Great leaders are powerful builders of enterprise.  They have a knack for creating a clear vision, believing in its fulfillment with every cell in their body, and inspiring others through heart-centered communication to share their vision and act toward its creation.  They can hold the vision in light, under all circumstances – especially during times of darkness, when it seems the world is against its fulfillment.

That was one of my abilities as a business leader, yet as I move on to my second act in the world of leadership development, I’m gathering a more refined level of awareness of the obstacles that get in the way of fulfilling your vision.

I’ve come to believe that the only obstacle to fulfilling your vision is you – self limiting beliefs linked to emotional reaction patterns throwing you off center.  The antidote is to see that these obstacles are merely unskillful thoughts we buy into, and know that once inner clarity is achieved, external clarity arises through new choices in the context of expanded possibility.

Below is a 4 step model to help you make more empowered decisions, and overcome obstacles between you and your vision.

1.  Cultivation of CLARITY

Clarity is 1) a calm mind, 2) an open heart, and 3) a fearless soul.  From this foundation you can solve any problem and achieve any goal.  And it begins with a mind that isn’t reactive to the barrage of diluting, diffusing, distracting energy throughout the day.  Invest in alone time, ideally in the morning and evening, and practice stilling your mind.  If it feels right, focus on your breath to ground yourself in the present.  From stillness of mind, clarity arises.

2.  Arising of INSIGHT

Have you ever had a flash of insight – where you suddenly realized a solution to a problem that had baffled you, or the resources to make something happen that you didn’t think existed?  With the cultivation of clarity, you’ll be in deeper

connection to your authentic core.  Those flashes of insight become foundations of wisdom, and you’ll release stress while garnering increased power in execution.

3.  Discipline of FOCUS

While we work and live in a crackberry culture, we subjugate ourselves to the tyranny of the urgent, constantly under siege by an incessant stream of bits and bytes compelling us to the next distracting fix.  In addition there are so many agendas competing for our attention – our supervisors, colleagues, reports, family, friends.  When you cultivate clarity and insight, focus can be attained with greater ease.  You’ll still need to exercise discernment and discipline to focus on what matters most, but from clarity and insight, focus will be more natural.

4.  Devotion to RIGHT ACTION

Diffused focus is a common obstacle preventing so many from experiencing the joy in achievement.  Yet, clarity can replace confusion, insight can replace analysis, and focus can replace complexity.  Then right action – the next best step – becomes clear not only in moving toward fulfilling your vision, but also in the context of serving the whole – the triple bottom line – people, planet as well as profit.

So as you move through daily life toward your vision, and obstacles arise, instead of resisting and fortifying the obstacle (what you resist persists), garner gratitude for the gift of the obstacle, since it is your teacher – the mirror to your inner world.  To then transcend it through the cultivation of wisdom and right action – that is the real game of business.

Why am I here?  What was I put on this earth to do?  So many people I come across have never actively sought the answer, yet desperately want to feel connected and on path.  When I sought answers,  it lead me to other ontological and metaphysical questions – Why does humanity exist? Where do we come from?   What is our purpose?  Do we have a creator, and if so, what was his purpose in creating us?

After many years of seeking, studying and soul searching,  my personal discovery was – yes we have a Creator, and our Creator’s purpose is simply to fulfill her desire to experience herself through the multiplicity of form  – humans, plants, animals, rocks – nature in general.  All exist to serve the creator’s experiential knowing.  And when we align ourselves with the desire to serve, we align ourselves with Universal law – we expand, we evolve, we grow – in wisdom, compassion, and peace – qualities that some people refer to as happiness.  And if we serve other’s needs, using our unique abilities, our purpose arises.

I was recently re-reading a few pages from The Power of Now by Eckhart Tolle yesterday – one of my favorite books of all time.  He was talking about purpose and had a clear and powerful explaination.

According to Tolle, our life’s journey has both an outer purpose and an inner purpose.  The outer purpose is clearly to aim for a destination, or a goal.  But if we become preoccupied with the goal, or the next steps we must take in order to reach our goal, we disconnect from our inner purpose, which is to be totally present to the step we are taking now – or  “the quality of our consciousness at this moment”.

