Engaged Spirituality & Mystic Activism

Slow Food? How About 'Slow Business'?

You might have heard the inklings about the fabulous 'Slow Food Movement', pioneered by Carlo Patrini of Italy, whereby the cultivation of appreciation, mindfulness, awareness, and sensuality is suggested as an antidote to the poison of our frenzied, 'fast food' (and fast everything) culture.

In other words, with the Slow Food Movement, you replace 'fast food' and 'eating on the go' with an attention to eating fresh, local food that is prepared at a gentle pace at home and is savored and enjoyed, perhaps, in the company of loved ones. Or, you simply allow the time to cook yourself a fresh, lovely meal and eat it as if it was a meditation. There is also an emphasis on 'shopping and growing local' and Nature-friendly approaches.

The more I read and learned about the Slow Food Movement, the more I realized that it embodied some of the key principles that I have endeavored to explore and share through Ivy Sea, and that I researched and wrote about in Big Vision, Small Business.

The primary difference is that, where Carlos Petrini is talking about 'slow food' and mindful agriculture and eating, I've been talking about 'slow business'.

What would Slow Business look like?

When we hear such a thing, we might immediately associate 'slow' with something negative. This would be an automatic response that comes from an indoctrination in the 'fast is better, bigger is better' culture.

Yet when we think about it, mindfully and heartfully, we know that our frenzied, urgency-worshipping, fast-everything culture is not optimal; in fact, we have plenty of evidence -- perhaps even in our own experience and life -- that 'fast' and 'urgent' are often unnecessary and harmful.

With 'Slow Business', as with Slow Food, we simply become more mindful, more aware, more skillful.

We have a greater sense of why we're doing what we're doing, and that 'why' is linked with heart-centered intuitive guidance about our own purpose, deep values, and 'right livelihood' than the old way of externally defined 'should do, or I won't be successful' thinking.

With 'Slow Business', we emphasize connection, in our actions as well as our vision or mission statements. We embody and demonstrate a true respect or valuing of the opportunity we have to share our gifts, skills, and 'pearls of experience', and to express our vision and purpose through our livelihood.

We extend this respect to all beings: in our way of relating to other people within and outside of our business or organization; in our decision-making, where we reflect on the ripple-effect and consequences of our actions, intending that they be positive and life-affirming.

We seek to explore, embody, and express deep values and the principles of 'holographic business' (read the article in the Transcendent Leadership Portal at Ivy Sea Online; there is a link from the Ivy SeaZine mentioned below).

We approach our work as a master-craftsperson approaches his or her art; we're artisans of business (or livelihood), creating a work of art in and through our organization or business, whether we're a larger group or a one-person enterprise.

In 'Slow Business', we weave a tapestry of positive connection and collaboration, seeing plenty and potential in the opportunities to co-creative with others on behalf of, and for the benefit of, others as well.

With 'Slow Business', as with living with greater mindfulness in all areas of our lives, we have a sense of what's 'enough' for us, so don't go into a frenzy of anxious seeking to acquire more than we actually need for living and expressing our purpose.

'Slow Business' simple means slowing down and visioning and acting from our center of being, our hearts, our 'Divine Essence' (whatever you might choose to call it), and make choices from this center, rather than 'fast business' where you're simply reacting and making hasty choices regardless of their ripple effects or consequences.

With 'Slow Business', you're experiencing joy and plenty and creativity right NOW, versus the frenzied 'always trying to catch up' that is the hallmark of 'fast business' and 'fast life.'

And oddly, though we've been conditioned to fear being 'left behind', we all remember the story of the race between the turtle and the hare, where the turtle's deliberate, steady, mindful pace outruns and outdistances the fast-hopping hare every time.

Slowing down can seem frightening, but that's just old conditioning talking. In reality, a greater mindfulness and awareness yields better choices and far-better outcomes.

And you get to enjoy your life and livelihood along the way, instead of constantly placing that enjoyment 'out there' somewhere in the distant future.

Read the rest of the April 30th Ivy SeaZine, from which this article was excerpted, at Ivy Sea Online.

