The 15 Commitments of Conscious Leadership

## Highlights We suggest that the first mark of conscious leaders is self-awareness and the ability to tell themselves the truth. It matters far more that leaders can accurately determine whether they are above or below the line in any moment than where they actually are. Distortion and denial are cornerstone traits of unconscious leaders. — location: 269 --- We are all committed. We are all producing results. Conscious leaders own their commitments by owning their results. — location: 323 --- In our experience great leaders pay more attention to how conversations are occurring than to what is being talked about. — location: 345 --- The gateway for moving from To Me to By Me is responsibility… — location: 417 --- …surrender, or letting go, is the gateway to move from By Me to Through Me. — location: 462 --- As leaders open up to Through Me, their purpose question changes. They ask, “What is life’s highest idea of itself that wants to manifest in and through me?” — location: 456 --- The By Me leader chooses to see that everything in the world is unfolding perfectly for their learning and development. Nothing has to be different. They see that what is happening is for them. — location: 425 --- the default setting for most of us is to place blame and find fault. Depending on how people are wired, they blame either someone else, themselves, or the system. — location: 578 --- heroing is a primary form of unconscious leadership. It is toxic because it leads to burn out, supports others in taking less than their full responsibility (being victims), and rewards behaviors that ultimately lead to individual and team breakdown. — location: 596 --- Commitment 1: I commit to taking full responsibility for the circumstances of my life and for my physical, emotional, mental, and spiritual well-being. I commit to supporting others to take full responsibility for their lives. — location: 617 --- self-blame is equally as toxic as blaming others, or circumstances, and it is NOT taking responsibility. — location: 638 --- What if there is no way the world should be and no way the world shouldn’t be? What if the world just shows up the way the world shows up? — location: 639 --- All drama in leadership and life is caused by the need to be right. Letting go of that need is a radical shift all great leaders make. — location: 647 --- Now when situations arise (formerly known as problems, crises, and issues), the standard response of the leadership of Athletico is “Hmm… this is interesting, what can we learn from this?” A second common response is “I want to take my 100% responsibility and see how I helped create this situation. I want to get all my learnings.” — location: 664 --- they realize that wanting to be right, being seen as being right, and being validated and appreciated for being right are what they really want. This attachment is all about the ego. What is “right” doesn’t need to be defended. The equation 2 + 2 = 4 doesn’t require us to fight about its validity. — location: 788 --- Wonder is a very different experience. It is not about figuring anything out. It begins with a willingness to explore and step into the unknown, which involves taking a risk and letting go of control—not an easy commitment. — location: 900 --- In our experience, most leaders rely on their head and neglect the heart. This approach can be catastrophic because the heart center is the center of emotional intelligence — location: 993 --- I commit to feeling my feelings all the way through to completion. They come, and I locate them in my body then move, breathe and vocalize them so they release all the way through. — location: 1008 --- Feelings are resisted and often repressed because they’re viewed as a distraction to good decision-making and leadership. — location: 1022 --- When asked to check in with current feeling states the accurate answer is “I feel…” followed by one or more of the five core emotions. If the words “I feel” are followed by “that” or “like,” you are expressing a thought, not describing a feeling. — location: 1041 --- Very few of us were raised by caregivers who understood that feelings are just sensations that need to be experienced and released. Most of us discovered that when feelings were felt, something bad happened. — location: 1063 --- The body releases naturally when you vocalize and let it move to match energy. By vocalization, we don’t mean “talk about it,” because that usually leads to recycling. Rather, we just mean make a sound. — location: 1102 --- In her book My Stroke of Insight, Harvard-trained and published neuroanatomist, Jill Bolte-Taylor says that emotions last at most ninety seconds. We agree. Most emotions—sensations occurring in and on the body—move through the body in a minute and a half or less (usually far less) if we match our expression with our experience. If you repress or recycle emotion, it can harden into a mood: Anger becomes bitterness. Fear becomes anxiety. Sadness becomes apathy. And these moods can last for years. — location: 1108 --- When we withhold, we cut ourselves off from the free flow of energy necessary for individual and collective creativity, innovation, and implementation. — location: 1290 --- Candor is one of the great antidotes to boredom. If couples learn to reveal rather than to conceal, boredom is rarely an issue in the relationship. — location: 1299 --- We don’t reveal our judgments to be RIGHT or to change the other person. In other words, when I reveal my thoughts and feelings I’m telling you about me, not about you. — location: 1341 --- Great leaders and teams become experts at revealing their unarguable experience (“I’m having a thought…”) without forming any attachment to being right about it. They share it and are curious about it, but they don’t need to defend it from an ego standpoint. — location: 1435 --- Most people listen while using filters. A filter is an internal lens that influences what we hear and how we respond. It translates a statement and gives it additional meaning, usually changing the way that the person responds. — location: 1460 --- One of the greatest gifts we give one another is to listen deeply to what the other person most wants. — location: 