New Consciousness Leaders

"While we will probably never grasp the entirety of God's thoughts or the wisdom of the universe, or whatever you call the vast organizing principle of existence, we can listen more deeply for inklings, we can pay closer attention to the cause and effect of our actions.  We can raise our own standards of behavior toward something kinder and grander. 

What might leadership look like if generated from a wise consciousness?   Here's my stab at some answers.  A New Consciousness Leader knows the difference between strength and force.  Strength comes from a deep, inner confidence; from loving and respecting and expressing one's own authentic self.   That kind of strength opens the gate to real love of others and life itself.  Force comes from a deep inner wound that spawns the urge to dominate and even the score.  A New Consciousness Leader uses her strength.  She is bold, direct and decisive.  She views terror and violence as the tactics of cowards and fools.  A New Consciousness leader also knows the difference between outrage and rage.  I think of outrage as Holy Anger.  Strong emotional responsiveness to the pain of others; to injustice, to ignorance.  Outrage is fierce but it never dehumanizes.  It fills a leaders sails with the winds of action, but it also fills her heart with discernment and compassion.  Rage, on the other hand, is like a forest fire.  It is impatient and it is vindictive and it is short sighted.  A New Consciousness Leader uses the energy of outrage to persuade and guide and include and create."

Celtic Spirituality

"Celtic Spirituality and the ancient Irish faith never forced anyone.  Never drove people through the tracks of programs with the intention of reaching the cold destination of perfection.   It never tried to unriddle the mind of it's gracious contradictions.   And it never tried to make the world safe or certain for people.   It constantly called people back to the source of their own originality."     John O' Donahue

Contradiction

"If we maintain our misery at the surface level, we hold off the initially threatening but ultimately redemptive and healing transfiguration that comes through engaging our contradictions."   John O' Donahue

Contradiction

"We need to re-discover contradiction as a creative force within the soul.  Beginning with Aristotle, the Western thought tradition outlawed contradiction as the presence of the impossible, and consequently, as an index of the false and the illogical.   There is a secret light and the vital energy in contradiction.  Where there is energy there is life and growth."   John O' Donahue

Conflict

"When you look at the different conflicts in your life, you will find that they are placed where contradiction cross each other, the nail of pain where two intimate, but conflicting realities criss-cross each other."   John O' Donahue

Change

"It is startling that we so desperately hold on to what makes us miserable.   We do not want to be cured, for that would mean moving into the unknown.   If we maintain our misery at the surface level, we hold off the initially threatening but ultimately redemptive and healing transfiguration that comes through engaging our inner contradiction."  John O' Donahue

Kalyana-Mitra

This is the Buddhist tradition of friendship, the "Noble Friend".   They will not accept pretension but will gently and firmly confront you with your own blindness, complement your vision in a kind and critical way.  They are willing to negotiate awkward and uneven territories of contradiction and woundedness."