Tag Archives: amplification

The New Year: A Time of Renewal

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relax renew refreshDecember 31. 2014. The sun sets on another calendar year. For so many, a time of making resolutions for a new year. Reflecting on this practice raises an awareness of the arbitrariness of a calendar date in making resolutions. It is not a solstice time. It is not necessarily a full moon or a new moon although in different years it may be. It is not a natural time of beginnings like spring, or like the fall has become for so many.  Yet it is a time of reflection and a time of renewal.

For me, it has the added significance of New Year’s Day also being my birthday. Beginning a new year. Beginning a new birth year. I long ago stopped making resolutions that take the form of promises to myself about life changes I think I should make or goals that I should strive for that often become broken promises or unreached goals. It has softened into reflection, intention setting and renewal.

Some lovely reflection questions:

  • How have I grown in the last year?
  • What places of beauty have I walked?
  • Who has impacted me and in what ways?
  • What and who have I cherished and made time for in my journey of the last year?
  • Who has cherished me? How did I respond in return?
  • In what ways have I honoured my knowing?
  • In what ways have I honoured the practicality of work and life too?
  • What has flowed to me over the last year in large and small ways? What do I want to fuel and seed in the coming weeks and months?
  • How have I honoured my path? How has my path honoured me?

Of course, there are things that have not flowed so well and maybe choices that didn’t work out so well. But these are not things  to focus on or fuel for what is ahead. If there are things to learn from them, by all means, let’s be in the learning. Absorb it. Let it go.

Intention setting. There are a number of ways to approach intention setting.

There are already many flows of life happening and available to each of us. What if intention setting began by sensing into those flows? Feel what works. Not need to name it even while being in the experience of it. What are the flows that want to be amplified? How do we turn our intention to that?

What BIG things are in movement or on the horizon that are worth setting intention for – aspects of work like big projects, new directions, partnerships, offerings; aspects of life like relationships, travel, living. Not just living. Living large, fully, powerfully, intentionally. Which doesn’t have to be flashy or braggy or materialistically but purposefully and meaningfully. Making it count. Your actions, your life, your voice, your word.

Leaving space for all the things we cannot know or anticipate but will recognize when they show up when they are aligned with the intention we set and are fuelling. Who do you want to set intention with – life partners, work partners, friends, colleagues? Nothing that feels forced, and it won’t if it is aligned with what is sensed in the flow of life and journey.

Renewal. Renewal of self. How will I renew myself now? My energy. My spirit. My joie d’vive? Renewal of relationship. What relationships do I want to renew now and continue to renew with intentionality? This does not just apply to the lapsed relationships we all have, but applies to the ones we are in and have now that we do not want to take for granted and that we want to bring the fullness of who we are to, to invite the other to show up in the fullness of who they are.

Reflection, intention setting and renewal. Not just a once a year practice, but a frequent practice. And, with the ending of one calendar year and the beginning of the next, a lovely time for renewal.

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Half Way Through 50 – Deepening In

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I’m half way through being 50. Well, maybe a bit more than half way but it is summer and I think the whole summer can count as half way if I want it to. And it’s not that I’m trying to resist or sugar coat the reality of linear time moseying along at sometimes frightening speed. I’m excited about being 50 – and for what comes after that.

Recently I have had the awareness of how much this year is a U journey for me. Maybe every year is, but it is particularly prominent this year.  There are three big chunks of Theory U – sensing, presencing and realizing. They do flow, but they are also iterative and there are many U journeys within overall bigger, longer, more expansive U journeys. And thank goodness for that.

I was excited to recognize I am in the presencing phase.  I felt invited to more fully relax into the summer and the continual unfolding of my journey, of me.  The transition to realizing energy will arrive as I go to California in late August, the first of many trainings with good people in varied environments.  Even as the energy shifts, sensing and presencing will continue to be a rhythm in each day, each experience, each movement.

So, what does this mean for me to feel the presencing energy of these moments this summer? And why the heck is it even important? In a post from a few months ago on turning 50, I wrote:  “This is a time for me to break old, limiting patterns, to step more fully into what is mine to do, to completely embrace my purposeful path and live into all that has been on my own edges for awhile.”  The ability to do this is activated,  amplified and accelerated by presencing.

Part of presencing is being in stillness.  The summer has been providing me with this opportunity.  The stillness that comes from not too many meetings or other obligations and lots of choice along the way about where to tune in time and attention.

Presencing is also about letting go and letting come.  Being in the stillness allows not just the witnessing of this but the embodiment of it.  I feel it fully in my body and in my spirit, in my being.  I sense the deep movement I am in and know with that sense of deep knowing that I am embracing my path, my unfolding and yes, my living into what has been on the edges.