So while the outer journey might contain a thousand steps,  the inner journey contain’s only one step – the step we are taking right now.  And as this realization deepens, we become increasingly aware of the depth, the beauty, the perfection in the present moment, and the light of “being” shines through, both revealing and fulfilling our purpose and journey at the same time.

Then the question arises – does it matter whether we achieve our outer purpose – whether we succeed or fail?

The answer is it only matters if we haven’t achieved our inner purpose.  If we have, the outer purpose is only a game, to by en-joy-ed.  It is possible to achieve the outer purpose, and not the inner purpose – “outer riches and inner poverty” – we all know people like that.  The key point is that every outer purpose is ultimately doomed to fail – since it is subject to the law of impermanence – constant change, and we all die at some point.  So to give up the notion that our outer purpose can make us “happy”, makes tremendous sense.  And to subjugate our outer purpose to the practice of achieving our inner purpose – Consciousness – is what I’ve experience as the only real path to fulfillment.

What does everybody, universally, throughout humanity desire most?

Happiness.

Psychological and spiritual thought leaders all point to one fact – that we cannot find happiness, without first cultivating inner peace.  Happiness, or joy, grows from inner peace. In my experience, our nature is peace, joy, freedom, love.  Yet our nature is mired in interference – a powerful force that pushes our egos into the driver seat, causing us to become unconsciously motivated by fear (with its subtler forms of anxiety and worry) and greed (with its subtler forms of “wanting” more).  This only creates suffering, which can occasionally be medicated by pleasure – shopping, drinking, eating, numbing out to TV – yet with no progress toward sustainable inner joy.

How do we release the interference and access inner peace and happiness?

There are many paths, and no one size fits all.  A progressive release of attachments to the finite material world constructed by our minds is critical.  A journey into authenticity, heart and humility is vital.  A prayer ritual is powerful.  Finding a teacher, and beginning a meditation practice cultivates all of the above.

In my journey, I’ve found that the access point to peace, and then joy, is Presence.  Presence is the Way to open the door to the ‘absolute’ unmanifested – from our ‘relative’ finite worlds, and receive the flow of life force.  How do we achieve Presence?  I suggest a five step daily practice.

1. Awareness on a moment to moment basis (become aware that we’re not present);
2. Choose to be present;
3. Breath – connecting mind body and spirit;
4. Feel the internal energy field that arises, regardless of whether it’s pleasant or uncomfortable; (which takes us out of useless mind activity); and
5. Practice becoming focused on -  becoming one with -  the task at hand

As the frequency of awareness increases, and the choice to “be” is made in the moment, presence is deepened, inner peace is expanded, and joy is available – to arise from the foundation of presence.

So many of us feel anxious today. There are seemingly infinite sources of stress all stemming from things we cannot control. Will we have enough money? How do we ensure we are successful in life? The pressure to keep up at our jobs, in our businesses, with our families, friends, hobbies. The great stress and pressure from the need to stay ahead financially, or the need to be a good parent, a good son or daughter, a good sibling, a good friend and the list goes on.

Our sense of inner peace, which is our birthright, is under constant fire and is replaced by a sense of not being enough. And in the wanting desire to become enough – an aim that can’t ever achieve the perfection we often seek, we are left with a feeling of anxiety. I would assert that accompanying the age of information is the age of anxiety.

While we cannot control our external environment, we can control our reactions to stress triggers. However, many of us have not built up the natural “stress inhibitors” and instead fall victim to our conditioned responses of worry and fear that we’ve learned from our culture – parents, teachers, society. The worry is totally useless, does not serve us in any positive way, and increasingly sucks up positive life force energy from our daily existence.

Living in anxiety certainly cannot be the intent of a friendly universe designed to support our individual and collective well being. So how do we cultivate inner peace in a practical way in our busy day to day lives – without enrolling as an apprentice in a Zen monastery? It is certainly possible, but it requires practice and a commitment to becoming more conscious of our mental emotional reaction patterns – events, thoughts and feelings that trigger us into unconscious reaction – which are so often the cause of our inner disquiet. Stress reduction techniques can be broken down into three categories: physical (body), psychological/emotional (mind), and spiritual (spirt).

