Insights Blog
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- 4 Energy Patterns
- Acceptance
- Agile
- AI
- Andy Robins
- Anne Masten
- Artificial Intelligence
- Awareness
- Ayana Elizabeth Johnson
- B-F- van Heel
- bamboo
- Behavior
- belongingness
- Bio-leadership
- blowing dharma
- Body
- Braiding Sweetgrass
- breath control
- breathe
- bullies
- bully
- Carols
- Change
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- Chosei Zen
- Chozen-ji Zen
- Chris Niebauer
- Christmas
- Cliamte crisis
- Climate
- Climate Change
- Co-create
- Coaching
- Coll
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- Collective
- community
- Compromise
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- connection
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- COP28
- Coping
- Coping To Transforming
- courage
- COVID
- COVID-19
- Culture
- Curiosity
- Cycle
- Dan Siegel
- Democrats
- dharma bamboo
- Discomfort
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- division
- Donald Trump
- Driver
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- embodied
- embodied leadership
- Embodied Work
- Embodiment
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- Emergency Response
- Empathy
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- Energy
- Energy Patterns
- enthusiasm
- Explore
- Facing The Hungry Ghost
- Family
- Fear
- Fearless
- Fearlessness
- FEBI
- FEBI certified
- Feedback loops
- Food is Medicine
- Forbes
- From Coping To Transforming
- Future
- generative medicine
- Ginny Whitelaw
- Gordon Greene Roshi
- Gregory Bateson
- Habit
- harmonize
- HEAL
- healthcare
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- Healthcare Professionals
- healthcare system
- HealthScripts
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- hotchiku
- How
- I Don't know
- I don't know
- Individual
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- Integral Theory
- interaction
- Interconnected
- Interconnected Universe
- interconnectedness
- Jeremy Rifkin
- Joe Biden
- Jon Meacham
- Journey
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- Keishin
- Ken Wilber
- Kevin Cashman
- kintsugi
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- Kosha Joubert
- Labels
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- Leadership
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- Leadership Skills
- Leadership Without Easy Answers
- Learn
- Letting Go
- limiting beliefs
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- limitless opportunity
- Listen
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- Ma
- Malcolm Gladwell
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- medicine
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- Meditation Practice
- Michael Beschloss
- Mind
- mind-body
- Mindvalley
- Moving Forward
- Mu
- Nature
- nelson mandela
- Neurobiology of We
- New Year
- Nikki Jackman Joy
- No Answer
- No self, No Problem – How Neuropsychology is catching up to Buddhism
- no separation
- Normal
- Norman Garmezy
- Norris Hansell
- Nutrition
- Observe
- Omori Sogen Roshi
- One with
- One-Withness
- Orchid
- Organizer
- Otto Scharmer
- pandemic
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- perspective
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- political divide
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- Rebecca Ryan
- Refugees
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- resonance
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- Robin Wall Kimmerer
- Ronald Heifetz
- Samadhi
- Schismogenesis
- Self Awareness
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- slow
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- slowing down
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- String Theory
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- systemic view
- team
- Teams
- Terry LePage
- The Age Of Resilience
- The Inconvenient Truth
- The Leadership Pause
- The Mind-Body Way
- Theory Of Everything
- Time
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- trust connection
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- Ukraine
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- World Systems Solutions
- Zazen
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Service-Filled Life
Here in the UK, the past ten days have seen an extraordinary outpouring of grief and sadness following the death of Queen Elizabeth II. During my own life, I have promised to serve the Queen on two occasions.

5 Degrees Of Connection: Which Support You As A Leader?
Dr. Ginny Whitelaw writes about Ken Wilber's Integral Theory. There are 5 stages of connection. Which stage are you in?

The Gift of Time
Our days are usually filled with so much doing that stopping is difficult and must be intentional. Sometimes, however, pauses are thrust upon us often through no fault of our own, but through an accident or illness, the pause comes. For some of us COVID was this pause, but for others, we only got busier.

Facing An Inconvenient Truth Or Inconvenient Consequences
Dr. Ginny Whitelaw writes about the 4 energy patterns we all have access too. How can they help support you?

Leadership Development 3.0—Energy Included
Energy-infused leadership development could be called version 3.0, which both vitalizes leaders and guides them in making their vital difference in the world around them.

What is Self-Transcendence?
But, for those singular moments when my legs would gain speed and every part of my body would move further and further forward, gaining momentum – I knew what it was to feel connected to all, connected to my true self, connected to nature, connected to something bigger than what I thought of as me.

Saturated With Loss
On my kitchen windowsill is one of my grandmother’s orchids. I brought it home after she passed away earlier this year as it wasn’t faring so well without her particular care and attention - I understood how it felt. Although I’m still a newbie gardener and have zero experience with orchids, it started to revive and I felt the joy of her presence again.

Becoming The Future We Want
Energy-infused leadership development could be called version 3.0, which both vitalizes leaders and guides them in making their vital difference in the world around them.

