I think this little excerpt from David Whyte’s poem beautifully illustrates the paradoxical nature of being human.

We each have an outer Onstage life of work and family and relationships. These are the things that other people can see about us, perhaps the things we want them to see about us. These include our professional and social masks, our different roles and responsibilities at work and home, our social media presence, our qualifications, expertise, reputation and influence.

The Onstage life is very much the focus of our western culture. The work that we do, how much we achieve, and how we look while we’re doing it. These things are highly regarded, so this encourages us to focus our attention externally.

But the flipside is we also have a Backstage Life, that private and personal internal part of our Self that we may seldom share with others.  This is where we hold our deepest values and beliefs, the things we love and hate, our hopes and dreams, self-doubts, fears, and prejudices. Very few people may get to meet our Backstage self because it doesn’t feel safe to share her openly, so we keep her hidden away.  It doesn’t help that many workplace cultures encourage people to leave their personal inner lives at the door with a clear separation between one’s professional and personal life.  Sometimes we hide our inner self so successfully, we risk losing touch with her ourselves.

But when we strive to be authentic and to show up as our true selves in our life and work, our inner and outer lives need to be in closer alignment.  This is much easier said than done though, because just as David Whyte’s words suggest, the relationship between our inner and outer lives is in a constant state of flux.
 
For instance, if you’ve ever had a sense of overwhelm with too many competing demands and flooded with urgent emails, or perhaps you’ve felt overlooked or unappreciated for a job well done, then you’ll be aware of how negative feelings can chew away inside and affect your outer mood and openness. Similarly, when we have positive inner feelings, these brighten our outlook and our mood. The way we show up in our outer life and interactions reflects our inner state, and this in turn, affects the quality of our interactions.
 
So there’s a constant interplay between our inner state and the way we show up in our outer life and the situations we encounter. One affects the other, and vice versa.  We’ll have some days when things are going well, and we show up with an open heart and an open mind.  And then there’ll be other days when some interaction may have sparked our inner fears which causes us to be more defensive than usual and less open to feedback we don’t want to hear. I imagine you’ve all experienced days when you’ve felt disheartened on the inside but have worn a brave face for the world. 
 
This is why regular reflective practice and growing one’s self-understanding is as important and valuable as developing one’s professional knowledge. Personal and professional development need to go hand in hand.   Authenticity and trustworthiness cannot be plastered on externally. This comes from within, and it requires an ongoing exploration of one’s inner ground, of getting to know one’s ‘whole’ self - both the light and shadow, strengths and limits, hopes and fears.  As Parker Palmer says, the most important thing we bring to our work and leadership is our Self and our ability to weave connections between ourselves and others, and the work we’re trying to do.
 
Connecting ‘who we are’ with ‘what we do’ lies at the heart of the Courage & Renewal® approach. Courage & Renewal retreats offer a unique and transformative approach to personal and professional development that deepens reflective practice, self-awareness, and interpersonal skills; replenishes well-being; and fosters closer alignment between one’s inner and outer lives.  This work is based on the belief that personal and organizational growth, and meaningful change always begins within.  Our internal life is central to our overall well-being.
 
When we know and trust ourselves – who we are and what we stand for – we’re better able to recognise and manage ego-led behaviour and show up in our outer lives with courage and integrity. Trustworthiness and courage are hallmarks of authentic presence and leadership.
 
You can find information about my next day retreat here.  If you’d like to learn more about my work, please don’t hesitate to contact me.  I’d love to hear from you.  

My birthday seemed an auspicious date to launch my new eBook - The Rebel’s Guide to Leadership.

The book weaves together stories from my personal rebel journey as co-founder and former principal of Matahui School in NZ with new theories of leadership and education. My purpose in writing the book is to encourage people to take a stand on things that matter to them, to challenge the status quo if necessary, to do what they can to help create a more compassionate, just and sustainable world. If you're uncomfortable with the idea of leadership, you may like Meg Wheatley’s definition of a leader as ‘anyone who is willing to help’.

In publishing The Rebel’s Guide to Leadership, I'm raising my rebel flag against the traditional, hierarchical leadership model, and also our society’s emphasis on achievements, affluence and appearance. Our culture has become so externally-focused, too many of us become disconnected from our own hearts and deepest values.

You can find out more about the book and download a free chapter here​.