Sincerely,
Jamie

Chasing Perfection, Missing The Magic That Is Now

What are we really doing, and what are we really robbing ourselves and others of, when we hold an image of 'the ideal', of 'perfection', that time after time real people, circumstances, or even we our selves do not -- and cannot -- meet?

We all do that, or have done that, in various ways. Holding a rigid image of perfection or an ideal, and then projecting that exacting standard out onto the people and situations of our lives, and measuring them one against the other. Of course, the 'real' always fails to meet the unmeetable expectation.

Why? Precisely because it is real.

An imaginary ideal of the perfect mate, or the perfect situation -- the fantasy woman or man, or job, or whatever -- is safe. It seems perfect because it doesn't speak, it requires nothing of you, and your own needs, habits, and rough edges don't bump up against it during the daily course of things. It seems neat and tidy, not messy and status-quo disrupting. It allows us to retreat into the old comfort of known fears and self-protecting habits.

And, in this fantasy that we escape to, we never ask what it took of us -- what it required -- to create the ideal, or to see a person as an ideal mate, or friend, to be the ideal mate or friend, or to see the ideal elsewhere. It just shows up that way, and is untarnished by other real-world influences, including our own 'stuff' and projections and moods.

Of course, there are costs and drawbacks to living with a fantasy of perfection that nothing measures up with. We can't kiss it, hug it, laugh or cry with it, hold or be held by it, make love with it, at least not in a full-sensory flesh-and-blood way. It's always out there, untouchable, and leaving us here and now, in our self-policed isolation and unconscious addiction to the drama of 'not having' and 'not enough'.

And because we never bump up against it, learn from it, laugh and adventure with it, we don't grow or expand in any real way. We stay static, fantasizing about something we can't experience right now and that can't touch us and move us out of our complacency and into what the Poet David Whyte calls the fierce edges of life.

This was the topic of the movie The Stepford Wives (1975, 2004), where criticism, dissatisfaction, and flaw-seeking of the real-world mate and lifestyle led to the creation of a seemingly utopian gated community and the seemingly perfect, albeit mechanical spouses that had been manufactured to conform to some ideal of perfection.

Of course, even in the film, the ideal gated community and the remote-control operated spouses ended up being flawed. And boring. The dark vein of conformity beneath the surface appearance of perfection was more than a little bit frightening. The mechanical mates malfunctioned regularly, and occasionally blew their circuits when their wires got crossed. The carefully engineered Stepford scheme imploded on itself as a result as real life seeped in through the cracks.

In our culture, we have a focus on constantly striving for unobtainable perfection, and, paradoxically and often tragically, an ingrained belief that we're entitled to instant gratification and having our real lives improved by 'virtual reality' without any effort or discomfort or patience required of us. Just take a pill, pop on the virtual-reality headset, or slip into Fantasy Land, and voila -- instant happiness, just not real, and not here and now.

Even in our spiritual or self-mastery practices, our perfectionist programming, ever seeking the elusive ideal, carries us out of our mindful, loving-kind, and compassionate natures, and out of the present moment, to conform with the over-striving, hyper-competitive 'battle' that we've been taught to believe we can actually win, and that fuels itself on fear, anxiety, stress, and discontent.

Many spiritual teachings speak about this, and tell us not to get blindly seduced by and addicted to the worldly and material quests and illusions, lest we find ourselves lost. They tell us that we don't have to find ourselves, because our truest Selves have never been lost … just paved over. They tell us that the Kingdom of Heaven is around us, if we adjust our focus to see it and open our hearts to feel and sense it. That tell us that what we nourish with the fertilizer of our heartful attention expands and grows.

A spiritual mentor recently said, "The opportunity is really about asking, 'Can I love and cherish what's right in front of me -- do I choose to work with and appreciate this wonderful, flowering gift in the present -- or do I distract myself with the illusion that there is something better over my shoulder, the allure of finding better treasure in the next field?'"

She continued, "The restless young soul is at odds with the wisdom wanting to be born in and through us, and with one another."

The Jungian Analyst and Author, Marion Woodman, spoke of our addiction to perfection, and wrote, "... perfectionist standards do not allow for failure. They do not even allow for life..." 

