The Time Has Come To Cross The Threshold – death/rebirth of self and system

Amid this time of upheaval and systemic challenge, we can reveal wisdom-seeds of a new way starting to spawn deep within us and within our social systems.

All transformation starts with a rupturing of the status quo. Breakthrough is preceded by breakdown.

This is what we are experiencing today.  From mass migrations, social unrest and increasing mental illness through to pandemics, climate change, ecological degradation and economic turmoil – a civilisation is dying and a new one being born.

At the heart of this systemic shift is a transformation in worldview upon which our beliefs are founded – a shift from a mechanistic worldview of separation to a participatory worldview of interconnection.

In short: the dying yet still dominant worldview today perceives life as a purposeless random affair, where separate individuals and competing organisations struggle for survival in a dog-eat-dog world. The lens of perception through which we perceive ourselves and the world around us is a narrowed-down lens. It objectifies the world into separate objects and deterministic push-pull relationships. It assumes life is like a clockwork machine that can be understood by examining the parts.    We have trained ourselves over generations of schooling to see this narrowed-down view.  It has become acculturated in us to such an extent that much of the time we don’t even question it, thinking it’s the way life really is. We analyse, extrapolation, categorise and manipulate the world around us, and lose our inherent empathic connection with life.  This creates a sense of separateness and insecurity that then fuels an ego-need to compete, control and dominate in order to be safe in a fearful world.   This atomisation of life, society and the individual desensitises us creating imbalances in us. We attempt to satisfy these inner tensions through outer material betterment and techno-fixes, unable to see that it is our inner imbalance that is the source of the problem.

The new worldview being born dares us to open-up this narrowed-down lens of perception, so we can perceive more of how life really is and enliven our empathic connection with all of life.

“A human being is a part of the whole called by us universe, a part limited in time and space. He experiences himself, his thoughts and feeling as something separated from the rest, a kind of optical delusion of his consciousness. This delusion is a kind of prison for us, restricting us to our personal desires and to affection for a few persons nearest to us. Our task must be to free ourselves from this prison by widening our circle of compassion to embrace all living creatures and the whole of nature in its beauty.” – Albert Einstein

This task that Einstein refers to, is the key to solving the social, environmental and economic challenges we face today. It involves a widening of our perceptual horizon that shifts the way we interrelate with ourselves, each other and life.  It’s a shift in consciousness from separateness to interconnectedness.   It is a home-coming, as it re-engages us with more of who we truly are, and how life really is. With it comes freedom, expansiveness and a humbling responsibility to find accord with life through our own coherence and connection.

Crossing the Threshold

This opening-up to more of reality, is a threshold-crossing, where the old sense of self starts to die, and a new sense of self is born.  It’s a psychological death of letting-go that welcomes in a richer experience of life.  It is as radical as the metamorphosis of the caterpillar to the butterfly.

 

“How does one become butterfly?’ Pooh asked pensively.

“You must want to fly so much that you‘re willing to give up being a caterpillar,” Piglet replied.

“You mean you die?” asked Pooh.

“Yes and no,” he answered. “What looks like you will die but, but what’s really you will live on.” 

– A. A. Milne

 

To die and be reborn is the task of our time: individually and collectively.

The Journey of Crossing the Threshold lies at the heart of all world myths and wisdom traditions. It is the Journey of overcoming the inner challenges amid a world of opposing tensions.

To begin to sense the wisdom contained within the alchemy of life’s tensions is to sense the wisdom that pervades life.

To apply a contemporary framing to Crossing the Threshold, we can draw upon MIT’s leadership specialist Otto Scharmer and his Theory U, which draws from ancient wisdom tradition.  We have to journey down the U by letting-go and opening-up our mind, opening-up our heart, and opening-up our will, so as to connect to Source at the bottom of the U. From this place of inner coherence and connection, we can start to engage in right thought, right relation and right action. A new, richer perception unfolds, and our orientation of self-other-world shifts.

