Emerging Futures

This time next week, I will have been on the Big Island of Hawaii for 24 hours.  The last time I was there (September 2006), I missed the earthquake by three weeks. However, during my entire stay, I could feel the earth move under my feet; and I could hear its sound.  As much as I knew that 2007 was not my time to be in Hawaii, I know that April 2008, is.  

Kilauea is introducing new expressions into the day.  As much as this volcano is now attracting many to the Island to watch, my desire to be there is different.  Recognizing that it is a holographic universe, I am mindful of my desire to be on the Big Island to ‘know’ this expression of intensity as one of my own.  For whatever reason, the Big Island has always felt like ‘home’ - a unique experience for me as I’ve never really felt home to be anywhere in particular.  But on the Big Island, something inside me was awakened (more than 15 years ago) and I’ve never gone back to sleep. 

It is on the Big Island of Hawaii that I had my first experience of being profoundly connected to the elements.  On this small dot of land in the middle of the Pacific Ocean… 2500 miles from anywhere!… something inside me came to life.  Although initially less than enthused by my Island experience, my initial indifference quickly turned into a panicked need to return.  It was as if returning to the Big Island was not a nice thing, or a fun thing to do - but an essential thing to do.  The ‘pull’ was not one of the intellect but one of the body.  I couldn’t sleep, was profoundly distracted from the day-to-day events of my life, and  turned myself inside-out to get back there ASAP!  That was 15 years ago and I’ve lost track of how many times I’ve been back. 

 For me, it really does feel like going back to where I belong.  

From the very first moment that this Mauna Lani Experience began to form itself, it has alway been about connection - to the elements, to each other and to Self.  It has also been about coming home - to Self and to the elements; and to recognizing that in all others, I can find mySelf.  Sometimes, our connection to the elements of Earth, Water, Fire, Air and I’O (as they each represent some aspect of ourselves and the whole of what we are) allows us to know some part of us that cannot be known - or touched! - through logic, reason and habit.  And in this Spirit of discovery, I know that there is still much of me that I have not yet met.   

I will be in the best of company!  Six more sleeps we’ll be on our way!  And one thing I know for sure:  there will be intensity and there will be acceleration for us all.  The powerful forces that are allowing Kilauea to breathe more deeply are the same ones that will expand my own capacity to breathe life into my connection to being here.  

It is all unfolding exactly as it should.

Breathing is good….. 

I spent time today with a woman I consider to be a good friend.  We’ve known each other for about 6 years, and yet it feels like just the slightest brush of time.  If you offered me money to pick one thing about her that I don’t like, I’d be hard pressed to come up with something.  When I think of her or engage with her, my experience is always one of dignity, integrity and courage.  

Today, our time together really tugged at something deep inside me - something that has been rumbling around for the past couple of weeks as I made my way through the ‘leadership’ material and then a few subsequent gatherings of women.  I have noticed things about myself; and I have noticed things about myself in groups of women.  I have become very clear, open, honest and direct about my intense disgust with the cultural conditioning of women and the degree to which we allow ourselves to continue to subscribe to it even when we recognize it for what it is.  

For most of the women I now spend time with, long gone are the days when they were too small or too young to choose otherwise.  In this moment, they are old enough and wise enough to recognize that their prison is one of their own construction.  As much as there are places in the world where women are killed because they refuse to take out their subscription to the status quo, here (at least today) it is not so.  And yet, we are crippled under the weight of ‘what will others think of me’ or ‘I must be loving/careing/supportive/helpful/etc even if it kills me’ or ‘No problem - I know you’re hungry so help yourself to my entrails.. Here!  I’ll just roll over and make it easier for you to get to…’ - when with all of it, we know that our lives will not be worth living.

