I got this text this morning:  "Cleaning up is a bummer." Most would agree.  But what if cleaning up is a sign of new things to come? I wondered what it would feel like if we all shifted our thinking, today, the Day After. What if we cleaned up not only our kitchens and homes, but our thoughts and ideas.

We could start with feeling happy and grateful that we ate so well, rather than scowling at the scale. As we started throwing out all that garbage, we could think about what we keep, always close to our hearts. Maybe it's that memory of an old family tradition; you know, the one you grew out of, but it never fails to put a smile on your face when you remember it. Then as we turned our attention to the mounds of dishes and maybe a broken glass or plate, we could marvel at how resilient we are, how much we can bend and change, rather than being sad or mad at what was lost. See what I mean?

Cleaning up is serious business.  All those thoughts and ideas just waiting to be swept out and a new clean cubbyhole ready for a fresh approach, a wild curiosity, and a childlike silliness. Lots to explore today, tallyho!

Here are a few pointers that came out of our discussion at the Sacred Commerce dinner in October, hosted by Columbia Business School Alumni Association. There are many but I will merely start a conversation here with the first three that come to mind. Feel free to add to it in the comments.

Ask for respect.  If you truly want to have a workplace that supports your growth and helps you feel supported, ask for it. I can't tell you the number of times I've facilitated a discussion where the participants make vague general statements. I'd hear things like, "They don't respect us." "They don't value us." That's when it's time to stop the discussion and get real. Get specific. "Can we stop here for a minute and can you tell me what you mean?" Don't assume you know what the person is asking for.  As colleagues, friends, and leaders, let them tell you how they can best be respected.

Some wisdom from my Grandmother here - begin as you intend to proceed. Ask for respect, and at least you will have been clear about what you need.

There is no THEY.  Let's move on to the "They" in the comments preceding this paragraph.  I remember working with the CEO of Lucent Technologies. He commented to his team frequently, "there is no THEY." He actually had a sign printed up with a red circle and a slash through the center where the word THEY was printed. Sacred commerce means we, not they. Remember the quote from Lincoln, "A house divided against itself can not stand." The more you split off from the 'other' group, whether that's the leaders, managers, the 'in' group, whoever, the less chance you have to being able to understand their thoughts and ideas, and the less chance there is for respect.

Look again. I've been asked a lot, 'what does respect look like?' People take me aside and they say in a hushed tone, "I know what it means to respect my elders, I hold doors, give up my chair, I even hold my tongue on those occasions when I think I need to learn from someone older and wiser than me, but what does respect look like in the office?" I nod gravely, look at their face and into their eyes, and, smiling, I say, "Exactly!" Respect comes from the Latin word, respere, meaning to look again. The description of holding doors, giving up a seat, listening patiently, all these are done because we look again at the person in front of us and we really see them. And we choose to show them 'respect.' Now do it all the time, no matter what.

Sacred commerce is very much like that marathon run, that moment of sheer delight on a long mountain hike, that peaceful restful place after a good meditation. Whatever you respect, think about it, and use it as a guiding star when you are at your work. 

Tony said, "we have no reason to be mean." He started telling me about how much he liked working there, that he has a great job, and he's basically lovin' life right now.

"We have no reason to be mean." My jaw dropped.

Here's a guy who's in his 20s, and he's happy. Doesn't he read the papers? My world came screeching to a halt. I study work places, for a living. That's what I do.  I'm always looking for great workplaces, the ones that get it, and as a result, get a lot in return. 

I walked back home and checked the company out.  Sure enough, the website looks exactly like the characters I see everyday over my steaming coffee cup. Happy faces, a YouTube that rocks, slightly irreverent, mostly proud. You can feel how alive this company is.