(source – Presencing Institute)

We cannot expect ourselves to come up with real and lasting solutions to today’s challenges without first knowing how to let go and connect to Source.  Yet how widely taught is this in our Universities or Business Schools today?  We are all-too-consumed with the dying worldview that objectifies the world with machine thinking – the very thing that skews our capacity to connect to Source. Hence, fashionable movements like Agile, for instance, get mechanised and superficialised into the outer ‘doing’ techno-fix part. The inner dimension of how we more effectively open-up, collaborate and engage systemically, is often overlooked and so the well-intended movement fails to truly transform ourselves and our organisations in any deep and lasting way.

Connecting to Source

Right at the heart of crossing the threshold is the capacity to tap into the life-force or Source within and all around us.

This inner connection to deeper parts of ourselves and reality is a very natural capacity we all have as human beings.  For the large part of our human history we lived with this deep connection to Source, yet as we became more mechanistic in our thinking, we drew ourselves away from this interconnectedness.

There are many methods and practices to help aid our reconnection with Source.  Practices such as meditation, walking in nature, playing a musical instrument, dancing, singing, sleeping under the stars, and such like, can aid us.  Yet to have a deeper more lasting transformation from an old separate sense of self into a more interconnected sense of self, requires an intentional practice over a longer time period, often involving a ‘dark night of the soul’ – months perhaps years through which we may experience depression or inner-shifts that feel uncomfortable and challenging, yet are part of a death/rebirth process.

Intentional practices where we work on letting go of the old self, connecting to source and creating space for the new self to be born and nurtured within us are useful.  I have found that Vision Quests in nature are powerful in this regard – a well-held intentional space of being in nature for atleast a day and night, preferably longer, where we allow our awareness to soften and our perceptual horizon to open-up while being in nature, connected close to the earth, and receptive to the plants, animals, clouds and sky around us while gaining space from everyday habits, routines, distractions and to-do lists.  I have experienced my own ‘dark night of the soul’ and also enjoyed many nature-based vision-quests. I have personally felt the wisdom innate within nature, and the healing and transformative power this wisdom provides. I have also applied this wisdom and healing through the coaching work I do to aid people through their own threshold crossings and dark nights of the soul as they go through important life inflection points, while finding deeper purpose and coherence in their lives.

‘We have today to learn to get back into accord with the wisdom of nature’ – Joseph Campbell

Gaia Theory, Facilitation Ecology, Quantum Physics, Depth Psychology, Neurobiology, Systems Thinking, Cybernetics, Complexity Theory and other 20^th century scientific discoveries illuminate the systemic, participatory and interconnected nature of life and consciousness.

Today’s dominant yet dying worldview still holds-on to separateness, and sees consciousness as something limited to within our own brains, even though Nobel Laureates and award-winning scientists now know otherwise.

The task of our time is to learn to let go and connect to Source so that we can get back in tune with the wisdom innate within nature.  It’s this wisdom (and its medicine) that we desperately need to help us find solutions to today’s challenges; solutions unencumbered by the same logic that created the problems in the first place.

It can seem a bit paradoxical to suggest to the busy business mind that the wise course of action for the leader is to stop, pause, take time out, breathe deep, connect and then sense and respond.  But this is what is needed now, amidst all this cacophony and confusion.

The other side of complexity is a beautiful simplicity.

In my latest book co-authored with Laura Storm, Regenerative Leadership, we explore how to connect to Source and access the wisdom of nature – a process we refer to as Activating our Super Nature.

Pioneering psychologist Carl Jung extensively researched different human intelligences everyone has access to:  intuitive; rational; emotional and somatic

The intuitive way of knowing has often been related to the element fire, and also to SQ or quantum intelligence – this intuition informs us as we bring this insight into our daily awareness, influencing our decisions.  Opening up to this intuitive intelligence requires us to reach beyond the grasping busy-mind of our daily awareness, to quieten, and still ourselves, so we can better cultivate this receptivity.

