Posts Tagged ‘compromise’

I’ve been thinking about this blog for awhile, specifically the intention I had in mind – what I wanted to convey regarding our will. The third step of the Twelve Step Program came to mind:

We turn our will over to the care of a higher power as we understand it

(The original version is: We made a decision to turn our will and our lives over to the care of God, as we understand him. Quite often, people are turned off by the religious components of the twelve steps, so I am paraphrasing in order to hopefully make this more palatable).

What I realized was that throughout our lifetimes, we’ve turned our will over to higher powers many times. From the time we take our first breath we turn our will over to our parents, teachers, coaches; we turn it over to our employers, our lovers and sometimes our children. We turn it over for the purpose of physical survival as well as emotional, spiritual and economic survival. We turn our lives and our will over to those who require respect and authority over us. As a consequence, we often learn to choose disempowering interpretations about ourselves and our lives; we learn to compromise and compensate for the loss of our will; our spirit and life-force; and we choose to use our will in ways that temporarily relieve suffering of such a loss (most of this is unconscious).

In a sense, we have surrendered our essential-self, which handicaps our capability to fulfill our highest expression of Self. Instead we compensate for what is no longer accessible by justifying our existence with what we do and what we get paid to do. Connection with our life force is lost and we use our willfulness to do what we are supposed to do.

To be willful is to thrive and yet, to be willful as a child or as an adult who is required to meet certain expectations is often punished, rejected or humiliated. We’ve all learned to temper our will for the will of those of higher authority. Feelings of powerlessness and helplessness to make a difference in the world turns us toward activities that numb us in all ways. TV, food, gaming, just to name a few, keep us from experiencing the desperateness that underlies so much apathy and dis-ease caused by surrendering our will to others. When we capitulate our ability to empower ourselves in service to our highest truth and our highest good we’ve lost connection to our essential nature and to Universal Consciousness, the source of all that is.

Not my will but Thy will be done

In the world of business each of us is required, sooner or later, to discover what is ours to do. Recognizing and acknowledging this then requires us to observe how we choose to use our will and whether this is, or isn’t, in service to our highest knowing. This is the moment when great leaders are born, as well as great managers and team players. When we choose to use our will to play it safe and stay small we are willingly fencing ourselves off from what we are wanting to avoid, that, however will inevitably precipitate a breakdown. Our survival mechanism – the way we use our willfulness to suffer, settle and survive, will need an overhaul.

I have no doubt that each of us is exactly where we need to be in order to figure out what’s truly ours to do. Willingly and courageously inching our way through the maze of confusion; willfully taking a stand for a quality of being that will transforms corporate culture is a self-transcending process for each individual and for each individual business institution.

We are all essentially in the process of recovery from the influences of our current paradigm, primarily the fear-based reality we are immersed in. Any traumatization we’ve experienced by our circumstances, to whatever degree, has to be worked through, reintegrating our souls/our will back into our bodies. Business environments are a perfect for this healing to occur, because of the multitude of opportunities we meet daily to use our will in alignment with our highest truth. Sometimes we can do this on our own, sometimes we have to reach out for help, and sometimes we feel like we are beyond help. In these moments we realize that we’ve turned our will over to a higher power that failed us. With no hope in sight, where do we turn?

We’ve corrupted our own identity by willingly surrendering our life force to those to whom we have been forced to trust. How do we begin to willingly choose differently, to will the will of our own highest power – our own highest truth?

Willingly stopping the corruption inside ourselves and all of our organizations is only possible when we are willing to notice that it is in all of us and that only through each of us can we begin to practice something different.

At what point do we consciously choose to turn our will over to an invisible source of support? Most of us wait until it is beyond obvious that our lives have become unmanageable and we are powerless over our addictive ways we deal with our circumstances. At this point, too frequently, we hurt like hell and feel as if we have no other option but to turn our will and our lives over to the care of this Universal Source of all the is.

Though it is the same process – turning our will over to God as we understand him (Sorry for the religious languaging), to do it consciously feels vulnerable and scary. Consciously choosing to surrender is different than using the usual logic and justification: “I have to because my boss says I have to; I have to if I want this promotion; I have to if I want to if I don’t’ want that SOB breathing down my neck.” Surrendering our will in these cases required a surrender of our integrity and dignity. I think that’s very telling. We can stop this corrupt practice by revealing the denial that is going on inside each of us.

Regardless of our work environment we have the opportunity to notice how we use our will to empower or disempower ourselves by giving power away to those we choose to have authority over us. How has it served you to exercise your will in this way? What’s it like for you to live with these choices? Are there other choices that would be more empowering for you and your company?

Notice when what you are wanting isn’t in your highest good or the highest good of anyone! Continually ask yourself if what you are thinking or doing is in your highest truth and highest good. If it isn’t, you might want to engage with someone that can support you in making the changes you want.

To willingly engage in this practice of cultivating awareness is in alignment with the paradigm shift. More and more support is available to you and your business organization to ensure an extraordinarily empowering experience. Enjoy the Adventure!

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Tagged as: active garage, baby, compensate, compromise, environment, rosie kuhn, Spirituality, Spirituality in Business, surrender, Trust, Will

We are rarely 100% committed to what we say we want.