What Globalization Taught Leaders—And What They Need To Learn Now
Energy-infused leadership development could be called version 3.0, which both vitalizes leaders and guides them in making their vital difference in the world around them.

Making Peace In The War Of Perfectionism: 4 Prompts To Practice Self-Compassion When The Battle Is Inside Yourself.
But in some ways, it can still be beautiful. Just like the Japanese art of Kintsugi, where we put broken pieces of pottery together with gold, there is simple beauty beyond perfection in embracing our imperfections and flaws as artfully raw and human.

Leading As A Land Grab Versus Leading As The Land
Dr. Ginny writes about two kinds of leadership, one that takes and one that recognizes the give and take.

Belonging
I am learning about belonging. The teachings of belongingness have come to me slowly from many wise people, communities, and nature. These teachings over the years are like walking a labyrinth, leading me towards the center and away, and towards the center and away from it again and again. A journey.

Depression: Weird Friend, Good Teacher
In this series called "Stuff I'd Rather Not Talk About," Rebecca Ryan Roshi offers her Zen perspective on different everyday experiences of being human. This month her talk is: “Am I Depressed?”If you or someone you love needs mental health help, please use the Mental Health hotline or its equivalent in your country.


Leading As A Wave, Not A Particle
Let that sink in for a few breaths. This is not just a phenomenon of the exceedingly small, but the nature of reality in which we lead, create families and communities, and make our difference. What it shows us is that process of observing is not passive, but a process of resonance or co-vibration that particularizes something by how it registers with us. In physics this is called “collapsing a wave function” where a range of possibilities condenses into a thing upon our pinpointed observation.

Making The New Year New — And Why Making the New Year New is Surprisingly Important
By flipping around our usual way of sensing, including our sense of self, we confound our filters, invert our thinking and let the new emerge. Descartes’ famous dictum, “I think therefore I am” flips around into the spacious truth that when we don’t have to reify a self, we don’t have to habitually think the same thoughts. We can put up different antenna and new music becomes possible.

There Are No Superheroes; It's You!
There is something slightly magical about mid-winter in the higher reaches of the Northern Hemisphere, the short days and long hours of darkness, with the sun rising around 8.00 am and setting soon after 3.30 pm. Stonehenge lies not far from my mother's house, where our prehistoric ancestors laid out a ring of stones to celebrate these circadian rhythms.

FEBI and Emergency Response Leadership
Nate Weed, a public health leader, shares insights on how the four energy patterns help leaders effectively respond to emergencies.

Cutting Back to Move Forward
Jen Ayres, a Zen Leader Practitioner, learns the art of letting go through her Zen training and her grandmother’s orchid.

Hark! Our Better Angels Sing: The Greatest Gift A Leader Can Give
In Lincoln’s first inaugural address, he appealed to the nation’s “better angels,” meaning the better aspects of our character, such as good sense and virtue. Seven score and sixteen years later, in the thick of the Trump presidency, historian Jon Meacham spoke to the battle for our better angels in The Soul of America. He recounts the disparities and triumphs of a nation founded on the declaration that all people are created equal and its unequal efforts to live up to that mighty truth.

How To Face A Mess – The First Flip of Zen Leadership
The world is a messy place. How do you face messes like these and still authentically add your value? Make the flip from Coping To Transforming.

How Resilience Deepens Depending On Who Is Resilient
These times are calling for a deep level of resilience. Relationships are an important factor in the level of resilience we are able to cultivate. How are your relationships helping your resilience?

From Individual to Collective Resilience: Notes from the (social) field
Dr. Maria Kukhareva shares about her experience working with young people that had experienced adversity. During that time, Dr. Maria learned a lot about resilience and it's relational nature.

The Key To Transformation Is Not Hacking The Form
The key to effective and enduring transformation lies beneath the surface in shifting the energies, including relationships and perceptions, that hold current forms in place.

Trust that everything is as it should be
One year ago, Courtney Amo, Dr. Julie Beaulac and Casey Berglund wrote "The Mind-Body Way." Now they are sharing how their Zen training is helping them share their work.

The Hidden Side of Deep Resilience in Leadership
Flipping around our sense of self fosters a deep resilience in leadership, as well as a joyful, purposeful life and a more joyful, resilient world. Here’s a practice for making this flip.

Out The Other Side
Brad Reed shares his journey through the Zen Leader series. He explores the ups, downs, and all the sides.

Growing Up In A Time Of Divisions - Schismogenesis
Dr. Whitelaw explores schismogenesis, the creation of divisions. She also offers ways to bridge those gaps.

How Joy Guides Us In Facing Climate And Other Messes
Dr. Whitelaw explores how are can use joy to face into any challenge.

Report from the Frontlines - Helping Refugees in Chicago
David and Sarah Rose, members of the IZL community, have been helping the Venezuelan migrants in Chicago. They share some highs and lows and ways everyone can help.