That's when I knew I had to meet the owners. I pulled out the stops.  When I really want to know someone, I figure out a way.  I sent an email, then a follow up long letter in a big sized envelope, then...low and behold, I didn't even have to go to step three. Tom Frainier, one of the owners of Semifreddis Bakery, calls me.  Okay, that's already unusual.  More typically, I have to badger at least twice on the phone to get a call back. Nope, and it turns out that's one of their signature ways of doing business. "If we're open, we answer the phone." 

Tom invited me to come in for a chat and I met him this morning.  He gave me an hour of his time.  I walked out with a huge story, about big-hearted people, doing things they love in a tough business, hitting the results out of the park, and, I had two loaves of their artisanal bread in hand and a big smile on my face.

Work that works, wow! I had just found another example of 'sacred commerce'.

Tom and his co-owners have cracked the code on how to create work that works. The work in this case is artisanal bread, and my local bakery is one of only two retail stores which bring in a small percent of their revenues. The bulk of revenue comes from their wholesale side.  They keep it local, they keep it fresh. And this bakery that I toured this morning is 19,000 square feet, impressive since at their founding they were baking bread in a 450 square foot closet! One bread machine (I saw it.)

Today, they have the company they envisioned.  What was that vision? It hasn't changed: To make the best bread in the universe. Yes, you read that right, the universe! Gotta love that kind of aspiration. By telling their employees what they were aiming for and by helping them understand what was expected of them, they started to grow the right culture and to build trust. They said, show up on time, work hard, work together, and we all get paid. 

And they do get paid.  According to Tom, they get the highest wages in the bread making business. Almost no turnover.  Of course, why would there be? With full healthcare plans, 401k plans, profit sharing, and not too shabby bonuses every year, people are happy. They start out in junior positions, and they make their way up. Head of bakery, been there 20 years.  Head of distribution, been there 17 years. 

I could go on and on. The company is greener than Ireland and a heartfelt community member. They respond to charities and other non-profit requests on a daily basis by donating fresh bread.  Fresh bread, not day old bread, the fresh stuff. Tom said, "most people don't do that, because they're afraid it will be sold.  You gotta trust people, and when the charities ask, we're there."

Why am I writing a blog post about this company?  My work is to help people transition from jobs that no longer inspire them to jobs that feed their soul.  I'm not a career counselor.  I help people face their frustration, find out what sets them on fire, what inspires them, and then together we feed that flame until they create that work.  I help companies do the same thing.  Or, I should say, I help groups of people who work on a common goal to create a place that helps them grow as people. That's  how I define 'sacred commerce', a place that helps people grow, not just profits.

I asked Tom about it and he said, "My philosophy is capitalism with a heart. I got my MBA from Berkeley, graduated in 1981 and went to work for Clorox.  Good company Clorox, I worked there 7 years, but I had a little too much personality.  By the time I was 30, I quit. I could quit, I wasn't married, I didn't have a mortgage.  I just knew I wanted to do something, make something. After about six months, my sister suggested I come work at her small bakery, and I thought why not. I went from making $70,000 a year in financial planning at Clorox to making $7.00 an hour. And I loved it! I've never looked back. "  

He summed it up with "That's my philosophy, capitalism with a heart. Treat people well. There you go, that's it."

'Treating people well, and being treated well' is simply said. It is the first pillar of sacred commerce and something many of us are seeking: how to live our lives in wholeness, do something we're proud of, and make money.  That's it, simple.  And the good news is, more and more people are stepping out of their corporate systems, and making it a reality. 

Ever since I met Tony at my local bakery, I smile every morning thinking to myself, what would it be like if other businesses had employees like him and they felt the same way he does: "we have no reason to be mean."

Outstanding! 

To honor them, I offer my own viewpoint.  Read all the way through.  If you are not religious, do not stop at the sentence that notices how irreligious we are.  There is room in this discussion for all beliefs.  If you are religious, do not smugly read on until you get to the part about materialism being the source of our current evil. Read it to the end, reflect on our current level of materialism and our impoverished spiritual state. Until our polarizing discussions come to an end and we look inside ourselves and then “upward” who wins our election is akin to a band-aid on a gunshot wound.