I’m assuming that because you are reading this that to some degree you are committed to the concept of bringing spirituality into business. On a scale of 1-100, where would you put yourself in relation to the degree to which you are committed? If you were 100% committed there would be nothing to stop you and you’d be fulfilled in having reached your desired outcome. However, generally speaking, there are underlying or conflicting commitments that create obstacles to us moving forward towards our stated desires.

These conflicting commitments are in alignment to a desire to remain invulnerable and avoid what we consider undesirable. In essence we want to remain secure and stable within our comfort zones. The degree to which we are committed to our conflicting commitment is the degree to which we use avoidance, distraction, procrastination and denial as strategies; this keeps us doing the same thing over and over, expecting different results. What occurs is a dilemma, the consequence of which is a feeling of being stuck, confused, doubtful and lost. The bottom line is that we are confounded by the dilemma with which we find ourselves.

Dilemma

I’m prematurely slipping in a D word here, because this is where life gets sticky. How one chooses to be with dilemmas will contribute to the inevitable outcome.

When we distinguish what we are committed to from our conflicting commitment we can see that we are at a choice-point. So, on the one hand we want change; on the other hand we want to avoid the undesirable consequences that accompany change. Hence, we have a dilemma. How do we choose? How do we choose to choose what we choose?

What most of us do, because we are unaware of our choice-making process that has brought about this dilemma, is to compromise our stand for what we say we want, at the same time compromising our stand for what we don’t want. We become professional fence-sitters. If you are interested in creating transformation or a paradigm shift within yourself or your organization it won’t happen by using compromise as a strategy.

What becomes clear as you sit with this dilemma, at this choice-point, perhaps with a thinking partner who can see the bigger picture for you, is a couple of things:

• First, either choice will require surrendering or relinquishing your attachment to the outcome.
• Second, the consequence of either choice will mean being confronted by vulnerability and loss of whatever you are attempting to hold onto. This is the nature of cultivating spiritual practices within the workplace. It is an allowing of the unfolding of the natural course of things to occur in service to what you say you want. This is also when the practice of faith kicks in, as you begin to consider the possibility of crossing the threshold, anticipating that first step required of you in order to begin this journey.

What’s at Stake?

What I like about working in corporations is that there is far more at stake for individuals, departments and the organization itself to actually walk its talk. The risk is greater and so is the reward. Not unlike any other institution and group of individuals, there is a culture and that culture has rules – some are spoken and some are not. Always – always we are walking the line between cultivating an environment that supports us and one that protects us. Again, if we are looking for a paradigm shift we have to surrender our attachment to this walking-on-a-fence approach to change and really challenge ourselves to practice acting in alignment with our speaking. What’s at stake will be different for each individual and organization. Generally though, we are afraid of losing what we have.

The distinction between business coaching and transformational coaching is that transformational coaching requires you to step into your commitments; to expand your comfort zone; to confront beliefs, interpretations, expectations and assumption that may not serve you or your organization; and to create a practice within which you exercise muscles that support cultivating consciousness and compassion for yourself and all beings impacted by the current paradigm shift. Transformational coaching requires you to be with the BIG-FAT-BE-WITHS that challenge current interpretations regarding personal gain and loss, as well as death of a way of being that no longer serves the highest good of all. It also requires a different way of choice-making in support of your commitment.

To choose to shift the degree to which you are committed by even one degree is enough to allow even baby steps to be taken towards your desired outcome; it’s enough to empower you to be with the anxiety and discomfort that comes with letting go and letting a higher power provide support, the consequence being that the process unfolds effortlessly. This is where the spiritual rubber meets the three dimensional world.

If Nothing Else

If nothing else, cultivating awareness through the practice of noticing will inevitably create profound shifts. Consciousness generates a greater capacity to change, to create and to generate from an empowered stand. This stand is grounded in a conviction to follow through with intent. It is far more powerful than just wishing and hoping for change to occur. A fascinating phenomenon that is challenging to grasp from a logical/rational perspective is that by intentionally increasing your awareness of what you are wanting, and bringing yourself – your being into alignment with your intention creates a vibrational modification in yourself and your environment. This in itself generates profound shifts beyond your wildest imagination. What isn’t in alignment with that vibrational state will either shift or it will disappear. Transformation at its finest!

Consciousness results in self-realization that we hope will translate into self-actualization. Without acting in alignment with our realization – well, all things will remain the same except for the fact that we know more then we use to. As I said above, if you shift how you are being to be more in alignment with your highest knowing, this in itself is transformational. You don’t have to overtly attempt to change your world or your organization. Just notice, shift and allow. This in itself is bringing spirituality into business.

Editor’s Note: Dr. Rosie Kuhn will be speaking on the topic of “Spiritual Wounding in the Workplace” at the San Francisco New Living Expo, Concourse Exhibition Center, Room #7, San Francisco, April 29th, 2011 at 7:00PM.

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Tagged as: Change, Choice-point, choices, comfort zone, commitment, compassion, compromise, Conflict, Confronted, consciousness, creativity, Dilemma, Dr. Rosie Kuhn, Spiritual Practice, Spirituality, Spirituality in Business