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transformation

Chrysalis: Getting Out of the Way

October 27, 2012 By Shae Hadden

Writers often talk of needing to retreat to write at some point in their creative process. Of a need to let things gestate and emerge in their own way, in their own time—almost as if writing is a chrysalis process. All my research, my writing, my life has plodded along this past year. Slow caterpillar movements shifted to a sudden breakdown in the last few weeks. And now the creation of something entirely new from all that has gone before.

San Francisco’s glorious sun feeds my smiles today. I love life enough to want to create many, many more days here—or somewhere very much like it (if such a place exists). For here I feel at home. The very air of conversations among my colleagues here generates me as a powerful creator.

In chrysalis, the speed at which imaginal cells
Coalesce and form themselves into lines and clusters
My ego cannot keep up with.

I feel my wings forming, the sun on my back.
This life is for me.
It’s not the life I expected.
And I’m grateful.

I’ve given up trying to control what’s happening. I’m curious to see what is emerging. Curious also to see who else will show up in the days ahead. 

All my focus now is on being an opportunity for infinite game players, as James Carse defines them. People who play with boundaries, rather than within them. Whose purpose is to keep the game going as long as possible. Who see me as an opportunity to realize what they envision is possible, and whom I see as an opportunity to contribute to as a co-creative ally.

Wanna play?

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This blog post by Shae Hadden is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 Unported License.

Filed Under: Writing Tagged With: creativity, opportunity, transformation, writing

What’s Emerging?

September 1, 2012 By Shae Hadden

Writing this book is an exercise in being with emergence. Patterns emerge out of the multiple conversations I’ve been having with coaches and coachees. Out of those patterns emerge multiple threads of ideas. And as I write those ideas down, a structure emerges from within the writing. It’s as if I could step aside and let the cosmos of the book grow into being.

“In all chaos there is a cosmos, in all disorder a secret order.”
Carl Jung

I don’t have to make it be organized. I can be part of what’s emerging.

It’s like those instances where things just spontaneously organize themselves—where the meaningless chaos we fear arranges itself into something new. Like a traffic pattern. A market trend. A complex of buildings. A network of relationships.

What are you allowing to emerge in your life?

Creative Commons License

This blog post by Shae Hadden is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 Unported License.

Image by O12 from Pixabay

Filed Under: Transformation, Writing Tagged With: coach, coachee, transformation, writing

Really Helpful

June 17, 2012 By Shae Hadden

“When things in the world go well for us, we become confident that we can manage by ourselves and feel we do not need friends, but as our status and health decline, we quickly realize how wrong we were. That is the moment when we learn who is really helpful and who is completely useless. So to prepare for that moment, to make genuine friends who will help us when the need arises, we ourselves must cultivate altruism!”
His Holiness the 14th Dalai Lama
Compassion and the Individual

Saw John Madden’s new film “The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel” this week. Each of the seven English seniors who travel to this dilapidated ‘resort’ destination undergoes a transformation of some nature in their relationships. Beautiful story that exquisitely captures the essence of life in India and the possibilities in growing older in a culture that perhaps values age and wisdom to a greater extent than we do.

I was particularly inspired by the transformational journey of Muriel (played by Maggie Smith), a racist curmudgeon who comes to India to have hip replacement surgery. As time passes, Muriel gradually and grudgingly starts to appreciate the people around her—including her Indian doctor and the ‘untouchable’ woman who cleans the hotel and prepares her meals.

The ‘untouchable’ acts almost like a silent coach to Muriel. Since they cannot speak each other’s language and must communicate through an interpreter, much of what they share is expressed through their actions and their expressions. Kindness needs no words. The cleaner, profoundly moved by Muriel’s acknowledgement of her, boldly steps outside of her culture’s norms and shares her profound gratitude by inviting Muriel to her home.

Muriel starts to see the world through the hotel cleaner’s eyes. This uptight British matron breaks through her self-imposed barriers and starts to relate to others around her with kindness. We see her reconnect to a long-lost purpose: to be of service to others. We watch her quietly begin to work behind the scenes from her wheelchair to help the young manager secure the funds he needs to keep the hotel open. No longer ‘useless’, Muriel even creates a new purpose for herself—to live in and manage the business side of the very hotel she originally detested.

We all have the potential to be helpful.

We often long to be useful.

To be really helpful, we need relationships with people who are open to receiving our gifts. And we need to know what is needed in the world, where we can be useful.

Life moves towards a homeostatic balance in everything. Receiving balances giving. Giving balances receiving.

Like Muriel, I am learning how to open up to other people helping me, to receiving their gifts in a non-attached, non-dependent way, so that I can be useful and helpful in my own way. My coaches in this are many and varied. Not only do these professional coaches, family members and colleagues help me see where I can be useful, these trusted friends also help me see more clearly and completely what beliefs or habits I have that stand in the way of fully expressing and sharing my gifts.

Perhaps that’s why I caught myself saying “I’ll always welcome a new friend into my life” last week….

 

Creative Commons License

This blog post by Shae Hadden is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 Unported License.

Image by Sasin Tipchai from Pixabay

Filed Under: Self-Awareness Tagged With: coach, relationship, transformation

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