a diverse and assorted toolbox to have to hand

Join us at one of our Managing & Leading Change Workshops here or become a Certified Change Agent here.

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Having the Courage to Embrace Change

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5 tips for a healthy diet this New Year

Whatever your New Year’s Resolution, a healthy and balanced diet will provide many benefits into 2019 and beyond. What we eat and drink can affect our body’s ability to fight infections, as well as how likely we are to develop health problems later in life, including obesity, heart disease, diabetes and different types of cancer. Check out the latest tea burn reviews.

The exact ingredients of a healthy diet will depend on different factors like how old and how active we are, as well as the kinds of foods that are available in the communities where we live. But across cultures, there are some common food tips for helping us lead healthier, longer lives. These are the Best semen volume pills.

Eat a variety of food

Our bodies are incredibly complex, and (with the exception of breast milk for babies) no single food contains all the nutrients we need for them to work at their best. Our diets must therefore contain a wide variety of fresh and nutritious foods to keep us going strong.

Some tips to ensure a balanced diet:

  • In your daily diet, aim to eat a mix of staple foods such as wheat, maize, rice and potatoes with legumes like lentils and beans, plenty of fresh fruit and veg, and foods from animal sources (e.g. meat, fish, eggs and milk).
  • Choose wholegrain foods like unprocessed maize, millet, oats, wheat and brown rice when you can; they are rich in valuable fibre and can help you feel full for longer.
  • Choose lean meats where possible or trim it of visible fat.
  • Try steaming or boiling instead of frying foods when cooking.
  • For snacks, choose raw vegetables, unsalted nuts and fresh fruit, rather than foods that are high in sugars, fats or salt.

Cut back on salt

Too much salt can raise blood pressure, which is a leading risk factor for heart disease and stroke. Most people around the world eat too much salt: on average, we consume double the WHO recommended limit of 5 grams (equivalent to a teaspoon) a day. This is how java burn works.

Even if we don’t add extra salt in our food, we should be aware that it is commonly put in processed foods or drinks, and often in high amounts.

Some tips to reduce your salt intake:

  • When cooking and preparing foods, use salt sparingly and reduce use of salty sauces and condiments (like soy sauce, stock or fish sauce).
  • Avoid snacks that are high in salt, and try and choose fresh healthy snacks over processed foods.
  • When using canned or dried vegetables, nuts and fruit, choose varieties without added salt and sugars.
  • Remove salt and salty condiments from the table and try and avoid adding them out of habit; our tastebuds can quickly adjust and once they do, you are likely to enjoy food with less salt, but more flavor!
  • Check the labels on food and go for products with lower sodium content. Try out the best appetite suppressant.

Reduce use of certain fats and oil

We all need some fat in our diet, but eating too much – especially the wrong kinds – increases risks of obesity, heart disease and stroke.

Industrially-produced trans fats are the most hazardous for health. A diet high in this kind of fat has been found to raise risk of heart disease by nearly 30%.

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Change and the Emotional Bank Account

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I’m always interested in exploring the true human elements of change management. بوكر اونلاين I regularly have the conversation with others whereby I explain that change is more than a process it’s a journey of feelings and experience. This emotional side is far too easily overlooked, particularly by those managers who want to manage activity rather than the people doing it!

pinkpiggybankIn the past year or so I’ve been taking a keen interest in discussions around the personal, or human emotional bank account. This is based on the premise that every individual has a set level of emotional energy within themselves and every time they do something, part of this energy is used up. However, there is only a finite amount of energy, so over time it may become dangerously low or even be exhausted. When this happens, people fall sick, become depressed or withdraw from interaction with others, even having a breakdown in the most extreme cases. العاب بلبل As with a Fully-Verified financial bank account, when the funds are perilously low, things get scary.