Strong and frequent are the pulls to allow ourselves to succumb to what we think others want of us… expect of us… require of us… need of us… demand of us (at least, in the dark places of our own minds)!  Easy and slippery is the downward slide of allowing ourselves to become lost in the myth and story of what we should be… must be… ought to be - even if it kills us. We don’t need to take our own life - we just need to lie back and think of England and allow it to be taken without protest.  It’s not that we choose to die, it’s that we are unwilling to fight to live!  

Unwilling to declare… to demand… to take!  Unwilling to wrap both hands around our life and say:  ”NO!  This life is MINE!  This one belongs to ME!  Get your own life - you CANNOT have mine! ”  But we don’t do that.  We suffer in silence.  We grit our teeth and lock our jaw so that we can get past… can stomach… can tolerate!… our own life.  We slide silently into the dark from yet another moment lost to our own unwillingness to stand up for ourselves.  We are so quick to take up and fight for the cause of others…. any other!… and yet for ourselves, we turn weak at the knees and dewey-eyed about our own right to live as we desire.  

We allow our sense of duty… of obligation and commitment… to sweep our life to the side, watching it slither slowly and painfully into the gutter of another lost hope… or forgotten intention, often turning our gaze away - pretending not to see - so that we do not have to witness who we have become.  We let go of our sense of being deserving of… of having the right to… a life of our own.  And as if it were not already bad enough, we then hate ourselves for who we’ve become.  We no longer need to be held in check - we’ve mastered doing it to ourselves.      

I’ve noticed lately in my work with women that there is this deep, intergenerational self-loathing that seems to be the back of the hand of which the huge desire to live, is the front.   It is the secret we try so desperately to keep from ourselves:  we want to live!  We want to live fully… and LARGE!… and with  gusto!  It is as if we despise our own unquenchable thirst for life and the degree to which it shows us up for wanting it to be so!  Just how deep does the cultural training go?   To what ends are we willing to go to pretend that it is not so; to be seen to be self-less and willing to put our lives on the back burner so that everyone else can have one?

I watch women come and go in program experiences, in coaching and small group gatherings.  I watch women begin to awaken; begin to find their voice, to recognize the vibration of power in their own sound.  I watch women begin to stir - carefully, at first - and reach for the life they want.  In the safety of each other, they become willing to allow their voices to carry the truth of who they are.  

There is a dynamic tension in their experience in the presence of each other.  There is a strength in the intensity with which they engage.  There is an ‘aliveness’ that is palpable; a sense of play,  an awakening to the irreverent and the outrageous, and a willingness to laugh out loud, dive in and take their lives by both hands!  It is as if they finally show up to take a stand - for themselves, for their own lives, and for a way of moving through the world that carries no apology for who they have become.  

And then, they return to their lives.  They hide the journey of how they came to stand where they stand.  They allow themselves to fall asleep - and sometimes, to feign sleep rather than deal with the consequences of being awake.  ”I don’t want to upset the apple cart”, or “They wouldn’t understand”, or “They don’t need to know” and in those moments, the opportunities for them to create and share their bigger, more compelling and rewarding lives with others… is lost to their own fear.  And yet, their world could have changed profoundly!  

I have yet to meet a single human being who does not have the desire to be more alive, more present and more engaged with themselves and the people they care about!  I don’t know a single soul who is not starved for the intimacy that comes with profoundly connecting to Self and the people they care about.  Far too many people are discouraged and exhausted by their seemingly endless and often hopeless search for authentic change.  And all that was required was that a truth be shared.   

I watch far too many go back into their lives and pretend they are not who they have become.  I watch them pull back, pull in and tone down.  I watch as the roar of who they have been returns to the squeek with which they have long made friends, over their life.  And I watch them disappear.  

In this moment, I feel saddened and fatigued by the relentless nature of how we keep losing ourselves; allowing our lives to slip away and not noticing until long after the trail has grown cold.  I feel overwhelmed by the density that comes with the passage of time and depth of  repetition that results in the unquestioned ‘grooming’ of women to become beasts of burden.  To me, it feels like watching a magnificent mustang turn into a donkey; a creature designed for freedom transformed into a beast of burden.  And if that were not bad enough, we have trained our own voices to repeat what we’ve been told and heap praise upon ourselves for having accomplished this transformation.  But inside, we’re screaming to get out and choking on our own despair.   