The emotional way of knowing has often been related to the element water, and also to EQ – the feelings within us, ebbing and flowing, inform and enrich our daily awareness, influencing our decisions.  Opening up to this emotional intelligence requires us to not simply react to feelings but sense-inward, allowing our feelings to have space, so we can consciously respond to these feelings. It is a subtle yet important shift from reactivity to responsiveness, from blind emotional outburst to informed emotional intelligence.

In 1995, Daniel Goleman’s work on Emotional Intelligence highlighted the importance of emotions and emotional intelligence (EQ) for leadership development and organisational learning. Goleman found that how we cultivate awareness of our own and other’s feelings and unconscious bias, then consciously respond to these feelings and filters in appropriate ways, helps our leadership potential.   Studies show that EQ out-performs IQ as a predictor of job success and performance capability.

Then in 1997, the neuroscientist Candace Pert’s ground-breaking work Molecules of Emotion provided more insight into the integration of body-mind sensations, feelings and thoughts, in what Pert referred to as the ‘psychosomatic network’ – an integrated system of psyche and soma. The psyche comprises the nonmaterial aspects such as mind, emotion and soul, and the soma comprises the material aspects such as the cells, organs and tissues.

This brings us on to another of Carl Jung’s ways of know: somatic intelligence. Our somatic and sensorial way of knowing has often been related to the element earth, and also to PQ.  This is the sensations we have in our body, for instance, gut pangs, or tickle in the throat, hairs on the back of the neck, or chest perturbations. Our soma (as Pert scientifically explored) is full of psychosomatic sensations that inform our psyche. As we allow ourselves to quieten and sense into the somatic intelligence within us, we enrich our conscious awareness and invite intelligence into our daily awareness, so as to be better at sensing and responding to changes within and all around us.

And finally, Jung’s fourth way of knowing, is the rational analytic intelligence – which has been related to the element air, and also to IQ.  This tends to be the dominant intelligence we call upon  in today’s busyness. Our head-logic, the analytic mechanisations it creates, is what dominates today’s meetings, conversations and decisions. It is but one intelligence within our human repertoire, yet when it dominates too much, it can suppress our other ways of knowing.

When we allow these 4 ways of knowing – intuitive (fire), rational (air), emotional (water), somatic (earth) – to cohere, we allow these 4 elements of nature to integrate in their rightful way within is. As we integrate these 4 elements of nature, we open ourselves us to the 5^th element, the Akasha, or what the brilliant scientist David Bohm referred to as the ‘ground of all being’ – a generative field that permeates space, it is the Source within and all around us all the time, if we so choose to tap into it. We tap into a quality of time/space that accesses wisdom.

To summarise: By integrating our 4 ways of knowing, we tap into the 5^th element: our true nature, and the wisdom of nature within and all around us. This provides access to the synchronistic and systemic capacity we need to thrive in times of increased volatility.   We tap into the generative field of life – what the ancient Chinese called the Way of Nature. This is our super-nature. It is well within our natural capacity, and all it requires is for us to integrate our natural human repertoire within us and find accord with nature around us. It’s an inner-outer attunement calling upon and enlivening self-awareness and systemic awareness.

This is the important basis for awakening our humanity, and for dealing with the root cause of our plethora of crises (whether it be climate change through to rampant social inequality and structural racism) what lies at root is a flawed way of attending to life that needs addressing at source.

What is happening to us biologically when we activate our super-nature?

The Neurological- Biological Threshold Crossing

By placing electrodes over the body and taking blood samples, etc., researchers have found that our brain-wave frequencies, neurological networks and hormones change dramatically when we cross the threshold and connect to Source.

A shift in brain-wave frequencies (beta-alpha-theta-gamma-delta) occurs. It can be summarised as a shift from a dominant beta-state to more propensity for alpha, theta, gamma, while beta is still present. We have access to a wider bandwidth of brain-wave frequency, rather than it being narrowed into beta-state.