1477 --- We liken gossip to a ping-pong game: the speaker and the listener each hold a paddle. If a listener says he doesn’t want to listen and symbolically puts down his paddle, the game is over. So the listener is just as responsible as the speaker. — location: 1570 --- People gossip to gain validation, control others and outcomes, avoid conflict, get attention, feel included, and make themselves right by making others wrong. In short, people usually gossip out of fear. — location: 1747 --- “There is no such thing as a small breach of integrity.” — location: 1845 --- Making clear agreements first requires being very precise about who will do what by when. So many unconscious leaders are sloppy about this. For a blatant example, take the leader who says during a meeting, “Will someone look into that and get back to us?” There is no clarity around the who (“will someone”) or the what (“look into that”) or the when (“and get back to us”). — location: 1858 --- Note that when cleaning up a broken agreement, you don’t need to “explain” why you didn’t keep the agreement. In the world of energetic integrity, explaining is a waste of time. The energetic loop is broken both internally and between two people when the agreement isn’t kept. It doesn’t matter why it wasn’t kept. — location: 1896 --- we hear people say, “They’re boring. He’s been thinking about that same idea for years. She always laughs at the same jokes.” To us this simply means they have stopped paying attention with fresh eyes. — location: 2062 --- for many, it’s more difficult to receive than to give appreciation. Usually unconsciously, they use internal and external strategies to refuse the appreciation. — location: 2071 --- Refusing appreciation robs the other person of a chance to give you their gift. You cheat both of you out of an experience of growth and connection. And usually you deny a truth about yourself. — location: 2096 --- What would happen if you started observing people to catch them doing something good, rather than focusing on things they need to change or improve? What you seek, you will find. — location: 2104 --- The big idea is that each of us has a gauge—like a thermostat—that measures how good things are, with a limit just shy of “too good to be true for me.” We have a limit for different areas of our lives: how much money we’re allowed to make, how much love or closeness we can feel, how much joy we can experience, how much fun we’re allowed to have. — location: 2237 --- Experts say that the nervous system needs to be reprogrammed to allow for greater happiness, fulfillment, and relational connectedness. — location: 2262 --- Whenever we don’t allow reality to be what it is, we are in opposition to life. This opposition is the cause of all suffering. — location: 2636 --- Conscious leaders take responsibility for being the labeler of life. They learn to question all of the labels. — location: 2651 --- Exploring the opposite means being open to the notion that the opposite of your story (thoughts, beliefs, opinions) could be as true as or truer than your story. — location: 2727 --- The Work of Byron Katie (www.thework.com) is a powerful tool in learning how to question beliefs that could likely be holding us back. — location: 2732 --- All of our complaints, desires, dreams, issues, plans, goals, worries, etc. are simply “wants.” Leaders and all people want a lot. — location: 2772 --- “You cannot go anywhere to get what you already have and you cannot do anything to become what you already are.” — location: 2846 --- Those who believe they lack move in the world from fear and those who believe they are already whole, perfect, and complete, lacking nothing, move in the world from love and creativity. — location: 2870 --- I commit to seeing all people and circumstances as allies that are perfectly suited to help me learn the most important things for my growth. — location: 3118 --- Other people don’t even have to consciously commit to being your ally. If you are committed to experiencing them that way, they are always instrumental to your growth. — location: 3154 --- I commit to creating win-for-all solutions (win for me, win for the other person, win for the organization, and win for the whole) for whatever issues, problems, concerns, or opportunities life gives me. — location: 3244 --- Conscious leaders use curiosity as a tool for individual learning. In creating win-for-all solutions, they bring a deep commitment to curiosity to all their interactions; it underlies every conversation and experience. — location: 3268 --- I commit to being the resolution or solution that is needed: seeing what is missing in the world as an invitation to become that which is required. — location: 3350 --- (V X D) + FS > R = C — location: 3479 --- Remember that the ego/identity is powerful (and that’s good). It doesn’t want to let go of control and step into the unknown. It equates control with security and safety. One way it most likes to stay in control is to allow us to think we’re willing to change when we’re really not. — location: 3606 --- “Trying is wanting credit for something you never intend to do.” — location: 3609 --- Keep in mind that willingness and fear usually go hand in hand. If you don’t have some anxiety, you’re probably not really willing to change, and you don’t understand what it means to let go of control and step into the unknown. By Me, transformational leaders are always stepping into and through fear of the unknown. Get used to it. — location: 3652 --- Getting Real: Ten Truth Skills You Need to Live an Authentic Life. — location: 3735 --- Commitment 1: Taking Radical Responsibility Commitment 2: Learning through Curiosity Commitment 3: Feeling All Feelings Commitment 4: Speaking Candidly Commitment 5: Eliminating Gossip Commitment 6: Practicing Integrity Commitment 7: Generating Appreciation Commitment 8: Excelling in Your Zone of Genius Commitment 9: Living a Life of Play and Rest Commitment 10: Exploring the Opposite Commitment 11: Sourcing Approval Control, and Security Commitment 12: Having Enough of Everything Commitment 13: Experiencing the World as an Ally Commitment 14: Creating Win for All Solutions Commitment 15: Being the Resolution — location: 3907 ---