Leadership, Feminine Power, Love, and Christmas

I’ve been away the past few weeks, and just realized that my last entry was a reaction to the Tiger Woods state-of-affairs, so I thought it would be better to leave something more thought-provoking to reflect on over the holidays. Last night we saw the movie, BLINDSIDE. It was a wonderful story that beautifully illustrated  the transformative power of the feminine. This is story about an intuitive, compassionate, persistent mother who completely altered the life of a young boy from the ghetto. The mother, played by Sandra Bullock, did what his male coaches and teachers couldn’t. If you are committed to influence others in ways that meet the changing landscape of today’s world, observe the way this mother transformed a life. I teach leaders across this country that leadership is is largely a matter of love. Leadership involves caring about people, not manipulating them. The mother in this movie reminded us that no plant ever grew faster because a gardener demanded or threatened it to do so. Plants grow only when the conditions are right and they receive proper care. Creating the best environment for plants and for people requires continual attention and investment. It is the feminine energy in all of us that bring us back to this truth.

Since this is the season of love, there is an opportunity to attune to compassion and sensitivity – the natural “beingness” of our nature. May we all take a few moments over the holidays to s-l-o-w d-o-w-n and learn some something about the power of love, the power of intuition, the power of trust in the capacity of the human spirit. Women, and their capacity to feel and tune in to their surroundings can be a powerful inspiration. I once heard a four-year-old say, “love is what’s in the room with you when you stop opening presents and listen.”

May peace be with you all this holiday season as we develop and express our innate capacity to influence the world with greater love, compassion, acceptance, and trust.

Tiger Woods and Authenticity

Well, here is my perspective on the Tiger Woods situation…

Great Golfer to Great Person?

“I make it very, very clear that my purpose in raising Tiger was not to raise a golfer. What I always wanted was to raise a good person.”

Earl Woods, Tiger’s father

Already the greatest golfer of all time, and with the world looking upon him, Tiger has an opportunity to take up the second, more important challenge, of his father. Tiger can see his current fiasco in his front yard as the media’s degradation of his private life — the worst of times — or he can come to understand the importance of his role in the world right now as a teacher, a leader, an influencer of others, especially youth — the best of times.

In a society obsessed with image, external trappings, and the “gotcha journalism” (it is disgusting that the night after the US President committed 30,000 young people to go to war, all the media was focused on Tiger), there is an immense opportunity – perhaps a responsibility – that comes with Tiger’s position to go beyond his success as a golfer or his mistakes as a husband. With the eyes of the world upon him he could teach us all that life is more than external success; it’s also about facing the darker sides of our nature, and that the ultimate fulfillment of life is not on the golf course or the boardroom or in material possessions.

It lies at the heart of his and our souls, in his and our character, in his and our courage to meet the demands of reality. Based on the rebound from his recent knee surgery, there is no doubt Tiger is resilient and will come back as a world leader on the golf course. What I hope is that he won’t miss the opportunity to turn his debacle into a positive rather than a negative outcome, based on the choices he makes — and become the world leader and a good person just as his dad wanted. There is, undoubtedly, a lesson here for all of us.

What is the lesson for you in all this? I’d love to hear from you.