Ann Badillo Leadership

2008 Year In Review

Dear Friends and Colleagues,

As we end the year I want to share this set of questions for us to reflect upon.

This last year --In myself, my relationships, my work, and my community:

1. Where have I been strengthened this year?

2. What has softened in me this year?

3. What has deepened (integrated or fallen into place) this year?

4. What has opened (what's new, what have I learned, where am I being stretched) in my nature this year?

Source: Angeles Arrien

 

Winter Solstice Open Coaching Call:

Sunday, December 21st, 9:00 - 10:00 AM CANCELED

Call in Number: 646 444 5502
Participant PIN: 696972

Join us!

All are welcome. Drop me an email  ann@badillo.com and let me know you are coming. We will reflect on these valuable questions as a community of practice.

The Power of Contemplative Practices

As leaders, cultivating stillness and a time for contemplation is one of the most important practices we need to develop for self care, resilience and renewal. And yet high achievers may equate sitting still with losing one’s edge. Self-observation is essential but most high achievers have equated success with speed and 'overdoing.' We cramp so much into our multi-tasking lives and while it may appear that we are getting much done, yet research shows it actually hinders our performance.

The benefits of these practices are well researched and show that daily practice results in the capacity to:
•    Enhance higher order thinking capacities
•    Heighten empathy (EQ)
•    Sustain emotional equilibrium
•    Expand sense of presence
•    Improve immune system function
•    Reduce cortisol production
•    Increase self-awareness of impact as a leader

What are Contemplative Practices?
One of my favorite site for contemplative practice is:
http://www.contemplativemind.org/practices/index.html

Contemplative practices quiet the mind in order to cultivate a personal capacity for deep concentration and insight. Examples of contemplative practice include not only sitting in silence but also many forms of single-minded concentration including meditation, contemplative prayer, mindful walking, focused experiences in nature, yoga and other contemporary physical or artistic practices. We also consider various kinds of ritual and ceremony designed to create sacred space and increase insight and awareness to be forms of contemplative practice.

Contemplative practice has the potential to bring different aspects of one’s self into focus, to help develop personal goodness and compassion, and to awaken an awareness of the interconnectedness of all life. They have helped people develop greater empathy and communication skills, improve focus and concentration, reduce stress, and enhance creativity. Over time, these practices cultivate insight, inspiration, and a loving and compassionate approach to life. They are practical, radical, and transformative.

Familiar and Timeless, Peter Drucker’s 5 questions

The nature of business organizations has changed dramatically over the past few decades. Today, employers and employees both understand few show up thinking they will collect their ‘gold watch’ after 25 years of service. Instead, individuals are responsible to carve and erect their career paths.

Individuals need to keep themselves engaged in a work life that might span more than 50 years. And, to do this requires a deep understanding of self.

Peter Drucker said, “Only when you operate from a combination of your strengths and self knowledge can you achieve true and lasting excellence”. This familiar but timeless wisdom holds truer today. So, let’s revisit Drucker’s 5 questions first introduced in the article, Managing Oneself, HBR, 1999:

• What are my strengths? (how do you know, what do you do to strengthen them and how do you use this knowledge to establish, and manage relationships?)
• How do I work? (how do you learn? are you a reader or listener? do you prefer solo to groups?)
• What are my values? (and are they consistent with your organization’s values/)
• Where do I belong? (is my role the optimal, the best fit for me?)
• What can I contribute? (how will I use my self-knowledge and strengths to make a difference in my organization, community, society?)

Without these answers, most people waste time improving skill areas where they have little competence, or try to modify ‘personality’ traits that cannot be changed. Drucker and authors that are more recent advise us to play to our strengths. What do you think? What stories can you share?

Source: Fast Company

Thought of the Day

"Don't worry about what the world needs. Ask what makes you come alive and do that. Because what the world needs are people who have come alive."

-Dr. Howard Thurman

Personal Renewal

“Meaning is not something you stumble across, like the answer to a riddle or the prize in a treasure hunt. Meaning is something you build into your life. You build it out of your own past, out of your affections and loyalties, out of the experience of humankind as it is passed on to you, out of your own talent and understanding, out of the things you believe in, out of the things and people you love, out of the values for which you are willing to sacrifice something. The ingredients are there. You are the only one who can put them together into that unique pattern that will be your life. Let it be a life that has dignity and meaning for you. If it does, then the particular balance of success or failure is of less account."

John Gardner
Personal Renewal Speech, November 10, 1990, Delivered to McKinsey & Company, Phoenix, AZ.

John Gardner on Personal Renewal

From my own limited experience

"From my own limited experience I have found that the greatest degree of inner tranquility comes from the development of love and compassion. The more we care for the happiness of others, the greater our own sense of well-being becomes. Cultivating a close, warm-hearted feeling for others automatically puts the mind at ease. This helps remove whatever fears or insecurities we may have and gives us the strength to cope with any obstacles we encounter. It is the ultimate source of success in life."

His Holiness the 14th Dalai Lama

As human beings, our greatness

"As human beings, our greatness lies not so much in being able to remake the world--that is the myth of the atomic age--as in being able to remake ourselves."

Mahatma Gandhi

The Power of Full Engagement

Authors Loehr and Schwartz argue that "time management" is an impossibility - and what needs to be looked at is energy management.

The point to four different arenas in which to manage your energy: physical, emotional, mental and spiritual. I particularly like their insight that you can't rely on self will alone to make changes, and the power of routine to make behavior change.

Engery Follows Thought

One of the powerful lessons of yoga is that "energy follows thought."  And just as thoughts create energy, energy creates our experiences.

So, positive thoughts create positive energy and positive energy leads to positive experiences (and vice-versa, of course).

It is important for each one of us to realize this truth and try to carefully select our thoughts in order to create positive experiences in our lives.

If we focus on uplifting, elevated thoughts, we will experience an uplifted, elevated direction in our lives.So, in order to be our very best, we must give thought to our best. Before we can even begin to do that, however, we must first become aware of our thoughts.

Most of us wander around as though we are helpless victims of our uncontrollable thoughts, but if we practice becoming conscious of our thoughts (yoga and meditation are great tools for helping us do so), we can then choose to let go of negative thoughts and focus on positive ones.

We have the ability to achieve the very best for ourselves in life by being the very best in our lives.    

Coming Home to Yourself

Seven ways to make a home inside of yourself.
Practices during times of uncertainty and chaos and while living a nomadic life.

1. Healthy cooking for yourself. Take care of your body and be mindful of good healthy choices.

2. Listening to music. Music simply has a way of soothing the soul and your mood tends to dictate the type of music listened to whether it is jazz, classical, R & B, Pop or Rock.

3. Develop practices like Yoga, Chi Gong, Tai Chi are forms of exercise and meditation that through the quiet connection to the breath and body. In the rest we take in sivasana, we gain peace and inner quiet. This often brings a sense of deep emotional security and groundness.

4. Meditate. Learn to calm and center yourself through being quiet and eliminating all thoughts.

5. Connect with elements of nature and earth. Connect with the natural rythmns of the earth, wind, water. Water has a calming and healing effect upon many. Walks along the beach, or through the forest, and hiking in the mountains can clear your head. Connect with your breath as you hike and listen to yourself.

6. Releas control. The awareness that not everything is within ones’ control frees up a lot of energy and releases a lot of stress. It is important to realize that there are limitations to what one has control of and these limitations should be acknowledged and accepted to avoid feelings of guilt and frustration.

7. Be in the Now. Be present to the day. Living in the now disarms you from future stresses. Accepting the presence allows you the freedom of the gift of living and not just existing, or waiting for your life to happen.