Clarissa Pinkola Estes, in a work of prose-poetry Do Not Lose Heart, We Were Made for These Times, asserts:
"One of the most calming and powerful actions you can do to intervene in a stormy world is to stand up and show your soul. Soul on deck shines like gold in dark times...To display the lantern of the soul in shadowy times like these - to be fierce and to show mercy toward others, both - are acts of immense bravery and greatest necessity. Struggling souls catch light from other souls who are fully lit and willing to show it."
Authenticity. We become who we are by staying true to our light within, which at times takes immense courage.
While the soaring language graciously offered by Clarissa Pinkola Estes may be or feel directed to the penultimate challenges of our individual lives and our many failed attempts to live peaceably together on our one planet we all call home, it also strikes me as a call to everyday leadership in ordinary times. She adds:
"One of the most important steps you can take to help calm the storm is to not allow yourself to be taken in a flurry of overwrought emotion or despair - thereby accidentally contributing to the swale and the swirl. Ours is not the task of fixing the entire world all at once, but stretching out to mend the part of the world that is within our reach. Any small, calm thing that one soul can do to help another soul...will help immensely."
If we are at work 40 hours a week for 48 weeks a year for 40 years, we will spend over 75,000 hours or 8.5 years at work in our lifetime. We are encultured to operate under the principle that we can/should check most of our humanity at the office door - to not be truly who we are for over 75,000 hours of our life! (And that is just talking about the work environment!) Applying a modicum of common sense thinking, how silly to think that such a significant chunk of our time here on this earth is somehow separate from everything else that happens in our individual and communal lives. And yet, how often do we boil leadership down to transactional management? To be clear, leadership and management are different things with different purposes.
Leadership requires us to acknowledge that what happens "out there" always influences what happens "in here" and vice versa, whether we are talking about the false dichotomy between the economy and institutions of higher education, home and work, external action and internal thought, self and other, and so on and so on. As whole human beings living integrated lives, we all cycle between hopes and fears, opportunities and threats, unsettling storms and enlivening sunrises - at all times. We are, after all, the unfolding universe, literally the children of stars. We are so much more than the narrow definitions and roles and compartments we are so quick to accept.
The work of leadership requires us to first cultivate our inner light, to grow our courage to let it shine, to develop a sturdiness and resilience of mind, body, and spirit. Only then will we be prepared to fully show up and make a difference in whatever situation we face. To bring clarity and calm and connection - in both ordinary and penultimate times - in the lives of individuals, organizations and communities that we serve is the outward facing work of leadership. To create space and opportunity for individuals, and teams, and communities to catch their inner light. To cultivate bravery and hope to let it shine.
As Clarissa Pinkola Estes concludes:
"In that spirit, I hope you will write this on your wall: When a great ship is in harbor and moored, it is safe, there can be no doubt. But...that is not what great ships are built for."
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