Three Dimensions of Stress Reduction

Physical

We cannot reduce stress and anxiety if we neglect our bodies. Diet, sleep and exercise are the obvious pillars of well being – so simple, yet not so easy. Exercise enables our bodies to abort the production of stress hormones, releases physical tension and promote relaxation. As well, with breathing, we regulate oxygen intake and carbon dioxide, and when we exhale in conjunction with our musculature, we can access deeper peace and serenity. Yoga is a powerful combination of both.

Psychological

We cannot reduce stress and anxiety unless we become aware of our thoughts, and the emotional reactions they produce. Without awareness there is no control, only reactivity to the incessant stream of daily forms that bombard us. This is the heart of mindfulness practice – developing increasing awareness of your thoughts, emotions and the accompanying awareness of physical sensations. Mindfulness minimizes anxiety, as you create space for yourself and become the observer of the anxious mind, vs. being the anxious mind.

Spiritual

We cannot reduce stress and anxiety unless we create perspective of the big picture -which means releasing attachments to the ever-so-dramatic “story of me”. Spirituality doesn’t necessarily only mean being religious, or praying in a church, mosque or synagogue . It can also mean internalizing spiritual qualities like gratitude for what is. Investing time into making a difference to others or the world – being of service. Spending time in nature and feeling a sense of sacredness in the natural world. Having a sense of being a part of something greater than ourselves, a sense of the presence of a higher power. Cultivating compassion for the human race, the earth, and a better world.

The following practice has helped me get through my most anxious days, and it is with gratitude and a desire that you find peace, that I share it with you.

Daily Practices for Stress Reduction

1.       Breath.

Breath is the life force of our worlds, the oxygen rich fuel that powers our sense of being. Yet so often we unconsciously move into shallow and choppy breathing when our lives become overwhelming. Consider committing to a week of steady, consistent breathing throughout your day, and feel the wonderful results.

2.      Be mindful.

Become the observer of your thoughts, not the reactor to your thoughts. This is the ultimate practice of presence, or mindfulness. We are constantly in reaction to the incessant stream of thoughts that bombard our daily lives, and we expend most of our existence in our heads. We have 60,000 thoughts per day, and 90% of those thoughts are the same! We repeat them over and over, consuming tremendous amounts of life energy to no avail! So often these thoughts center around mentally avoiding something we fear may happen, or mentally desiring something for our futures. They take us out of the present, and out of the flow – the juice of life. Begin watching your mind in this pattern of thinking that causes emotional volatility, and creating some space between you (your Self, Consciousness, Observing Ego) and your mind.

3.      Embrace stillness.

As your practice of watching yourself deepens, your consciousness arises – and your levels of inner peace increase. Take quite time for yourself. Begin a meditation and/or yoga practice.  Use yoga as a moving meditation (the original intention of Yoga) and observe how your thoughts manifest as emotional reactions, often in resistance to a pose or thought form. I’ve studied different forms of meditation and yoga for many years, and found that Jon Kabot Zinn’s book Full Catastrophe Living, provides a simple and elegant methodology for beginning practice.

4.      Practice gratitude.

There are always infinite interpretations of reality. See the proverbial glass of ‘your life’ half full, and invoke a feeling of deep gratitude for all the blessings in your life. Do this daily.

5.      Practice acceptance.  Surrender resistance.

When an event arises that creates a negative reaction in your system, feel it in your body, watch the reactive thoughts in your mind. Be with the thoughts and feelings. The thoughts are neutral, it’s the meaning we create that gives them the toxic charge. And know that you have the power to let that go. You can choose to hold on to the negative reaction – whether anger, resentment, fear, anxiety, rage etc., or you can choose to let it go in the moment.

Realize Greater Peace in 7 Days: Turning Knowledge Into Practice

There is a common understanding among business managers that what gets measured, gets done. I’ve extended this practice to my inner world, and the results have been significant. One way to start is to set up a spreadsheet, Word table, or use a paper notebook and create one row on the left hand side, and one column at the top. On the vertical row list each behavior. On the horizontal column list the days of the week. At the end of each day rate yourself on a scale (1 – 5 works) on how conscious you were of each behavior. At end of 7 days, enjoy the progress and keep the evolution moving.

Inner peace is the ultimate source of happiness, joyfulness ~ Dali Lama