This opening-up comes with a ‘sweet spot’ of left-hemispheric and right-hemispheric brain integration. The corpus callosum coming alive, and there is an electromagnetic alignment at the head-heart-gut level.  Our bodymind coheres.

With this neuro-biological-electromagnetic coherence, brain scans show a sharp rise in high wave amplitude brain wave-energy. It seems the brain’s way of being shifts into a new stage of consciousness.

Our capacity to access consciousness from the ‘field’ enhances.  Likewise, our systemic-awareness of what is happening in our team and organisational dynamics greatly enhances.

As a brief aside: At school we may have been taught to see the brain as the originator of consciousness. Advanced neurology and consciousness studies now indicate something quite different.  The brain is an ‘inhibitor’. Its primary purpose is to inhibit the sea of sentience/consciousness of this reality we find ourselves immersed within.  It tunes-out frequencies, signals and resonances that are deemed irrelevant or unhelpful for our day-to-day functioning and survival.

It tunes us out of the immensity of the ‘field’ we are immersed within, so we can separate out what is important to us, narrow-down, focus-in, and delineates the otherwise fluid connective reality we inhabit. This is radically different from the brain being seen as the sole originator of consciousness.

It has been said that looking for consciousness inside the brain is like looking for the radio announcer inside the radio-set. Yes, we need to attune the radio-set to ensure the right connectivity, but that does not mean to say the radio-set suddenly becomes all-there-is, far from it.

As we activate our super-nature, the ‘inhibitor’ function of the brain is loosened, so that our ‘bandwidth’ for connection is widened – we can access more ‘radio-stations’, to use that analogy, while still being able to tune in to specific stations as we wish. Our consciousness becomes like a super-power, whereupon we can learn to detect more of what is useful for us to tune-in to, so as to help us understand what might need attention in different parts of our selves and social systems we live and lead in.

If not handled correctly through time-honoured practices and approaches, this super-power can become over-powering, even maddening – too many felt-senses, energies, images, voices, resonances – confusing the hell out of us, overrunning our capacity for coherent purposeful engagement with life.

The opposite is also true.  If the inhibiting brain is too tight, too grasping, too narrowed-down in its inhibition, it can tune-out the very essence of life that informs our sense of place and purpose as human-beings. We get caught up in an illusion of separation, and see only individualism, materialism, anthropocentrism and egotism.  This leads to the contagion of consumerism we are inured in today.  It is our present malaise of the mind.  We are inhibiting too much of reality, focusing too much on our own self-reflection – enter the story of Narcissus.  Yet, just as there is hope contained within Narcissus’s fate, as he falls in love with ‘self’, falling into nature in the process, there is evidence of our narrowing-down scientific rational-analytic attention piercing its own hall of mirrors.  At the macro-scale in astrophysics, the micro-scale in quantum physics and the meso-scale in morphogenesis, facilitation ecology, neurobiology and developmental psychology,  our narrowing-down razor-sharp focus is cutting through to see the innate inter-relationality of our reality.  Our ‘return’ back into real life.  The Journey of Separation starts to arc back towards Reconnection.

Back to the neuro-biology of what happens within us during this activation of our super-nature, as left and right brain hemispheres cohere and brain-waves cohere with the deeper waves of the heart and gut: in the instant of this brain energy surge, neurological and hormonal transformation happens both in brain and body.

And within the centre of our brain, the pineal gland is activated.

‘The greatest breakthroughs of the 21^st century will not occur because of technology. They will occur because of an expanding concept of what it means to be human.’ – John Naisbett

Let’s look at what is actually going on biologically when this pineal gland activation happens.

Pineal Gland Activation

Scientists from the URSI General Assembly – Baconnier, Lang and Seze – have found small calcite crystals, less than 20 microns in length within the pineal gland.  These seem responsible for electromagnetic transduction that takes place in this pineal heart of our brain.

