Presence in Complexity
The Known, Unknown, and Unknowable
Many years ago, when I first entered the Presence-Based Coaching work as a student, Doug offered three specific distinctions that I found very useful at the time of my professional stretch to learn to be a coach. These same distinctions have been bubbling up recently in my memory for re-examination. I am finding them to be once again useful and timely. The three perspectives...
Presence in Complexity through a Baby’s Cry
I had the pleasure, honor and intensity of being with my daughter and son-in-law last week with their newborn baby. It was a time of extreme emotions for me – deep joy and relief that this miraculous little being made the transition into this world safely. Feeling the baby’s wide-open heart and sensing her preciousness and innocence. Frustrated by my own habits of pushing...
The Hand of the Unseen
Our narrow view actually precludes seeing the workings of the system itself. When we are living and leading in complexity, we often experience the effects of complexity. We experience the unseen hand of governing dynamics. But, our narrow view focuses our attention on the effects themselves and how they threaten or create opportunities for us. Our narrow view actually precludes...
Presence in Complexity Series #9: Investing in Embodied Capacity
Complexity requires embodying new ways to lead. The problem is, our lightning-fast cognition says “good enough” way before our nervous system has embodied a new capability. Physiological change and cognitive processing proceed at very different timescales. A sound strategy for development requires components for both. We must feed our agile and impatient cognition. And,...
Presence in Complexity Series #8: Scaling Awareness
Complexity is unpredictable. Our world responds to good intentions and common sense actions with perverse and unintended consequences. Our noblest efforts fail to accomplish what we believe we should be able to accomplish. This is of course a huge challenge to our sense of self! And, it’s not personal! Complexity is actually normal Complexity is actually normal. Even when...
Presence in Complexity Series #7: Resilience: De-Coupling State from Context
Directing attention instantly and directly modifies our inner condition. We live in extraordinary times. It is a new form of agency to begin to discover that we can affect our mood, our sense of ourselves, our outlook on life, and our thoughts simply by directing our attention where we choose. What do you mean? No drugs, no therapy, no decades of self-improvement reading?...
Presence in Complexity Series #6: Leadership Presence in Complexity
Leadership presence is the means by which our internal feeling states are shared into our relationships. Leadership presence is the means by which our internal feeling states are shared into our relationships. Consider this thought experiment. You are walking down the sidewalk alone, at night. Someone is coming the other way on the same sidewalk, a hundred yards away. There’s...
Presence in Complexity Series #5: Embodying Congruent States
To the extent that the system around us being chaotic or fragmented means that we are chaotic and fragmented internally, we have lost the boundaries that distinguish us from the system. Wow, what a world we live in! It’s a New Year. And, we face a level of risk and uncertainty that I’ve not experienced since the Cuban Missile Crisis. My father is in the hospital, facing...
Presence in Complexity Series #4: Resourcing with Presence in Challenging Times
We live in very unpredictable times. And, this has profound effects on our moment-by-moment experience. Complexity, for leaders who are accustomed to making things happen, is an uncomfortable space. Lack of predictability can trigger us in ways that reduce our resourcefulness when we need it most. As a ready example, note your own reaction to the recent US election. What has...
Presence in Complexity Series #3: What Does the Body Have to Do With It?
Everything, really! Our body structures our interpretations of the world around us, generates our reactions to things around us, and determines the actions we take. Attention in the body is the key to staying resourceful when the world isn’t cooperating. It is how we can bring bringing awareness and choice into our reactions to the world. These urges drive our relationships,...
Presence in Complexity Series #2: Identity on the Line
Our responses in complexity are often determined, in ways that are both debilitating and invisible to us, by our perspective We experience situations as difficult when they call into question our sense of who we are. Among most of the people I know, domestically and overseas, there is a sense of outrage about last week’s election. Among others, there is presumably a sense of...
Presence in Complexity Series #1: Reading Our Context
Because we don’t know how to navigate this terrain, we tend to double down on what we’ve always done in an effort to re-establish our inner sense of a competent self. It’s most people’s experience that the world we live in is changing rapidly. We experience it as “VUCA,” a term coined by the acronym-favoring military at the end of the 80’s to describe the...