To prevent going too low on your emotional account, you need to find ways to make deposits into it. Like in the financial space those deposits can be achieved from a wide range of sources, and will vary in amounts too. Now we live in a world that doesn’t create a lot of space to get deposits of emotional energy. Most of the emotional withdrawals are linked to change events, with the extreme changes having greatest impact. Of course, one of my personal challenges is allowing people time to recover somewhat from a change before the next comes along. We never have opportunities to truly grieve on the last change, before the next happens.

mindbreakingNow the whole concept of an emotional bank account I find close to building personal and therefore professional resilience. I talked about this in my last post here. If we do not carve space in our hectic schedules for recharge time we run the threat of a poorly prepared organization, unready for change, lacking resilience to cope with that next piece of activity coming fast over the horizon.

rechargeI think there are a number of easy things we can do to help with building up the balance in this emotional bank account. We can start by recognizing its existence and reflecting on our personal levels. We can find ways to recognize what takes more out than others and prepare for those higher value withdrawals. لعبة الكوبه We can also find ways to newly create or replenish those emotional reserves. To this latter point I have seen a personal change in my levels since embracing elements of mindfulness. I’m not an expert in the field by any stretch, but the short time outs to consider self and be centred around your position in the universe have truly paid me dividends. This article I wrote discussed my journey with mindfulness.

I truly see great benefits in managing your emotional bank account, developing resilience and being better prepared for professional and personal change in your life. We live in a constantly changing world with an ever increasing speed of change and number of changes. We need to find our coping mechanisms proactively and move away from Band-Aids to try and fix it when its too late!

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Exploring a Curiosity in Mindfulness

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I’ve seen a lot of chatter about mindfulness recently. It seems to be “in fashion” right now. I have seen it referenced recently for change activity, I’ve also seen it as part of wellness packages and employee assistance programs. It’s definitely something that is permeating to the surface in many ways.mindful

My first confession here is that I really didn’t know much about it. I’d seen some webinars, read some articles but had no true experience or even observational knowledge of the subject matter.

Through the Curiosity Culture journey, we have been providing Curiosity Labs. These supplement the core workshop and provide a safe space to explore a focus area of true curiosity. We did our first lab on vulnerability and we decided to explore mindfulness within the curiosity lab environment. Learn more about glucofort benefits.

Now I work in a world brimming with change challenges. Besides Curiosity Culture I run Capillary Consulting Inc. which focuses on learning, coaching and advisory services for change. I’ve been experiencing a significant rise in requests to understand change resilience and coping mechanisms for change fatigue and its associated experiences of exhaustion and breakdown. So I’ve been exploring, discussing and helping a number of people build managing strategies, action plans and personal contracts to deal with these challenges far more effectively. Now I’ve been looking at how mindfulness can help prepare individuals for change ahead as well cope after the fact. All part of the personal resilience needs for change and life really.

Doing the curiosity lab allowed me to experience mindfulness first hand. To really get a clear understanding and appreciate how it may impact and affect me. I admit I was nervous. I can’t remember the last time I took a half day out just for me and my benefit! I had some adrenaline rushes and some skepticism about the experience. If I’m totally honest I felt both excited by the event and conflicted by the value of taking that much time out of my busy schedule.

So I think I had my own personal a-ha moment! I won’t spoil the experience for others but I will say the way this played with my mind, body and dare I say soul, was a revelation. For the first time in more years than I can count I was able to consider myself as a focus. I was able to find a way to give my mind space to recharge without it involving sleep. I experienced a strong humanity connection and yet also a two-way link to my fellow humans. I also connected with my significance in the world that’s both great and small concurrently. I was both exhausted and energized at the same time after the experience.

In the weeks following the mindfulness experience, I discovered a lot more about my attitudes and approaches to the way I work and live my life beside and intertwined. I realized that living in a world of change I so readily focus on the future; I forget about the current.  I also appreciated that I spend a lot of my energy and effort for the benefit of others first, when I should be balancing this with myself.

I’m still exploring where this journey is going to take me. I have definitely become a convert to the world of mindfulness through this experience. I’m working on connecting resilience for change and mindfulness into an experience for people to engage with – proactive and reactive muscle building for change. I’m also excited to see how those involved in the Curiosity Culture experience take this forward as we look at resilience in a future lab.

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