The pineal gland is a transducer, a neuroendocrine transducer to be precise. It’s an antennae and reverberator. It receives an incoming signal from this deeper electromagnetic field we are immersed within.  Then, it reverberates, like a tuning-fork, which informs a shift within us.

Put another way, as the inhibiting tendency of the brain opens-up to the field, the pineal gland, like an antennae on a radio-set, picks-up a signal from the field. As it is a transducer, it starts to pulsate, reverberating with this energy it has picked up, like a tuning-fork.

This is called a ‘piezoelectric effect’, which occurs within the tiny calcite crystals. These tiny crystals pulsate, creating an electromagnetic field in the pineal gland that excites a change in hormonal activity and a change in neurological  and nerve activity throughout our bodymind, emanating along the spinal nerve and throughout peripheral nerves, emanating this energy to our tissues and organs, and in turn, to every cell and sinew of our soma.

In terms of the hormonal change this piezoelectric reverberation triggers, it seems that this electromagnetic change influences a ‘methylation’ process, a chemical transformation (one might say, ‘alchemy’) where methyl compounds undergo transformation. These methyl components are key to so many activities such as DNA repair, rational reasoning, the activation and deactivation of genes, and our ability to fight off infections. As a direct consequence of the pineal gland piezoelectric shift, methyl compounds in the hormones melatonin and serotonin are affected.

The production of melatonin (which invokes receptivity, relaxation, contemplation, introversion, sleep) interweaves with the production of serotonin (which invokes responsiveness, energised aliveness and extroversion).

As melatonin goes down, adrenal cortisol levels go up, and vice versa. Adrenal cortisol increases our focusing-in, assertiveness, desire to move-forward, and progress. Too much can lead to a sense of grasping, which can warp into impatient pensiveness, stress and anxiety, in certain circumstances hedonism or mania.

Chronic stress affects the natural levels of melatonin and serotonin and the process of methylation that sees melatonin and serotonin shift between each. Chronic stress creates incoherence rather than head-heart-gut coherence, and this incoherence tunes us out from the field. We get caught in high-beta brain waves, which increase the propensity for fight-flight amygdala-hijacks which breeds further stress.

Heart Entrainment

When we cross the threshold, and connect to Source, we allow our brain-waves to entrain with the deeper waves of the heart. This is called ‘heart entrainment’ which shifts the body’s electromagnetic coherence, along with shifts in the nervous, endocrine and neurological networks throughout the body.  Hormones change. The production of DHEA increases. DHEA is known as the ‘mother hormone’ due to its influence on other hormones like oxytocin, and the increase in empathy, trust and connection this creates in us. We shift our consciousness from separateness to connectedness.

Much research has been undertaken into the heart as an organ of perception (along with the gut and brain.  The heart is the body’s most powerful electromagnetic sensor and transmitter, continually decoding the vast array of electromagnetic and quantum signals radiating in our lived-in environment. 65% of the cells in the heart are neural cells which are wired into the nervous system, gut and brain.

The heart governs our bodymind’s sensory, neural, nervous and instinctual systems. There is now scientific evidence pointing to the heart perceiving and decoding intuitive information from our surrounds (‘direct perception’) and then updating the brain and gut, which then respond to this information. Hence, ‘extra-sensory perception’ in the form of intuitive feelings, premonitions and clairsentience come on stream through the direct perception of the heart (see one such scientific study here).

‘And now here is my secret, it is a very simple secret, it is only with the heart that one sees rightly, what is essential is invisible to the eye.’ – The Little Prince

With pineal gland activation and head-heart-gut coherence, we become more alive, more conscious, more coherent and more open to nature’s wisdom.

It seems we receive a biological upgrade which enlivens our capacity for relationality, self-awareness, systemic-awareness, empathy, receptivity and responsiveness. This, inturn, when conducted regularly with life-practices amid shifts in our Life Conditions, can provide advancement in our ‘adult developmental psychology’. We can shift from what psychologist Clare Graves’ research refers to as Tier 1 to Tier 2, characterised by a worldview shift from Separation to Inter-connection.

