Most of us will feel we have little time for contemplation or at best it’s done on the run. The dictionary offers several layers of definition of ‘contemplation’ ranging from ‘deep reflective thought’ to ‘seeking to pass beyond mental images and concepts to a direct experience of the divine’.
Whilst from a leadership perspective, in general, the latter definition might feel like a deeply personal expression and not for the world of work, and, for some, an irrelevant definition, it nevertheless offers us something extra beyond ‘thinking deeply’. It invites us to go beyond our rational mind and toward something more abstract, wider and potentially richer.
In Otto Scharmer’s work on ‘Theory U’ he shares a fundamental observation of corporate life today…our tendency to get consistently hooked into relying on linearity – going from problem to solution – from opportunity to action – without entering into a more expansive space of receptivity and contemplation – without entering the ‘U’ and listening at deeper levels.
In an esoteric wisdom book a process of creative meditation could be paraphrased as follows:
· Identify what you want to meditate on
· Open the mind to receive (this broadens the possibility of new insights and admittedly is one of the more difficult stages)
· Spend time with a clear focus on the topic you are meditating on – be open to seeing it from different angles
· Deliberately focus on the (new) ideas that emerge
· Recognise the new thoughts/ideas that may be emerging without judgement/filtering (again this can be a very difficult stage if we haven’t detached from our daily concrete mind)
· Allow them to unify into something that has new possibilities in your consciousness (allow for non-linearity)
Contemplation, meditation, deep reflective thinking, entering into the U of Scharmer’s Theory U formula…all of these are inviting us to break the pattern of linear thinking and our over reliance on pace and immediate solutions and move toward listening more deeply and entering into a broader field of insights and wisdom.
The paradox is that once we take the time to develop this practice of contemplation and reflective thinking at a deeper level, we actually create better solutions more quickly – the answers come in new ways and with new dynamism. They feed us and they feed others. Of course, new challenges also emerge as we seek to bring new thinking into cultures where only safe, tried and tested solutions are accepted. The safe route however won’t bring the transformative step change needed if we are truly to create a better world for all.