It is evidenced by how fast I have been spinning into and out of turmoil in these last few months.  Faster than I ever have before.  I’m learning how to be in it without being overwhelmed by it or projecting it onto someone else – trying to make my experience someone else’s fault; enquiring into my experience to understand what is mine to own, what is projection from someone else, what I need to let go of and grab hold of, what is mine to learn.  I feel a bit of joy and anticipation in it and am not needing to rush into the next phase.  When I feel my anxiety rising because my book still needs editing and is sitting waiting for me and I don’t yet know how I will publish it or any other of a myriad of things I’m in the middle of, I breathe, let go of following those thoughts into the future of doom and trust the book’s energy will invigorate me in the right moment.

Work opportunities arrive, some land, some flow away.  Trusting the right things will show up.  Seeing where the invitations are, the openness, the readiness for me, what I have to offer and my journey.  Seeing where the energy isn’t.  Feeling how it is guiding my path.  No need to try to grab everything that might be within reach but being intentional about moving with the flow of what is mine to do, where I am needed, where I’m not.

I’m witnessing the evolution of my own spiritual growth, my knowing who I am.  I find myself leaning in, not jumping to conclusions, not lashing out at others but sharing my experience and my questions, and breathing through experiences that would have spun me out not even that long ago.  At the end of each of these periods of turbulence, I come out more grounded, more deeply connected to my core and my purpose and less attached to people, places and things – ready to let go of anything that hooks me and anything where the energetic openness is not available.

Trusting the guidance from the subtle realms and feeling more deeply connected – with a sense of, “of course this is how it is, how simple, easy and available.”  Opening more fully.  Yes, the journey to open heartedness and somehow even more than that.  Surrendering with joy and delight into the shifting shape of my world.

Healthier Health Care – Now! A Little Taste of What’s Cooking

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We wondered what would happen if we invited friends from across North America to convene in Salt Lake City, Utah around the question of Healthier Health Care Systems Now?  We were amazed.  We began by sharing who we are – the innovator and pioneer in us that  compelled us to come to this conversation.  Then we shared the exciting work we are engaged in.  We talked about the “system” and discovered “it” was never A system and “it” was not about health.  We moved from talking about systemic issues that felt as philosophical as we know they are real and moved into embodying the conversation, coming from a place of deep connection to ourselves, each other and the work that continues to call us in the worlds we work and travel in.  The insights, themes and cool learning are just beginning to percolate for each of us.  More, much more, is cooking.

It was beginning to cook before we even arrived in Salt Lake City.   We discovered healthier health care was such a compelling question people went to great lengths to get there.  Some initially said no and then found a way to come.  Others felt the question so urgently they used vacation days and airmiles to get there.  One person even crowd funded her flight.

Twenty-six of us arrived on January 11, 2012 – physicians, naturopaths, other practitioners, administrators and consultants from heath, public health, dentistry, acute and long term care from Nova Scotia, Ontario, Alberta, Ohio, Minnesota, Winsconsin, Illinois, Texas, Oregan, Washington and Utah.  Everyone an innovator or pioneer already working diligently on shifting the shape of health care within their spheres of influence.  We all brought stories of change and deep and compelling questions. We made instant connections that inspire us to go deeper and to keep at it.

This will continue to simmer and cook for quite some time to come.  I will have more to share here about this conversation at the beginning of 2012, curious to see how it might grow as we convene a community of practice for those who were there, those who wanted to be and couldn’t make it and those who begin to find their way to this particular conversation in their own way.

You can find snippets of harvest on Twitter by searching #HHSUtah.  Thanks to Amanda Fenton, who was with us from afar, for stepping in and compiling our tweets @Storify.

I offer here a little taste of a quick and fun harvest at the end of day 2 as we went around our circle and each of us added a line to the unfolding story of our journey together. I didn’t catch every word, but it will give you some small essence of the experience, recognizing some references are very specific to our experience, and it will have to tide you over til the next post.

“There were a bunch of hooligans in a house by the mountain.  They thought of themselves as pioneers, radically re-engineering, brought together by living systems that taught them how to transfer what they are learning and experiencing into what they are doing now – open to possibility.  In sharing, they saw new connections and unique opportunities.  They described them as opportunities to change and blow shit up.  These hooligans had so much to think about, they sat in circle, played, visualized and created on many levels a new vision of what they were yearning for – simplicity, wellness, with open heart toward the future to bring this new narrative to everyone.  Envisioning systems that bring forth vision and health, letting go of the old to release into timeless universe.  They pondered next action.  In the middle, they went deep into the cellar to share unique fonts and forms of creativity.  They came together to discuss the topic but it was more than the sum of its parts – human nature – own beauty, higher power and purpose run in each of them and each other with gratitude, although we do fear discovering in horror on FB the shaking moments, with brains exploding in chaos, guerrilla gardening and permaculture parties.  But then, a pause for reflection and even more to emerge.  Finished.  No shame.  Amazing thing, working hard to create something different.. but in the end, they were different, a community – and in their differences they found their common humanity from which to go back to the places they came renewed, reinvigorated, inspired to innovate on!”

With gratitude to all who were there, all who held the rim of this gathering from afar and specifically to my fellow hosts Tenneson Woolf, Steve Ryman and Marc Parnes for an experience that will be long remembered, in a gathering where the new narrative of health was activated, the field of innovation in health care where we meet was amplified and shifting the shape of health care in our spheres of influence has been accelerated.