At the personal level – this bio-psycho-socio-spiritual boost may or may not contribute to a persistent and lasting up-stretch into a different level of psychological maturation. This depends on how we integrate this ‘shift’ into our daily life.  Through daily practices of living-systems-being (see Chapter 8 of Regenerative Leadership) we can learn to cultivate coherence and connection to Source more frequently, thus enriching our general self-awareness and systemic-awareness to become Regenerative Leaders.

I would like to finish this article with a rather long yet insightful quote. I believe it is highly relevant not just for what lies in the recent history of the United States of America, and so informing some of today’s ruptures, but for what lies within all Western cultures.

This letter was sent in 1855 by Native American Chief Seattle of the Duwamish Tribe to Franklin Pierce, President of the United States in response to an offer to purchase the Dwamish lands in the North East of the US, currently Washington State.

The Great Chief in Washington sends word that he wishes to buy our land. The Great Chief also sends us words of friendship and good will. This is kind of him, since we know he has little need of our friendship in return. But we will consider your offer, for we know if we do not so the white man may come with guns and take our land. What Chief Seattle says you can count on as truly as our white brothers can count on the return of the seasons. My words are like the stars – they do not set.

How can you buy or sell the sky – the warmth of the land? The idea is strange to us. Yet we do not own the freshness of the air or the sparkle of the water. How can you buy them from us? We will decide in our time. Every part of this earth is sacred to my people. Every shining pine needle, every sandy shore, every mist in the dark woods, every clearing, and every humming insect is holy in the memory and experience of my people.

We know that the white man does not understand our ways. One portion of land is the same to him as the next, for he is a stranger who comes in the night and takes from the land whatever he needs. The earth is not his brother, but his enemy, and when he has conquered it, he moves on. He leaves his father’s graves and his children’s birthright is forgotten. The sight of your cities pains the eyes of the redman. But perhaps it is because the redman is a savage and does not understand.

There is no quiet place in the white man’s cities. No place to listen to the leaves of spring or the rustle of insect wings. But perhaps because I am a savage and do not understand – the clatter only seems to insult the ears. And what is there to life if a man cannot hear the lovely cry of the whippoorwill or the arguments of the frogs around a pond at night? The Indian prefers the soft sound of the wind itself cleansed by a mid-day rain, or scented by a pinõn pine: The air is precious to the redman. For all things share the same breath – the beasts, the trees, and the man. The white man does not seem to notice the air he breathes. Like a man dying for many days, he is numb to the stench.

If I decide to accept, I will make one condition. The white man must treat the beasts of this land as his brothers. I am a savage and I do not understand any other way. I have seen thousands of rotting buffaloes on the prairie left by the white man who shot them from a passing train. I am a savage and do not understand how the smoking iron horse can be more important than the buffalo that we kill only to stay alive. What is man without the beasts? If all the beasts were gone, men would die from great loneliness of spirit, for whatever happens to the beast also happens to the man.

All things are connected. Whatever befalls the earth befalls the sons of the earth.

Our children have seen their fathers humbled in defeat. Our warriors have felt shame. And after defeat they turn their days in idleness and contaminate their bodies with sweet food and strong drink. It matters little where we pass the rest of our days – they are not many. A few more hours, a few more winters, and none of the children of the great tribes that once lived on this earth, or that roamed in small bands in the woods will remain to mourn the graves of the people once as powerful and hopeful as yours.

One thing we know that the white man may one day discover. Our God is the same God. You may think that you own him as you wish to own our land, but you cannot. He is the Body of man, and his compassion is equal for the redman and the white. This earth is precious to him, and to harm the earth is to heap contempt on its Creator. The whites, too, shall pass – perhaps sooner than other tribes. Continue to contaminate your bed, and you will one night suffocate in your own waste. When the buffalo are all slaughtered, the wild horses all tamed, the secret corners of the forest heavy with the scent of many men, and the view of the ripe hills blotted by the talking wires, where is the thicket? Gone. Where is the eagle? Gone. And what is it to say goodbye to the swift and the hunt? The end of living and the beginning of survival.

