Lead Better: Align With The Divine

Much of generating executive presence within yourself has to do with aligning with what is great within you and the greatness around you.

Think about it: when you move through the day putting out fires, responding to issues, and migrating endlessly from meeting to meeting, there can often be a sense of "handling things" or "getting through". But presence requires a groundedness in the form of a cultivated sense of purpose and intention. What's more, it requires we cultivate an ability to return to that sense of purpose and intention in the midst of unbridled chaos.

You want people to feel your leadership and respect your words? Begin to feel your own leadership and respect your own words with reverence and attention. This doesn't just happen by reading these words - although reminders definitely can help. If you actually DO the steps below you'll find an inroad to access your own sense of presence more consistently no matter how crazy this lazy summer gets:

1. Think about the last time you felt yourself completely powerful, at ease, or in a state you might call "flow", "the zone" or "optimal". What qualities were you experiencing? What characteristics were you feeling within yourself and that situation? Write down as many words as you can to describe the situation and how it felt.


2. Think about the last time you felt REALLY OUT of your power, struggling, or at odds with? What quality did the situation lack?


3. Consider what might be three or four words to describe your team/function/company/group at it's essence. At it's very best, what makes that group exciting or effective? What thrills you about it's function or it's contribution?


4. Look at the list of words you created for all three categories - thriving moments, qualities lacking in not so great moments, and what brings alive your organization- what are recurring themes? Can you nail down the essence of all three lists in two or three words?

When you identify the essential qualities that make you thrive and those that best express the thriving of your immediate environment, you create an anchor to remember yourself at your very best and your surrounding at it's most optimal. Repeat these words to yourself throughout your day, not just for the sounds but summoning within yourself an experience of what they really mean. Being vigilant in operating from that position, you begin to raise the level of your own presence and invite the organization to function at it's very best. Summoning these divine or performance and experience enhancing qualities at will is nothing short of leadership in it's essence and this simple act of alignment will invite others around you to do the same.

Lead Better - Joy to You & Me

Gandhi advised that until you find God in the person in front of you, you must travel no further. Happening upon the guy pictured above and his fish on a long drive in the Smoky Mountains, I was reminded that we also have to look within.

If the G-word is troublesome to you, fill in with another huge, blank, encompassing concept. One like kindness, beauty, compassion, wisdom - a word is beyond analysis. Because when you think of fishermen and their fishes, it doesn't take images of the christian Christ, Allah or Yahweh to find a lesson that resonates. And if you are willing to give Gandhi the benefit of the doubt, God is always worth finding.

In this case, we found it when driving down a twisty mountain road just on the boarder between North Carolina and Tennessee and stopped to observe a fight for dear life. In this fight the fisherman above had hooked his catch, and she was fighting for hers. Her fight was one of those epic struggles. I-got-her, I-lost-her, I-got-her, I-lost-her ran the comments from the fisherman. No romance, after more than a half-hour of drama the fisherman successfully pulled her from the water and we caught this picture. Happy to see his joy, the part of me that likes to think meat comes from packages lamented his success and was quickly cheered when he put her back in the water to go FREE.

Within seconds the oddest thing happened: the fisherman became very concerned with FINDING the fish again. This made no sense at all. Why would someone fight so tenaciously to catch a fish, immediately let it go, then be distressed that it is gone?

If you fish or hang out with people who do, you already know this: animals who are stalked for a prolonged period will die from the fight. Fish, the mice my cat chases (and yes, catches), even humans having heart attacks on sunday nights before going to work on Monday morning - we often more threatened by our response to fear than we are from the actual source of danger.

As he looked for his fish, I was told if he did not care for her now, she would give up. The lactic acid in her body (effect of adrenaline) would literally shut down her systems and she would die. Thrashing through the water he found her belly up in the reeds, and turned her right side up, rubbing his hands over her gills repeatedly for several minutes literally calming her down.

This striking lesson from nature is one we need to learn: fear-triggered adrenaline taxes our many systems. Prolonged states of perceived threat generates to cortisol, a common factor in many stress-related diseases. Sure, there's no hook in your mouth, but how frequently are you hooked on worries about issues at work, concerns about achievement, social standing, financial status or familial approval?

In this case the fish was lucky enough to have an expert there to set her straight (literally), and calm her back into a survivable state. But most of us don't have a kindly fisherman or other big daddy/mommy to point out the warning signs for us. From behavioral red flags such as insomnia, irritability or irrationality, sexual torpor or eating disorders, burnout to physical dysfunctions that may be digestive, circulatory or immune, there's a lot going on to remind us to be our own wise fisherman. Take a time out, take a breath, realign with life and remember that unlike the little fishy, most of our suffering is caused by fears about social survival. In such moments you just might find God (wisdom, beauty or whatever word you prefer) within.

The fish lived, after all. And if we're smart and conscious, for a time so will we.

Green Your LIFE - Just say NON!

What can't you live without? Beyond jokes about Ipods or subscriptions to Vanity Fair, let's take a rudimentary look at what truly puts more life in your life? What rejuvenates you? What restores your inner sense of "yes", your joie da vie? Can you think of what those activities might be? If you had to list them right now could you commit them to paper?Because the truth of the matter is, we forget to do them. Sure, mom always told us to take a nap or eat our vegetables, but whether you're one to go on week- long carry-out diets or push the three hour night's sleep habit, most of us have more intimate relationships with the habits that burn us out than the habits that inject life, or SUSTAIN us.

For this reason we created the Sustainability Schedule. We use a little chart when we teach this in workshops, but for the purposes of this newsletter, check out the bullet points below and make your own. The key here is to actually write down the things you can do at each type of interval no matter how crazy your day/week/year/life gets so that even if you can't go to the gym, get the massage, eat right, or spend time with friends 'cause you're on the road, you have a ready set of tools to turn to to keep you in the livin' zone rather that the o-mi-gosh-I-feel-like-I'm-dying zone.

• Daily - okay, so say you've got a packed day with meetings, presentations, lunches, coctails and dinner. All the activities you use to get you through the crunchare out of the question and you've got to shine. What can you integrate into such a day? Parking at the far end of the parking lot? Five conscious breaths between each obligation? More water than coctails? Turning off the crackberry during meetings? Make a list of every peace & well-being enhancing action you can take when nothing you would like to do under more ideal conditions will possibly happen.


• Weekly - The week went pretty well as planned, meaning nothing unfolded the way you wanted it to and next week doesn't look any better. What are you going to do to make sure you refresh/revive & renew? Is it planning on a single solid night at home reading? A walk through the park on the way to work at least once this week? A massage on Sunday night to make sure you can get a good night's sleep? What exactly can you do to make sure you put a little YOU back into your universe on a weekly basis?


• Monthly - for some people the massage is weekly, for some it is monthly. Some folks make sure they take weekend escapes once a month. Still others work in a trip to a museum or a phone date with a far-away old friend. What is a monthly activity that would feed some aspect of you that might otherwise go 'round hungry? Even though "America Runs on Duncan", your soul doesn't.


• Annually - Yoga retreat, 10 day vacation, a trip to a state park, a course to develop new skills or explore new topics. What can you identify that if done annually would help you feel more alive year upon year?

The point here is not to create to do's. By identifying things that can be done in any timeframe, you've got a go-to for the moments when you've mistakenly come to believe that life ails you - as if it ever could. This go- to list reminds you that the only thing that can ail or enliven you are your own choices and actions, and provides a remedy for whatever the situation or timeframe you are dealing with.

So go ahead, take responsibility for your quality of living and green yourself. Remember your own "that which withouts", and the next time you're feeling burnt out just say NON!