How Spirituality, Meditation and Philosophy facilitate Leadership Development (Gift inside)
"The body benefits from movement, The mind benefits from stillness"
Plenty of tasks, plenty of choices, and plenty of options. Personally and Professionally, we are continuously called to take decisions, from releasing that budget to grabbing the right sliced bread. How many different roles do we cover in just one day? How many choices and decisions do we make every day? I am trustful today’s society knows very well how to pressure us, stress us to the edges, and make us run, but, What about when the evening comes and we need the brain to slow down in order to give us a good quality of sleep and efficient rest? How can we calm our thoughts? How can we feel aligned with our virtues and values? The point here is not how to go fast, the point is how to slow down when needed.
The Art of Slowing Down. I recall a metaphor used with a client a few months ago. Providing stillness to Your mind is like sharpening the most valuable weapon of Yours. Think at Yourself as an ancient warrior or a hunter. Dwell on the importance of having Your tools and weapons efficient. Literally, the outcome of Your efforts is strictly twined with the efficiency of Your weapons. This is one of the reasons why we oftentimes seek the latest software to speed up our admin tasks or the latest kitchen tool to make us save time chopping. The point is: we always seek to better the weapons with which we fight. Now, what if we consider Your Mind as Your most valuable tool? What about the nature of Your Emotions and the way You deal with all events of Your life? Nobody can deny that all choices we made are born in our minds. So, how can we sharpen our minds? How can we prepare ourselves for facing life with a razor-sharp sword and hit the target “once and done” without having to come back on again, without overthinking, and without regret?
Let’s spend a second comprehending the consequences of not sharpening our minds. We surely have experienced phases in which we feel less alert, maybe fatigued, less concentrated, or less able to keep focus. We keep attending tasks (and we might achieve too) but we keep attending them without the engagement that gives us satisfaction and fulfilment in return. With a blunted mind we risk leaving a crucial detail out of our analysis, we might order the wrong items, or send the wrong email, or a lot worse. Mental fatigue can become chronic in certain cases (i.e. intense adversity over a long period of time). One of the characteristics of chronic fatigue is a sense of being pulled and pushed from one task to another as we are following a script not allowing us the time to think, not allowing us to listen to ourselves. Using again the same metaphor, can You think about a warrior with a worn, blunted sword? Every enemy could require several hits before being “sorted”, similarly in our professional and personal lives, we sometimes come back on decisions “sorted” already or we find ourselves thinking back with regret about behaviour we had where maybe we reacted to rather than responded to. The list of what “bad” can happen when/ if we are mentally fatigued, can stretch much longer. I am sure we all have real-life examples.
See why is crucial to care about our minds. Consider Your mind as Your most valuable weapon, it might require some thinking. Currently, You use Your mind for whatever task You have to attend to or undertake, You use it for processing past experiences and as well planning the future. We can say is one thing we use even when we are asleep and do not realise it. It really never stops, especially when highly stimulated. Here unfortunately we recognise we do live in an over-stimulated fast-paced society, as we mentioned above, too many choices, too many stimuli, and too many tasks definitely do not help our minds to slow down. We must commit to it. Spirituality, Meditation, Philosophy, Mindfulness, and Positive Psychology all can be good allies.
Spirituality is not Religion, slowing down does not imply any belief, and respect all beliefs. Philosophically and Spiritually, our Self and our Soul are the source of all wisdom and knowledge, the place where we find all answers we seek, and the place as well where we can rest and feel serene. How beautiful is thinking of having a place, always available, where You experience the benefits of expanding Your consciousness and feel safety, clarity, enlightenment, relaxation, and positivity?
From the Meditative space: there are several ways to meditate, depending on what we would like to reach. Intentions are crucial. There are meditations that can be done walking, some can be done eating, and some are a boost of positive emotions. Some of us, especially at the beginning, think that meditation is to stay still, with crossed legs, palms out, as a statue for hours. Our meditation might not be (every time) transcendental. We might want to meditate to relax the mind in the evening, not necessarily to encounter the spirit guide or explore past lives. We might want to meditate to regain control of our personal and professional spheres, in that case, there are guided meditations to do so (open monitoring meditation for example). Meditation gives You what You need, allows You to be calm and take that guilt-free time for You to sharpen Your “sword”, conscious that slowing time is not time wasted but the complete opposite, the wasted time is attending to tasks and taking decisions with a tired, clouded, busy mind. Meditation helps the mind to be as much efficient as possible, balancing activity and meditation, movement and rest. The effects on the nervous system under regular meditative sessions (at least twice a day) are scientifically proven together with increased calm, acumen, compassion, and self-listening, the latter crucial to have awareness of -when to push and -when to rest.
From the Philosophical point of view: At school of practical philosophy, we often read “Know Thyself”. Philosophy promotes Self-Mastery and of course, You must get to know Yourself along the way. The school promotes and favour meditation as a good tool for getting to know who we are. I recall Marcus Aurelius from his meditations, book 4,3: There is nowhere quieter with more freedom from trouble than when a man retires into his soul, particularly when he has within him such thoughts that by looking into them, he is immediately in perfect tranquillity; and I affirm that tranquillity is nothing else than the good ordering of the mind. Constantly then give to yourself this retreat, and renew yourself […] will be sufficient to cleanse the soul completely, and to send you back free from all discontent with the things to which you return […] Marcus Aurelius, Meditations Book 4,3. We all know Marcus Aurelius was Rome’s Emperor, he had to declare war or peace, and decide life or death, we can safely assume he was busy, way busier than we are. He promotes living according to Your nature, checking Your values, checking Your virtues.
Lastly, from the Emotional Intelligence spectrum: From an EI coach perspective. The goal of this typology of coaching is to develop soft skills and pragmatically use them in the life scenario in order to bring improved performance and general wellbeing. I can talk from precedent experiences with clients, nobody ever disliked meditation (until the moment of writing). With some clients, we eventually decided to start and finish the coaching sessions with a small meditation. Is like “cleaning the desk” for the mind, sharpening. I personally meditate for balancing activity and rest, for giving a segment of pause to the mind among all day’s activities, I meditate for coming back home spiritually. I meditate because I soon recognise if I do not meditate, I begin to sense impatient, and too full of activity, I feel my mind runs too fast and sometimes heads in too many directions that I end up feeling clouded. Is understandable because of all tasks and activities but definitely is not beneficial for the person and for the performance. Meditating helps to calm that cyclone of thoughts we normally have, reset priorities, and face events with enhanced clarity, with a higher degree of focus and attention. With the most valuable weapon sharpened!
Concluding, there is a part of deeper spirituality, energies, and frequencies, say white shamanism without wanting to scare. Is not available to anyone who is not ready. Spiritual coaching, meditation teaching, spiritual guidance, mindfulness practicing, and soul guidance are different typologies of support, slightly different from each other for the nature of the topics treated. They all fall under the same umbrella but they come naturally throughout consequent levels of understanding. Spiritual development takes its time. Step by step, session after session, the coach and the coachee determine together where and when to direct the interventions and practices.
Thanks for the time You spent reading.
I am currently gifting 11 sessions to 11 strangers before the end of ‘22. It aims to be my gift to the Universe for the multitude of blessings and lessons he empowers me with, in order to serve other humans. If personal, professional, and/or spiritual development stimulates Your curiosity and You feel intrigued, please do get in touch, You will find a friendly-professional human willing to support and facilitate Your journey. I am committed to human flourishing, it wants to be a genuine gift. Hope You will take advantage!
In the whilst, best of blessings.
Nick
Leadership coaching
meditation
Soul Guidance
Spiritual life coach
Wellbeing