We might understand if we knew what it was the white man dreams, what hopes he describes to his children on long winter nights, what visions he burns into their minds, so they will wish for tomorrow. But we are savages. The white man’s dreams are hidden from us. And because they are hidden, we will go our own way. If we agree, it will be to secure your reservation you have promised.

There perhaps we may live out our brief days as we wish. When the last redman has vanished from the earth, and the memory is only the shadow of a cloud passing over the prairie, these shores and forests will still hold the spirits of my people, for they love this earth as the newborn loves its mother’s heartbeat. If we sell you our land, love it as we have loved it. Care for it as we have cared for it. Hold in your memory the way the land is as you take it. And with all your strength, with all your might, and with all your heart – preserve it for your children, and love it as God loves us all. One thing we know – our God is the same. This earth is precious to him. Even the white man cannot escape the common destiny.

And so to summarise:

When we lose our connection to Source, we become ungrounded and up-rooted from the wisdom of life, and lose our innate biophilic empathy for life.  We lose our inner coherence and our head, heart and gut are no longer in alignment. The pineal gland is no longer activated, and our hormonal balance is affected, and high-beta brain wave patterns form, tuning us out of the intuitive, emotional and somatic intelligences within us. We grasp at an ego-sense of ‘self’ in outward material ways – status, job position,  number of likes or fans on social media posts, selfies, etc. Enter the world of hollow consumerism.  Signs of a dying civilisation that struggles to smell the stench of its own decay. Yet decay breeds new life, a rebirth.

To find real and lasting solutions to today’s trilemma of social, economic and ecological stress and strain, we need to rebalance the inner and outer dimensions of life by reconnecting with our true nature within and with nature all around us.  Then we Activate our Super-Nature and bring a quality of consciousness to our solutions fundamentally different from that which creates today’s problems in the first place.

A powerful tool to help is a well-held Vision Quest or overnight solo immersion in nature, where we engage in simple yet powerful practices to let-go of our old ego-self, connect to Source while activating our super-nature.

Then, we see a beautiful simplicity the other side of all this complexity and stress in today’s world.

‘The greatest voyage of our lifetimes is not in the seeking of new landscapes, but in the seeing with new eyes.’ – Marcel Proust

It is only then, that we can truly begin the path of turning the Journey of Separation into a Journey of Reconnection and Regeneration.  This helps our selves, our families, our organisations, our communities and the wider fabric of life on Earth, as we wake up to the magnificence of existence and begin to see the sacredness in everything – and then the words of Chief Seattle and other Indigenous Elders do not fall on deaf ears. And we remember the Way of Nature, caring for it as the newborn loves its mother’s heartbeat.

Nature immersions and vision quests can enable this threshold crossing by opening-up our consciousness, and enriching our innate biophilic, empathic, participatory engagement with life. From this place, we seek solutions that deal with root causes as well as down-stream effects.

The time has come, to cross the threshold.

For a series of short youtube podcasts that explore the Illusion of Separation and our way beyond it, see here.

join the LinkedIn Nature Immersions group if you have not already:

https://www.linkedin.com/groups/13767578/

and Natural Business Facebook group:

https://www.facebook.com/businessinspiredbynature/

Giles Hutchins is a pioneering practitioner, coach and senior adviser at the fore-front of the [r]evolution in organizational and leadership consciousness and developmental approaches that enhance personal, organizational and systemic agility and vitality. He is author and co-author of several leadership and organizational development papers, and the books The Nature of Business (2012), The Illusion of Separation (2014), Future Fit (2016) and Regenerative Leadership (2019). Chair of The Future Fit Leadership Academy and Founder of Leadership Immersions, he runs a 60 acre leadership centre at Springwood Farm, an area of outstanding natural beauty near London, UK where he holds-space for clients to create life-affirming futures for themselves and their organisations.