Tag: personal growth
The Seven Dimensions of Leadership Assessment
In my work as an executive coach over the past 30 years, I have developed a useful methodology for assessing leaders. It combines the best approaches I have learned from multiple sources. When I first started in this profession, the prevailing perception was that anyone who needed a coach was in trouble. The coach was hired to fix a problem. Fortunately, that perception has evolved over the years. Now, executives without a coach are questioned Read More
Endings and Beginnings
In 1984, we formed a book group in Basking Ridge, NJ with 6 other couples. Our first book was George Orwell’s 1984. We met monthly (with few exceptions) for the next 32 years discussing a diverse mixture of books: fiction and non-fiction, simple and complex, light and heavy, funny and sad, uplifting and depressing. Each book gave us an opportunity to share our thoughts and feelings and to get to know each other on a Read More
Awareness with Acceptance
Call it serendipity. Call it luck. Call it random events that just happened to be connected. Call it anything you want, but I just experienced a strange coincidence that boggles my mind a bit. I had been thinking about a new post (yes, that’s what I do with most of my free time) about the notion of awareness and acceptance. Incidentally, my process for writing posts is to latch onto an idea from something I have read, Read More
Timelessness and Transcendence
“This trip had dimension and tone. It was a thing whose boundaries seeped through itself and beyond into some time and space that was more than all the Gulf and more than all our lives.” -John Steinbeck, The Log from the Sea of Cortez We just returned from the Sea of Cortez on a trip with National Geographic to watch the whales migrate from the tip of Mexico to the Bering Strait. The beauty of Read More
Connect, Create, Collaborate
I recently attended a week-end workshop on Calm Clarity conducted by Due Quach (pronounced Zway Kwok), a Vietnamese boat refugee who grew up in a drug infested and gang ridden inner city and then went on to: graduate with honors at Harvard, complete a Masters Degree at Wharton, work for one of the most prestigious consulting firms in the country, scour Asia for the most enlightened spiritual sources, and create the Calm Clarity organization which Read More
Range and Reach
I recently visited the Picasso Sculpture exhibit at the Museum of Modern Art in NYC. It was a stunning display of the range and reach of Picasso’s work over five decades. As the introduction to the exhibit suggests, Picasso upended categorical distinctions. The retrospective collection provides ample evidence to support that observation. What struck me as I moved from room to room through MOMA’s beautiful exhibit spaces was Picasso’s range of materials (plaster, bronze, wood, Read More
Labels, Limits, and Levels
Dr. Bill Anthony, the highly respected, world-renowned, executive director of the Psychiatric Rehabilitation Center at Boston University, initiated classes with new students by throwing the DSM into the waste basket. This dramatic statement was intended to communicate to people entering the mental health field that labels limit our ability to see the potential and possibilities of another human being.
Stages and States
I just completed an on-line course through MindValley Institute entitled “Beyond Seeking” taught by Ken Wilber, whom I mentioned in my last post. The course triggered so many ideas that I wanted to filter them through my lens and write a post. So here it is. As the title of this post indicates, throughout our lives, we can experience many stages and many states. In my last post, Spiritual Awakening, I constructed scales for Wilber’s Read More
Development or Deterioration
As I turn 70, I’m sure the first thought that crosses peoples’ minds when they meet me now is, “He’s old!!” Most people associate aging more with accelerated deterioration than continuing development. But I think there is no end point for development. Growth may take a different form or shape, but it doesn’t need to end.
Strength
Strength is working through, not walking over It means confronting pain, dealing with sadness, living with fear Strength is expressing feelings, not repressing them It means shedding tears, breaking down, getting it back together Strength is opening up, not closing down It means being vulnerable, sharing fears, seeking connections Strength is looking in, not looking out It means finding a place inside that nourishes the soul Strength is being grateful for Read More
Conscious Dualism
Dualism means the tendency of humans to perceive and understand the world as being divided into two discrete categories. Dualism exists in many belief systems including Zoroastrianism, Christianity, Taoism and Confucianism. In these beliefs the universe is divided into the complementary oppositions, e.g. good and evil. In traditions such as classical Hinduism, Zen Buddhism or Sufism, a key to enlightenment is “transcending” this sort of dualistic thinking.
Being at Home in the Universe
An Internal Space or an External Refuge At my older daughter’s wedding, she sang the song, “Feels Like Home to Me” to her husband. It struck me that we are all searching for a sense of home in our lives and I was so grateful that she had found a man with whom she felt at home. Her beautiful voice filled the reception hall and my hope for everyone there was that they felt, in Read More