We are surrounded by crises big and small and the inclination to see them as something to be afraid of is strong – after all we have inbuilt fight and flight mechanisms for a reason and when we see the danger posed by many of the crises why wouldn’t we allow ourselves to feel fearful. The triggering of fear also triggers the seeking safety response.
The challenge we have today though is there are very few safe harbours to be found given the breakdowns being faced on every level – social, economic, health… Where and how can we seek the ‘shelter’ that might enable us to feel some level of equilibrium?
Like so much of life perspective is everything – noticing the level at which we are seeing – the lens through which we are assessing and the scale of the vista we have within our sights. Whether we are leaders of teams and organisations, parents and family members or social and community leaders – in fact whatever our ‘function’ or identification, it seems to me that the wider and higher we can take our perspective the more chance we have of addressing the fear and even moving into gratitude.
For example, our economic system is deeply flawed – it places money at the centre of all life and favours those with money and penalises those without. So the fact that we can see so clearly the blatant manipulation of power through the associated power of financial wealth is a blessing is it not. We’ve known it, we moaned about it, we sought to find our own little corner of protection within it and if we’re really lucky we’ve even been able to make a fraction of it work for us.
But right here, right now in 2025 there is no sweeping under the carpet, no opportunity to pretend – the economic system we have does not support the greater good of all life on this planet. And this is just one topic which is of course vast and complex but, in a nutshell, the economic crisis contains within it opportunity – not to get rich quick but to enable another system to be created that contains higher values at its core. That though, requires firstly a willingness to see the opportunity and secondly the collective will to demand more (of ourselves) and activate something better.
Here we come to conscious leadership – by that I mean the willingness to act from a place of higher consciousness in all leadership – whether we are leaders in a formal sense or because we are in touch with our inherent leadership that exists within every person.
Conscious leadership is underpinned by higher values, a commitment to the greater good, a deep recognition of the interconnectedness of all living things and a deep respect for Life.
When systems breakdown, new light can enter – new ideas can be born and manifested, courage to seed change can be rewarded. Accessing the perspective of gratitude for the breakdowns, for the failings, for now fully seeing the fundamental flaws in how we are governing ourselves as a humanity on every level, brings with it huge riches. As we shift our perspective and access our equilibrium we can channel our courage to the right places.
Let’s use this time of global crisis not to hide or seek refuge but to access our gratitude and enable our courage to rise up as we dare to design a world that is fundamentally fit for our grandchildren and their grandchildren.