Tag Archives: Empower

Catch 22

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Temprod1

 

For some reason life is full of intractable – not easily solved or manageable – problems. The standard optimistic viewpoint on this is that it is for our growth, we will be given nothing we can’t handle, etc..

It also might just be the way things work, see The Root of Stress for a taste of the part we create ourselves. There is certainly the part we have no apparent control over as well, see 30 Blows.

In my practice we train with koans to find an appropriate response to situations that are not solvable by the rational mind. Such as, ‘What is the sound of one hand’, which you’ve probably heard of but with clapping added. Koan is an esoteric system, but one of the few tools that actually addresses this subject of meeting life head on.

This week I was presented with a life koan about this very blog. You see it seems LinkedIn would like me to:

‘modify my content to make it more in line with their professional network’.

This came right on the heels of another person from my old industry dying of a heart attack in his early 50s and as details were starting to circulate about the suicide the week before.

Corporate Rehab was started because:

people are dying from the lack of ability to deal with the end game of corporate life.

Wouldn’t the ‘professional’ thing to do be to acknowledge it?

I make no claim to be the most articulate or best council on this subject and would be happy to see the conversation and service expanded by others. However for now it is me and LinkedIn is the obvious platform. I will have to find a middle-way.

Much of what I have written so far is about looking inward which I know is a difficult step. For an easier first step may I recommend the book Everything is Workable .

If you are finding yourself out on a limb and feel like you have no choices … reach out to me, a priest, a minister, pastor a therapist … there is plenty of good living outside the corporate world view and it’s not that hard to find.

I hope this meets the censors criteria and sees the light of your screen.

May your lives go well

 

The Root of Stress

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Stress Pic

Stress manifests from one source and that is the maintenance of your story.

We each have a story of who we are.

You are not your story.

To complicate things you didn’t consciously create the story, much of the story you accepted from your family and the culture you grew up in without a thought. This is not wrong it is just how the self develops.

Stress develops when our story and reality diverge. The farther apart they are the greater the stress.

If we are successful at re-inventing our self as things change, life is fairly stress free. Most of us had a couple decades of career growth where this was true. We parlayed one story into the next, we were told and told everyone, we were growing. As the economy changed and corporate environment shifted, we found no motavation to re-invent ourselves in a direction we considered un-growth.

Our stories don’t accomodate being happy as the cheese guy at Whole Foods.

As an aside I chose this example because I know a guy who went from CEO to cheese guy and is quite happy.

Unknotting the psyche and psychology of the story and stressors is a long arguous process, it is much easier to just see through the whole story business. This allows the efforts you make to go toward moving forward on a new plan.

The goal of Corporate Rehab is to help you see through what is no longer serving you and empower you to write a new screen play where you lead the interesting and fulfilling life you desire.

May your life go well

 

Empower Yourself

Posted on by

Tempfodder

 

The poster to the left is meant to inspire you, it is a trap. It is bullshit.

Thinking like this is what got you where you are. It makes for successful egos, not happy human beings.

“Surround yourself with people who empower you to become better”

Where to even start?

 

‘people who empower you’ … No one empowers you but you!

‘surround yourself with people’ …. You’ve been surrounded by people all your life, how’s that working? I love the old Ram Dass line, ‘I’ll pretend you are who you think you are, if you pretend I am who I think I am’. We have created so many filters for dealing with people, if it is your way, you won’t pick them, they’ll show up. Dogs, cats, horse, a bug on the sidewalk, even the sidewalk are just as likely to provide you insight. Opportunities to glimpse your true self are literally at every turn.

‘become better’ …   what is better? If you knew what was ‘better’ you would have no conundrum. I do not know what is better for you and it certainly isn’t what someone else has done.

What it should say is:

Surrounding yourself with your true-self is empowerment.

So what to do:

There are two things that will help you begin the empowerment process and both are scalable, so you can begin from any starting place.

First, is to build a container. Find a place where for some amount of time you won’t be engaged by people, phones, etc. Notice, I said ‘engaged by’ not devoid of. Secondly, establish a ritual. To keep this brief I will give an example and leave it to you to be creative. You can start with 5 minutes only on Wednesday if you must and increase the duration, container and change the ritual over time.

For example go to a coffee shop out of your neighborhood or office radius, sit as alone as you can and enjoy your favorite beverage. Do the crossword, knit, journal, people watch whatever you might enjoy.

Commit to doing this for some period of time on a regular schedule. Yes it will be inconvenient at some point, this is when I want you to pay close attention. Did you even notice when you scheduled a conflict? Did you forget? What are the ‘yeh, buts’ of keeping the commitment to yourself?

Likely you will yield the first time and maybe even the 10th or 50th, just go back to the schedule and the ritual. It took 25-30 years to get here; it’s going to take a while to get out. As for the rest of the process, it will take care of its self.

May your life go well