Maybe tomorrow will be different.  Maybe tomorrow, we’ll not be so unsure of ourselves, so afraid to be seen, so willing to hide who we are behind the expectations of others.  Maybe tomorrow, we’ll find not only comfort but a sense of personal power in relaxing into the intensity of how deeply we desire, how much we care and how profoundly it really does matter that we have the life we choose for ourselves… now!   Maybe tomorrow, we’ll give up waiting and hoping and wishing and we’ll simply make it so.  

Breathing is good… 

It seems like I blinked and a couple of weeks went by.  

I’ve been listening to and editing for production the raw recorded material from the October 2007 offering of Emerging Futures: Leadership Redefined - Reclaimed.  What an amazing experience!  What felt so strange about it is that as I listened to my own voice (there was more than 24 hours of recorded material to work with), I had no sense of it being me.  It wasn’t the sound quality, or the voice itself - it was that it felt like I was hearing it all for the first time!  That’s a bit tricky when I’m supposed to be editing.  

I kept getting lost in the material, itself. For 10 days, I listened and re-listened and re-re-listened to capture almost 10 hours of the most compelling material.  As I engaged in those multiple passes, I was stunned by the power of the material.  How could that be???? I was one of the women there!!  And yet, there you have it: it was all a big surprise for me, too.  

We (Paul with WEL-Systems Productions and myself) took great care to ensure that the design of the product (labeling, tracking, chunking, etc) was a match for the power of the content.  Man!  I had no idea that it was going to take each of us in excess of 50 hours to get this done.  But we did it - and it’s magnificent!  We now have a 10-disc CD series that will launch a wave of insight and discovery from which there will be no going back.  (It will be available in a week or so, in the online Store.)

Not only am I proud of what we’ve created as a product, I’m deeply honored to be with these courageous women in this raw, edgy and powerful exploration of leadership.  As one woman has already said:  this conversation will redefine how we think of, talk about and live ‘leadership’.   I don’t doubt that for a moment. But all that’s about the CD series.  What about me?

 I’m exhausted and elated at the same time!  I’m filled with anticipation for the future and what is to come!  I’m very, very clear - not just from the force of my own intention/manifestation but also from the life force that pours through my body as I engage this way - that I am indeed, an activist for the acceleration of human evolution! And I am discovering that I am not alone in this pressing force in the body.  

I am finding/meeting/creating many, many other women for whom this call in their own body is intense and will not be ignored.  There is much going on today that is inviting and awakening many to their own evolution.  And yet perhaps what I am most mindful of is :  why walk when we can fly?  Why struggle when we can glide effortlessly into our own magnificence?  Why seek answers when we can learn to delight, relax into and surrender to the joy of the much larger question?  Why have this awakening be the domain of the few when it can be the breath for us all?

I have become very aware of what sets me apart from many.  I do not seek to rid myself or anyone else of their ‘dark’ side.  By having discovered how to acknowledge, claim and honor my own ‘dark side’, I have come to know the genius that it carries and the power of its capacity for allowing the light in.  There are many gateways and discovering a new context for what I once was taught to press aside, has made it possible for me to claim the full measure of who I am in the world.  And life is good!

 Yesterday, I had the great joy of spending my morning with a small group of women, gathering… to explore what it is that ‘lights’ them up.  In three short hours, it was clear that as much as the whole had become greater than the sum of its parts, it could never have gotten that way without each part. In our willingness, each to stand alone, we found great strength in a new collective.  In truth, when we stand alone and take the time to look around, we can see others standing strong in their individuality.  Strength does not lie in blending ourselves into an existing collective - it lies in being the seedpod and attractor for the creation of a new one.

Breathing is good….. 