The Voice of the Judge

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There is no more powerful limiting mechanism in our lives than the voice of the judge.  I don’t mean that other person – parent, spouse, child, teacher, boss, friend, co-worker,random stranger on the street or in the shopping mall.  It’s the internal voice of judgment or internal critic that often runs rampant inside of us that we barely notice, if at all, because it is so clever and really good at disguising itself – for self preservation really.

I first became intimately acquainted with my inner judge in 2008-09 during coaching work with Sarita Chawla.  She recommended I read Soul Without Shame by Byron Brown in addition to the work we were doing together. I will forever recognize this as a pivotal point in the shifting shape of my journey.  I wrote about the voice of the judge back then in an article.  I am reviving that article here now in an updated version because it is the season of amplification.  My inner critic is activated – obvious to me because of how I feel – and I am reminding myself of strategies I already know that help to deactivate it and release its grip on me.

When I first became aware of the force of the internal judge, I had been working with the concepts of self-leadership and hosting oneself for almost as long as I could remember – still do, of course.  I worked with coaches, read books, did courses, took part in and led deep group work.  I am generally a positive, optimistic person holding deep appreciation and gratitude for much of what transpires in my life and who shows up.  I have transformed negative self talk into more appreciative forms of self talk and into periods of quiet in my mind.  I meditate and practice other forms of reflection and mindfulness.

So, imagine my surprise when I discovered a voice of self judgment and self criticism that was booming loud and clear in my unconsciousness, stronger than any external voice of judgment or criticism could possibly be.  This voice constantly set the bar for my performance at the best that I had ever achieved.  The bar moved if I did better.  When I didn’t match my most excellent performance, even when I did extremely good work, this voice told me that I had failed, that I did not measure up and that I never would on a consistent basis.  Strong performance was interpreted as mediocre.  Criticisms from others, whether justified or not, was reinforced by this inner critic.

When I felt most down on myself or just down in general, this voice played a significant role – and still can in moments I feel most overwhelmed or vulnerable – until I expose it.  I didn’t actually hear it as a voice until I began to listen for it but I felt it strongly in many forms: sadness, unhappiness, melancholy, anger, listlessness, lack of motivation and many other emotional manifestations.

While I had been aware of this voice (or at least the emotions it manifested in) to some extent, I also prided myself on my journey of self-transformation and change.  Been there, got that medal, surely I must be done now, can I just get on with my life and success?  I realize now it was the voice of self judgment that said, “You’ve been doing this long enough, how come you’re not done?”

Part of the reason I had been pretty oblivious to this voice was because, in my quest to be calm and serene and professional, I skirted over my own emotional reactions.  I barely recognized I had them except in the odd instances where they overtook me.  Oh, was that an emotion that wasn’t calm and serene?  Oops.  Nope. Couldn’t have been.  It must have been something else.

Then, a friend told me I deal with my emotions intellectually.  So, I thought about that.  And I thought my friend just might be right.  Emotions don’t reside in our intellect.  They reside in our bodies.  We feel them and sense them.  We use metaphors to describe them.  We say things like, “That packed a punch!”  If we stop to notice, we will notice where it feels like we got punched.  And if we stay with that, we will begin to notice the impact.  And if we stay with it longer, we will notice the uncomfortableness and want to move onto something else.  This is where I am learning to stop.  I have learned to stay with it longer, until I can begin to discern the wisdom that is held there and that can only emerge when we give it an escape hatch to surface to the light.

It is in these moments that my voice of self judgment has come booming out at me in all of its voraciousness.  With all good intentions, all it wants to do is protect me – from failure, from being unlovable.  But its methods only serve to reinforce for me my failures, even to the extent of turning successes into failures, thus creating in my mind my own unlovability and unwantability.  I have also become aware through the Law of Attraction and the teachings of Abraham that this voice of the judge interferes with flow, abundance and allowing the full vibrancy of life.

I learned to journal in this voice.  I am astounded by the punch it does pack.  Periodically I sit and check inside of me to sense into what I’m experiencing and feeling and what the impact is.  I journal what I am sensing until I feel done.  Then I check in again to see what I am experiencing, sensing and feeling, and then journal again. And then again, if that seems required.  I am committed to going the next layer deep and the next until I feel the light flood back into my soul and I feel a lightness of spirit and of body. This is what I want to amplify in my life now.

Exposing my voice of self-judgment transmutes it into a gift of understanding and insight after which joy can once again arise and take more of the space that is its, and my own, rightful due.  Now, instead of seeing my journey as one that should be concluded and being hard on myself because it is not, I see my journey and myself with a gentleness I could not access before as it was hidden underneath the protective layer of the voice of judgment.  I have always known, intellectually, that learning and growth is a life long journey.  Now I know it and accept it with a graciousness that only comes from the light.  It is a good reminder in this season of amplification.