 ​Many years ago I worked as personal assistant to a very difficult Financial Manager. Lao Tzu would have had a thing or two to say about him.  This man had an ego the size of a house.  He seemed to enjoy undermining and unsettling his staff, as though needing to constantly re-affirm his own superiority by making us all feel incompetent.  Today, we’d call him a bully.

In order to survive, my own ego came into play, and work came to feel more like a competition, which I spent my days trying to win.  I did everything I could to always appear cool, calm and competent, never asking for help or giving him any suggestion that I mightn’t understand something.  Even when that something  was completely new to me.  I worked around him as much as possible, because direct dealings often resulted in a bruised ego.  Mine, not his.   But the worst aspect, I think, was watching how he undermined my colleagues, particularly the junior staff, noticing how he damaged them, left them questioning their own sense of worth. 

Lao Tzu’s definition of a ‘wicked leader’ sums up this manager perfectly.  He was truly disliked by his people.  He created a culture of fear where there was no place for personal vulnerability or honesty. Needless to say, I didn't last long at that job, though when I made the decision to leave after only six months in the position, it felt to me like a personal failure.  He’d won and I’d lost.  At the same time, though, I realised that it was the organisation that had lost the most.

An extreme example of poor leadership, perhaps, but one that illustrates the nature of ego and how it can drive our behaviour through fear, desire and ambition.  An organisational culture that requires its people to always appear strong, objective and goal-focused will operate with an undercurrent of fear. Egos flourish in these environments because they’re all about having to look good in the eyes of others.  The need to be seen as successful, important, competent.  Competition will flourish also, because winning looks good, it strokes our ego, and it helps us feel good.  But it’s important to remember that this emphasis on outward appearances masks the true fears beneath.  Fear of failure.  Fear of not looking the part.  Fear of not belonging.  

The problem is that when our behaviour is driven by what others think of us, or what we look like, or what we manage to achieve, we will look outwards, not inwards, when making decisions.  We ignore, and risk losing touch with those deeper parts of ourselves where we're able to access our inner truth, our feelings and intuition, our values and beliefs. 

When we're able to step back from our ego and see it as a separate part of ourselves, we’re better able to recognise and control our ego-driven fears.  As I said in my last blog entry Head versus Heart, once we’re freed from the controlling influence of the ego, we find we have the courage to show up in the world with all of ourselves, with our strengths and weaknesses, our successes and failures.  With fear out of the way, trust is able to flourish, and we’re more likely to connect with a deeper sense of purpose in life and the courage to stand up and strive for what we believe in.

In conversation with a colleague recently, I was dismayed to hear that we shouldn't use the word ‘heart’ when talking about leadership development.  Apparently ‘heart’ is frowned upon because it has subjective connotations which don’t sit well with the constant demand today for objective, measurable data.  Talk of the leader’s heart moves us into the realms of human feelings and intuition, both of which are clearly unmeasurable and, worse still, somewhat mysterious.  So this simply won’t do in today’s organisational environment which requires strong, objective, outcome-driven leadership.

As I said, I was dismayed - in fact I was disheartened - because I refer to ‘heart’ regularly when I'm talking about what we each bring to our work in the world – e.g. “the teacher’s heart” – “the leader’s heart”.  To me, ‘heart’ is so much more than simply the centre of our emotions and feelings.  When I refer to ‘heart’, I'm talking about the very core of our being, the place where we bring together our intellect, our knowledge and experience, our values and beliefs, and yes, also, our feelings and intuition.  When we’re able to operate from a place where all these parts of ourselves are integrated, feelings and intuition become an important source of creativity and wisdom.  From this integrated centre we are able to step back and separate from our ego, and recognise how ego loves to control our lives with fear, ambitions and desire.  Once freed from the controlling influence of the ego, we find we have the courage to show up in the world with all of ourselves, with our strengths and weaknesses, our successes and failures.  From this integrated centre we also can find a deeper sense of purpose in life and the courage to stand up and strive for what we believe in.

The domain of the heart is also where we develop our human capacity for making meaningful connections and building rich, respectful and trustworthy relationships with ourselves, with others and with our shared environment.

For me, the word ‘heart’ signifies the source of our personal integrity and it is central to our sense of humanity.
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I believe the world needs more leaders with heart.