Month 1: Purpose
This is a rented house.
You do not own the deed
You have a lease, and you have set up
a little shop where you barely make a living sewing patches on torn clothing.
Yet only a few feet underneath
are two veins, pure red and bright gold carnelian.
Quick. Take the pickaxe and pry the foundation. You have got to quit this seamstress work.
What does the patch-sewing mean, you ask. Eating and drinking. The heavy cloak
of the body is always getting torn.
You patch it with food
and other restless ego-satisfactions.
Rip up one board from the floor
and look into the basement.
You may see two glints in the dirt.
-The Pickaxe (2), RUMI
Reflecting on Purpose Exercise:
Compare and contrast the quotes and poems above and below with what you are learning about purpose in general and the importance of discovering your unshakable inner purpose.
How is your relationship with purpose changing?
What does it mean to have an externalized sense of purpose?
How does an internalized vs externalized sense of purpose shift or change the experience of your life?
Describe how developing a sense of inner purpose or unshakable sense of purpose related to emotional experience and/or the process of individuation.
Describe how your experience of your life shifts or changes when you discover your Unshakable Purpose.
How is your sense of purpose shifting or changing?
“When we are not identified with the fear of the small self, we remember who we really are.”
Jack Kornfield
"In General, Purpose In Life Can Be Defined As A Self Organizing Life Aim That Stimulates, Organizes Goals, Manages Behavior, and Provides A Sense of Meaning"
Journal of Psychosomatic Medicine, March 2016
“Vision and Purpose: Generally speaking, as you get more access to Self and become more Self-led, you also attain more clarity about the vision you have for your life, which means that your priorities may be quite different than they were when your protectors were in charge.”
- Richard C. Schwartz Ph.D., No Bad Parts
Perspective
As high-performing leaders who want to be our best, we must learn to connect to our bodies, nervous systems, and state of being if we want to respond consciously and creatively to the challenges of life, work, and relationships. To do anything else would be to repeat a pattern of disconnection, avoidance, addiction, trauma, or fear-based protection that will stagnate our growth and development as human beings and as leaders.
We survived to get here. Along the way, we develop protective parts of ourselves to survive and fit in. This process is non-conscious and adaptive, meaning most leaders are completely unaware of protective parts. This leaves them prisoner to their anxious, angry, fearful tendencies running their lives with limited access to the resources, qualities, and gifts of their nurturing, generative embodied Self. Every new season of life, work, and relationship invites a new opportunity to relax, open, and connect to our lives. The way to do this, as we will discover in this program, is to first notice our tense parts and then to learn to befriend and to attend to them.
There are no bad parts. As we move through the flow of our default life, these parts of us have helped us maintain our roles, relationships, and responsibilities. When this happens, we begin to identify with these parts; we are fully blended, and it can be said that our parts are running the show. It’s essential to recognize that there are no bad parts; Jung called this process of maturation into our whole selves the process of individuation. This is the process a leader must go through to discover her own inner uniqueness and hidden gifts of his shadow and to become a whole person. This is the work of embodied leadership.
The first stage of the Embodied Leadership process is purpose. We return every season to reconnect and deepen our connection to the qualities of the embodied Self so that we can learn to bring Self-leadership resources to our lives, relationships, careers, and communities.
“To fully operate in the inner and outer worlds, the self needs access to the body”
- Richard Schwartz.
Discover your Unshakable Purpose: Our Unshakable Purpose is the purpose that will never go away. When a person realizes this purpose and takes it on as his mission to accomplish, he creates a ripple of transformation and change that extends out to everyone and everything.
What is your Unshakable Purpose? To do the work to become the primary caretaker for your protective parts of self to allow the wholeness of who you are as a human being and leader to be fully and completely unleashed on the world.
To become Self-led, a person must directly experience the qualities of the embodied self-state. When leaders discover this state, we find they can be guided to find their innate sense of wisdom, vision, and healing.
Welcome to the Embodied Leadership Training Program. This is the beginning of a 6- month process of transformational change. You will move through a 3-month seasonal cycle 2 times with up to 30 other leaders. After you complete this cycle, you will develop the embodied leadership skills and tools required to become an Unshakable Executive. These skills will be mastered and embodied for the rest of your life.
Each week, you will receive an email with that week's theme video, reading, and an outline with the learning objective, embodied practice, and journal questions. Review these, do the embodied practice, and come to a group to practice with other leaders who are co-creating this container with you.
If you have any questions along the way, email chris@returntopractice.com
Learning Objective:
Discover your unshakable purpose and what it means to be Self-led. Conjure the qualities of your embodied self and reflect on your inner experience with other people.
Embodied Practice:
Unshakable Purpose Practice - Conjuring The Qualities of Your Embodied Self
Set a ten-minute timer and walk around your home until you find a spot that calls to you to sit—inhaling in your nose and out of your mouth. Finding a seat in a chair or on the floor or earth, coming into your body to be with whatever you feel. Just sit.
Pause for a moment to reflect on your life from birth until now while looking around the room. Scan your perceptual database for sensational events and experiences that have been memorable. While looking around the space, reflect on the process of survival you have gone through to get to where you are today. As you reflect on this path of survival, you notice what protective parts within your body ignite and turn on. As images and memories come to mind, feel into your body and ask yourself, what am I feeling? Where do I feel it in my body? And What does it need? Don’t answer with your mind; wait to feel for parts of you to tell you their answer. Then, notice a shift or change in your state of being. Are you able to access a state of Self Energy? This is an allowing process.
We conjure these protective parts with our minds and learn to access our innate embodied qualities of self-energy. See if you can find one part to work with and get to know it, inspiring it, turning it up in or on your body, giving it what it needs or wants by moving your body, making a sound, breath, or posture to soothe and care for the part. When the timer interrupts, you go and turn it off. Then, thank each part you found and celebrate to close your practice. This is your unshakable purpose. To learn to allow your life to open you and to do this work.
***If you feel frustrated, annoyed, confused, distracted, or disconnected. Use that. Connect to that. And then, bring your experience back to the group to reflect on what you experienced. All experiences are welcome here, and there is no right or wrong. You are the only person who can do this work and who can be trained to report on your inner experience. You will get better at this. But you must practice and then share what you noticed to go deeper.
Journal Questions:
What are the qualities of the embodied Self, where is it accessed, and how are they different from protective parts?
What is your unshakable purpose? How does connecting to your Unshakable Purpose shift your experience of your life?
What does it mean to access the embodied Self in your words?
How do you discern between your embodied Self and a protective part of you?
Describe one moment in detail from this month when you tapped into an experience of the embodied self.
Where have you noticed protective parts of yourself getting in the way and running your life?
Growth question: What is your relationship with falling into the earth, unconditioned space, and something to experience?
“Letter To Self” Work-Statement
Suggested Reading:
Season 1: Read or Listen to No Bad Parts, by Richard C. Schwartz, Ph.D. Season 2: Read or Listen to The Practice of Pure Awareness by Reginald A. Ray, Ph.D