If I offend anyone, I sincerely apologize upfront and immediately. I simply express that this is a viewpoint I embrace.  You may find this surprising, it was expressed by someone else in a speech in 1978!  

“As long as we wake up every morning under a peaceful sun, we have to lead an everyday life. There is a disaster, however, which has already been under way for quite some time. I am referring to the calamity of a despiritualized and irreligious humanistic consciousness.

To such consciousness, man is the touchstone in judging and evaluating everything on earth. Imperfect man, who is never free of pride, self-interest, envy, vanity, and dozens of other defects. We are now experiencing the consequences of mistakes which had not been noticed at the beginning of the journey. On the way from the Renaissance to our days we have enriched our experience, but we have lost the concept of a Supreme Complete Entity which used to restrain our passions and our irresponsibility. We have placed too much hope in political and social reforms, only to find out that we were being deprived of our most precious possession: our spiritual life. In the East, it is destroyed by the dealings and machinations of the ruling party. In the West, commercial interests tend to suffocate it. This is the real crisis. The split in the world (East vs. West) is less terrible than the similarity of the disease plaguing its main sections.

If humanism were right in declaring that man is born to be happy, he would not be born to die. Since his body is doomed to die, his task on earth evidently must be of a more spiritual nature. It cannot be unrestrained enjoyment of everyday life. It cannot be the search for the best ways to obtain material goods and then cheerfully get the most out of them. It has to be the fulfillment of a permanent, earnest duty so that one's life journey may become an experience of moral growth, so that one may leave life a better human being than one started it. It is imperative to review the table of widespread human values. Its present incorrectness is astounding. It is not possible that assessment of the President's performance be reduced to the question of how much money one makes or of unlimited availability of gasoline. Only voluntary, inspired self-restraint can raise man above the world stream of materialism.

It would be retrogression to attach oneself today to the ossified formulas of the Enlightenment. Social dogmatism leaves us completely helpless in front of the trials of our times.

Even if we are spared destruction by war, our lives will have to change if we want to save life from self-destruction. We cannot avoid revising the fundamental definitions of human life and human society. Is it true that man is above everything? Is there no Superior Spirit above him? Is it right that man's life and society's activities have to be determined by material expansion in the first place? Is it permissible to promote such expansion to the detriment of our spiritual integrity?

If the world has not come to its end, it has approached a major turn in history, equal in importance to the turn from the Middle Ages to the Renaissance. It will exact from us a spiritual upsurge, we shall have to rise to a new height of vision, to a new level of life where our physical nature will not be cursed as in the Middle Ages, but, even more importantly, our spiritual being will not be trampled upon as in the Modern era.

This ascension will be similar to climbing onto the next anthropologic stage. No one on earth has any other way left but -- upward.

Harvard commencement speech, Alexander Sozhenitsyn, 1978.

I've grappled with the subject of skeptics my whole life and it suddenly dawned on me, I'm not the only one.

If you've read my blogs, you know there was one where I told you the story of doing a cartwheel. I desparately wanted to be a cheerleader, I was still in grade school and it was a big deal. To be on the squad, though, you had to do a cartwheel, minimum requirement.

The gist of that story was the remembered taunting of the other kids, the shouts of 'kelly belly' on the schoolyard, as I tried and fell, tried and fell. And the ultimate victory that persistence brings, doing a cartwheel and making it on the team.

I had alot of skeptics back then, even my parents tried to dissuade me, perhaps thinking an overweight kid is just going to embarass herself.

Here's the thing:  the skepticism never eased up. In fact, it got more intense as I grew up.  The numbers are in the hundreds and now thousands of people I would encounter who would ask me something about myself and I would answer and receive a barrage of naysaying, doubting, challenging, sometimes angry, skeptical retorts. Even close friends, family.

