"Do you have the courage and commitment to make the possibility into a reality?"

This week I was inspired by a short clip of Sadhguru, the Indian yogi, mystic, bestselling author and poet talking about what matters. The question he left us with stayed with me all week:

"Do you have the courage and commitment to make the possibility into a reality?"

We talk so much about what needs to be done. What I need to do, what you ought to do, what they should be doing. It sometimes feels as if we are talking ourselves in circles rather than quietly getting on with what needs to be done.

Sadhguru's question cuts to the chase. We need courage and commitment to take the action we know is needed or we shall forever be sitting on the sidelines running commentary.

Courage is not the absence of fear. Courage is fear walking. ~ Susan David

We've heard a lot about trusting our gut or intuition or that little voice of knowing that speaks to us, often in whispers. If we are open to it, the way forward is known to us or it arrives, just at the right time, when we are ready to hear it.

Our inner voice of truth is made up of a lifetime of learning, observing, listening - of our lived experiences and flashes of insight, which inspire action. And yes, taking a leap does take courage and will require adjusting as we go along, which is what makes it all so interesting and worthwhile.

“The only calibration that counts is how much heart people invest, how much they ignore their fears of being hurt or caught out or humiliated. And the only thing people regret is that they didn't live boldly enough, that they didn't invest enough heart, didn't love enough. Nothing else really counts at all.” ~?Ted Hughes

I wish you a week without regrets, full of curiosity, discovery and courage.

3 Things to enrich your thinking for the week ahead

My aim each week?is to bring leaders at all levels three things that are worth knowing about, thinking more deeply about or taking action on. I'd love to hear your thoughts on this week's trio (+1)!

Does your organisation suffer from OCD?

(Obsessive Certainty Disorder)

This is the question Sonja Blignaut, Co-Founder of Complexity Fit asks us to contemplate in her wonderfully thought-provoking article, which I felt compelled to re-read a few times! Sonja knows a thing or two about complexity - she teaches internationally using the Cynefin Framework, Waysfinding and Complexity Fitness.

Why is it we gravitate towards simple answers rather than being comfortable with ambiguity - or prefer strategic planning to futures thinking and strategic foresight? Why do we seek to fill every moment with busyness rather than allowing boredom to stimulate curiosity and creativity, which is where we find fresh new innovative ideas and ways forward?

This is the crux of the problem: Innovation often lies on the other side of messiness – amid ambiguity, uncertainty, tension, and risk.

If you've been listening to the urgent calls for leaders to be more creative, adaptable, innovative and comfortable with ambiguity, Sonja's article will provide the spark for you to ask where you and your team are, how supportive your corporate culture is and what you can do to foster change?

"Leaders say they want transformation, engagement, innovation, creativity, and agility. However, their actions and the environments they create say otherwise i.e. that what they actually value is stability, sameness, safety, certainty, busyness, and consensus."

Stop, Ask, Explore

Whilst I'm on the topic of uncertainty and messy middles, Joan P. Ball's book Stop, Ask, Explore, Learn to Navigate Change in Times of Uncertainty, has just been released and I can't wait to read it.

Joan, whom I met through a think tank we both belong to, is the Associate Professor of Marketing at St. John's University in NY. She works with emerging and established leaders to help them to navigate change, build resilience, and develop a wayfinding mindset, especially when they face uncertain transitions.

"Interruptions and disruptions are a threshold to uncharted territory. You can learn to navigate uncertain transitions - and to flourish in times of unrelenting change."

"Stop, Ask, Explore?is a lively and eye-opening book that will allow you to more effectively engage interruptions and disruptions and develop the experimental mindset needed to flourish in an era of unrelenting and exponential change. Discover the power of curiosity, wayfinding, and discernment to make sense of uncharted territory and learn to thrive in times of uncertainty."

Inner Development Goals Summit 2022

Have you heard of the Inner Development Goals (IDG)? I hadn't until late last year (thanks for the intro Anna Hummel-Gumaelius) when I attended a couple of their online sessions.

The aim of the IDG is to make the world work better by sharing the skills and qualities that lead to a more purposeful, sustainable, and productive life — for each and for all of us.

The IDGs framework consists of five categories organising 23 skills and qualities of human inner growth and development, which are especially crucial for leaders needing to address the UN's 17 Sustainable Development Goals. Their framework has been developed by a team of international researchers after an extensive outreach consultation involving more than a thousand people. Explore more here.

The good news is their international Summit is coming up on the 29th of April in Stockholm and you can attend in person or online, which is what I'll be doing. You can learn more and book your ticket here.

"Conflict, loneliness, poverty and environmental threats. Despite our good intentions, we can’t seem to tackle our biggest problems. Why? Because we’re stuck in the old thinking that created them."

"We can do so much better than this, but we need new tools, and we need to start with ourselves."

The "What" of War

My plus one this week is an epic article from the editors of The Wrap at the Grey Swan Guild, led by Ben Thurman and Rob Tyrie titled The Future of International Conflict and Neutral Technology and Systems.

Not the easiest of topics. Saying this, Ben and Rob do a brilliant job of stepping back and exploring the “what” rather than the “how” or the “why” of war.

"There has been plenty of coverage in every moment of this war and all the other wars and mass migration that they cause. There are killings and deaths all amid shifting pandemic waves, restrictions and innovation. There are injuries and victories in those battles while economies contract while expanding, supply chains break and jobs are lost and bosses are fired. The coverage has been in every media, from social media all the way to vanity-driven, book mill-generated ghostwritten, self-published biopics in paper."

Join the Grey Swan Guild on Clubhouse today at 8am (PST) 11am (EST) / 4pm BST to have your say, connect the dots and help us to make sense of it all. We’d love to hear your thoughts.

Thank you for reading #LIFT?- I trust the 3 things (+1) explored here enrich your week ahead and beyond. Please comment and share your thoughts with us and if you know of someone else who would also enjoy this edition, why not?share it?