I care deeply for the people in my life.  My mother tells me that my greatest strength lies in my obvious and unwavering passion for my family.  (I think she’s a little biased….)  And given the nature of the work that I do - of how I live my life and the great intimacy that comes from  my time spent in experiences with clients - my clients very often come to be part of my extended family.  When they hurt, my own body vibrates with that same resonance as if we were strings on the same violin,  sharing in the music.  In that moment, I know that it is an invitation for me to find within myself that which we share that has been touched in some way. 

If you were to ask someone who knows me well about what I cherish most in my life, they would likely tell you that I adore my sons.  I am so blessed to be their mother.  That the Universe has chosen me to walk with them in their lives has been my greatest honour.  There are times when I am so filled with the sheer joy of having them in my life that I sit by myself, tears streaming down my face, at the wonder of it all!  And yet, I am not without an awareness of the magnificence of their imperfection.  In the moments of their imperfection, I come to be gentle with my own.  Sometimes, in being willing to do for our children what we cannot or will not do for ourselves, we learn more about how to know the experience of love of Self. 

Having said this, I am also aware that my sons - as magnificent as they are! - can also be huge pains in the ass.  They think for themselves and are not shaped by ‘the pack’.  They have never been ones to do as they are told simply because someone is older or taller than they are.  They have their own agendas for their lives and insist on living those lives, their way.  As much as they are open to engaging with me and are willing to include me in their lives, they stand strong in owning their choices and insist on moving forward in their own time, in their own way.  In those moments it becomes very clear to me:  I am not them, and they are not me.  

How do we cherish others and yet hold true to our own path?  How do I love my sons and also love myself, refusing to ’sacrifice’ myself to their needs/wants?  How do I come to trust that living my life in ways that are open, honest, clear and direct - choosing to honour the truth of my experience rather than the convention of what it is to be ‘mother’ - will allow us all to become the ‘more’ that instinctively I know we are?   Without trust and respect (of self and other), what kind of ‘love’ do we share? How do we love deeply and let go?  

I am not alone in these moments.  In a recent exchange with a wonderful friend, I found new ground for myself as I shared my thoughts with her.  

“What comes to mind as I read your words is how easy it is to doubt ourselves alfer we’ve let go; and yet, how debilitating it is for us to hold on.  Either way, I believe we need to do what feels authentic for us in the moment and stay present to what continues to unfold

For what it’s worth, I do believe that it sorts itself out.  Being open, authentic and clear are such unusual affects in our world that we often have no idea what the next step can/could/should be.  In that moment, breathing is good… allowing your body to open and relax… and just engage when and where and with whom it feels ‘right’ for you to do so.  

Bifurcation is such an interesting experience in the body.  Like you’ve already noticed, we feel two distinct things at the same time:  the chaos of the old coming apart and the great excitement/anticipation of the creation of the new.  They both exist, occupying the same space and the same time, and the sensation plays itself out in the body.  Personally?  My life has been at its most creative and compelling in those moments! 

I know that as you redirect your attention to what is deeply meaningful for you to create, you’ll be amazed at how quickly it begins to fall into place.  That space I mentioned above is unbelievably fertile ground for new thought to manifest - and fast.” 

My life is lived as an Emerging Future.  That includes my way of engaging with the people I love.  An Emerging Future is a journey that offers no road map or reference points.  What it does offer is the invitation and opportunity to rapidly, profoundly and exponentially transform our lives - in a single breath.  What that demands is that I not only trust the godforce that I am but that I let go and come to trust the godforce that is expressing through the body of the person I so love.  

I love my sons and I also know that loving them means letting them go.  They are no longer children, they are grown men.  I need to trust that who I have encouraged them to become will serve them well.  To spend my life teaching my sons to stand on their own and trust themselves, and then not trust who they have become, dishonours us all.  Holding on is like holding my breath.  When I’m holding my breath, nothing moves - and movement is a sign of life.  The truth of it is: holding on will destroy us all.  

Breathing is good…