Yet the allure of the fantasy tugs at us. We expect circumstances and other people to conform to its glossy ideal; get frustrated, angry, and even resentful when it and they do not; and then wonder why our dissatisfaction, loneliness, anxiety, and suffering seem to increase.

And in doing so, in seeking Stepford lives, jobs, partners, friends, and even Stepford Selves, we rob ourselves of the beauty, magic, laughter, and love within us, around us, and in the present moment.

In constantly keeping our eyes to the horizon, without ever shortening our glances, we miss the perfection that is right in front of us, and it passes by unappreciated, or unnoticed.

What magic, what beauty, what blessings, and what Love is in your midst right now, awaiting your full-hearted presence and appreciation of it? Are you willing to cherish what's in front of you right now, and work with the beautiful, flowering gift in the present?

Blessings and Beauty on the Way,
Jamie

'Culture of Urgency' is an Empathy Killer

Most of us have heard it, probably more than once. And we've surely felt it, and been caught up in it at some point. Or perhaps we're still caught up.

I remember that, when I first became aware of the 'Culture of Urgency' that I'd been entranced by, I was consulting on several change-management communication projects, to several different large-sized organizations. One was a healthcare system; all had corporate or organizational cultures that emphasized, or perhaps idolized, 'urgency'.

As I conducted a wide variety of conversations with people throughout the organizations, it also became clear that the organizations of 'urgency' had something else in common: a culture with norms of rudeness, curtness, brusqueness, and high levels of stress and problematic communication.

We might also notice this in urban areas, in which a fast-paced culture seems inevitably paired with incidences of 'road rage', rudeness, disconnection, coldness, or observations such as people stepping over persons slumped against buildings, without a so much as a glance.

In San Francisco during the dot-com invasion, longer-term residents of the City noticed that, as the culture was permeated by people flocking in for the 'get rich quick' technology boom, those less-civil observances became more and more the norm. For example, San Francisco was awarded the distinction of having one of the highest levels of pedestrian injuries, because people were more routinely rolling through stop signs or red lights and hitting pedestrians.

These observations, as it turns out, are not unusual. Research by people such as Daniel Goleman, author of the book Emotional Intelligence, indicates a connection between empathy and compassion and our ability to be present enough to choose them. The faster the pace, the more distracted or in a hurry we are, the less we choose our innate capacity to empathize or be compassionate.

Perhaps this is why civilizations, as they became more industrialized, urbanized, automated, and high-tech, may also seem to be, upon study, more brutal or less compassionate. It would be interesting to delve further, but from the information available, it's at the very least a fair question.

Goleman, in a TED talk, emphasizes that all individuals have the capacity for empathy and compassionate. We are innately 'wired' or created to connect with and empathize, and from that sense of connection and empathy choose a compassionate, altruistic action or response. When we do things that help us to slow down, center ourselves, be more present, pay closer attention, we are more likely to act from this innate capacity for connection, empathy, compassion, and loving kindness.

Spiritual traditions have historically emphasized practices such as contemplation, presence, attention, prayer, and meditation. There are some philosophical traditions that have emphasized the same, though in a non-spiritual context.

Each of those helps us to disengage from our culture-induced (and well-ingrained and reinforced) addiction to urgency, to speed, and perhaps the adrenalin addiction that accompanies with it. Practices that help us to slow down also help us to detox, and by doing so, re-engage with our innately 'Divine' qualities, or, as Abraham Lincoln put it, the better angels of our nature.

Given the current state of things, where the costs of our speed addictions and cultural idolatry of 'urgency' are horribly evident, what used to be 'a luxury' or 'a waste of time' -- through the lens of our addiction to urgency -- has now become essential not only to the better angels of our nature, but to the wellbeing of Mother Earth, Gaia, and all of us who are supported by it.

Giving our attention to those practices and ways of being that help us to slow down, and approach our 'doings' in this way, is a great way to allot our energy, time, and attention.

So don't just do something, sit there. Go slowly, and notice.

To listen in and watch Daniel Goleman's TED talk, follow the link.

Blessings,
Jamie