Welcome to the CPL blog where we bring leading-edge thinking and stories of purpose in action. You can count on learnings and brilliance gleaned from our work with Purposeful Leaders around the globe. As authors of The Art of Convening™, we explore how convening brings your purpose alive.
Today we joined for our 97th Essential Conversation. This past week’s Essential Conversation was heavy, tearful, difficult, and necessary. This conversation continues a powerful sensing into the horrors of war and the heart it takes to find ways to heal.
Read MoreToday marked our 98th Essential Conversations. We invited back our conversation starters from last week Tatiana Riabokin, DC and Katherine Curran to share more reflections. We gathered for the Hearth to slow down and go deeper into our conversation on the Ukrainian Crisis. We hold the people of Ukraine and all the refugees in our hearts today.
Read MoreToday we joined for our 97th Essential Conversation. This past week’s Essential Conversation was heavy, tearful, difficult, and necessary. This conversation continues a powerful sensing into the horrors of war and the heart it takes to find ways to heal.
Read MoreToday we joined for our 95th Essential Conversation. Following last weeks conversation we welcome back our guest conversation starter from Rwanda; Jeremy Solomons. Today we took time to breathe, reflect, slow down and dive deeper into our conversations.
Read MoreAs we reach the end of the current month highlighting Black History and Futures, we are met with a time of uncertainty and fear surrounding the growing turmoil between Russian and Ukrainian borders. For this reason we began this 94th Essential Conversation with “This Joy” by The Resistance Revival Choir, a reminder that joy is an act of resistance against the pain, hatred, and inhumanity we find plaguing our world. Upon convening, we examined as a group, “How do you bring peace, joy, and love in the midst of ongoing disruption?” The responses included small acts of personal preservation such as going outside, meditation and prayer, or receiving a hug.
Read MoreDesigning “ultimate virtual dinner party”... What would be your recipe? People are hungering for “courageous conversations.” Imagine a great dinner party: What questions would you create and people would you invite?
What if the questions are uncomfortable? What questions would you ask a family member and/or best friend that may be different verses meeting someone for the first time?
Read MoreWhy a dinner party? What better way to plan a great conversation. Why today? What better day to talk about purpose than on Valentine’s Day, the day of love! Anthony Douglas Williams reminds us, “Our purpose is simple… to love; to love each other, to love all life, and to love our Earth.” But let’s not stop there.
Read MoreWhat is an elder? The word elder can evoke so many different things for everyone. In most cases we think of elder as a chronological period of ones life. If you think about it we’re elders from the moment we take our first breath because we’re living in a new way of being.
An elder is a person who has chosen to step into a role, not from ego but from a sense of calling within her or his heart that says they are a carrier and communicator of certain aspects of wisdom from their life experience. As many members mentioned elders have capacity, wisdom, experience and knowledge. It is a combination of all of it and not just from one or two generations but from all of us.
We are at a time of endings in our world. We’re in a time of tremendous anxiety and grief around climate change. Many people are seeing therapists for depression and anxiety around climate change which seems to get more and more daunting, every few months. It’s the end of a lot of things in our culture that have worked for us in the past; but they’re not working for us anymore. The age of disconnectedness and separation is coming to the end because it doesn’t work anymore.
We are impatient. We are sensing urgency without panic. A patient urgency. Our job is to imagine a new nation. Imagination is an action in the commons for the public good. None of us can do this alone. We need to take all the wisdom we have, all the experience we have and all the compassion we have and find a way to channel it. We cannot do this alone. We need trusted friends. We need to be vulnerable together so that we can go into more strength and not just have to be strong all the time ourselves and true community breeds wisdom and stability. Each of us have so much necessary to bring into this world right now, authentic action in the commons for the greater good.
Thank you Craig Neal, Carolyn Baker and Terry Chapman for bring this content and powerful topic into our community. Their new program Coming of Age at the end of an Age Program starts on February 21st. It is a wonderful place for this conversation to continue. (more information about the program below.)
Greta: “Eldering not as an age, but rather a mindset. When you think of it that way it is easier to apply it as a young person. The idea of wisdom and wisdom of not having all the answers but knowing whats coming. Rather a sense of direction and having foresight based off of your own personal experiences the perspective of others. Eldering is listening to others hearing from other people having conversations learning and then applying that to your life and sharing it with others. not regretting, to waiting but taking authentic action.”
Missed last weeks conversation? Watch HERE!
Coming of Age at the end of an Age Program
8 Weeks: February 21 - April 11th (7:00 - 8:30 PM Central Time) on Zoom
Our culture’s perception of aging may seem new and revolutionary compared with earlier generations, but is it really? Do our souls really long for more opportunities to travel, more attractive long-term care facilities, or larger flat-screen TV’s for streaming and video watching? While these may effectively enhance our quality of life, they may not feed our souls.
For thousands of years, aging women and men in indigenous cultures have chosen to consciously claim the role of elder, which did not simply mean becoming older. As an elder, a person was revered for their wisdom, not just their success in living many years. Elders were not afterthoughts in their communities but actually guided them because their cultures understood how important elders were for everyone’s emotional and spiritual maturity.
Coming of Age at The End of An Age is an opportunity for participants to rediscover the joy and power of stepping into conscious elderhood along with other participants on the journey. The series has been designed to deepen our wisdom, assist us in navigating the natural limits of aging, and lovingly give back to our communities the gifts that flow from the journey of awakened aging.
2/14: Making My Life Count: The Path to Purposeful Living Richard Leider
In the discussion we heard from several graduates of the Mastering Convening course about how their journey with The Art of Convening has shaped their work, life, and mindset. Their insight was both personal and profound, opening the conversation for small group discussions with the question, “What have you heard that resonated with you as a leader? In your life and/ or work.” The responses remind us of the power of the convening wheel which allow us to look inwards, practice living out love, authenticity, and looking for the good. When we give permission to ourselves we are able to see the same in others.
Read MoreThis week we gathered for the Hearth which is another expression of Essential Conversations. We welcomed back our allies Kelly Chatman, Yvette Trotman and Harry Waters Jr., who will continue to deepen our conversation from last week about justice and dreams of justice.
Read MoreIn continuation of the last week’s Great Reimagining of 2022 Part 1 (outlined in the image below), as we explore what it means to reimagine leadership as a community and as individuals Part 2 discussions centered around convening in organization and systems as well as the environment. After reflecting on last week’s discussions we were brought forth into a new discussion with a poem from the heart, mind and pen of Minx Boren in which she writes,
Read MoreToday brings the history that connects us all because we are all in this moment together. The poem by Maya Angelou: Still I Rise brings us together in unexpected ways. Maya Angelou’s birthday is the day of Martin Luther King’s assassination. There are connections there that will forever keep us home. The home comes from a very deep place. Sometimes we don’t see it because we are caught up in our own mind, world, and how we think things should be - but we are here together. We are all the legacy of Martin Luther King.
Read MoreHappy New Year from Center for Purposeful Leadership! We have all lived the lives of the old normal, but are ready to leave it behind and move on to a new normal
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