We've heard about this before, right?  Michael Jordan not making it on his high school's basketball team, most famous example.  Somehow those stories seem far removed from my little coffee shop, and my morning cuppa joe and that one person who seems interested and curious, and then wham, before your caffeine has kicked in, your told five ways your story/dream/idea/purpose doesn't work.

Does dreaming a really big dream scare that many people?

I'm dreaming a really big dream right now.  I'm in California, and I'm going back to school for a Ph.D. Here's the big hairy audacious goal: how can we shift our corporate/business models so their focus is on human growth and development and secondarily on commerce?

I have an idea how to do that. (And a ton of people who are skeptical!)

Even so, I have an idea.....and I'm going for it.

I wrote this for my current and future clients.  Here's the takeaway: Skeptics are there to hone our choices, to make us better, to shape and mold our ideas. Thank them, honor them, stay the course, tweak it, and carry on!

No matter how many times I read that I seem to forget it. Usually when I need it the most, in the face of adversity, the daily challenges, the ups and downs of life, I go mental.  

We all do it.

Going mental is the safe route.  That's what the mind is there to do, sift through our experiences, our thoughts, make sense of the environment, analyze, compare, and conclude. It throws up solutions at an extraordinary pace, leaving us blinded by our mental superhighway.

And all the while, the heart remains still. It waits, sometimes a really long time. It doesn't speak in words; the language of the heart is more subtle and nuanced. The heart is like the blade of grass that pushes up and cracks the concrete sidewalk. It's insistent, patient, and ever present.

If there was a theme this week in my coaching practice it would be resisting the whisper of the heart. I would ask a client, how does that feel? "Um, well, I think ..."

Deep breathe, how does it feel?

That breathe is the distance between the mind and the heart. It can be a second or a million seconds. If you are patient, if you stalk your feelings, your mind will calm down, enough, for you to hear a soft whisper.

Don't miss it.  The whisperings of the heart tell us what is true, and good, and beautiful in our lives.

And yet, the mind is our ally if only we would make it so.  Everyday is a choice to dedicate our thoughts and our energy to something that produces a quality of joy or hope. That's not the easy route.  The easy route would have us building walls, setting up barricades in a fruitless attempt to shut out, protect, and disconnect. If you're shaking your head right now, then you don't recognize that judgment, criticism, blame, and gossip, are some of the greatest and strongest walls we can create. That's the easy route.

Having read my posts before, you know already that feeding our thoughts is the most conscious and awake action we can take.  What thought fuels us in the moment of challenge? When we're cut off on the highway. When we get the results of some medical tests. When we watch the news. When someone treats us cruelly.

It's all there for all of us to shift inside of ourselves in any one moment.  We don't need to go up on a mountain and meditate until 2025. We don't need an ashram to pray, eat or love. All we need is the next moment, the one that triggers us, and then we consciously choose.

And the choice is not about the opposite of how we feel, it is about the twin of our thought. If we observe ignorance, can we shift to see innocence?  If we experience the arrogance of someone's certainty, how much farther do we have to think to find wisdom? Same goes for the rampant superficiality in relationships - in the loneliness and isolation of the superficial, do we discover clarity?

In a world of positionality, it works in our favor and to the collective benefit when the roar of our mind produces the twin of our thoughts.  In this way, lions become lambs, once again.

It dawned on me after giving a speech at Bainbridge Graduate Institute's MBA program that perhaps the emptiness had to do with empowerment, or lack of empowerment.  I got lots of questions about being heard in a corporate setting and I heard huge amounts of frustration and disappointment around this feeling of 'holding back' and 'not saying what is so.' 

That brought me to the understanding that people want to know HOW to speak up. That floored me.  HOW to speak up is obvious, right?  We just load our brains, and shoot off our mouths.  Oh no, this was not what the real question was.  The real question had a twist. 

How do I speak up AND avoid risking my career and paycheck?

Whoa, and there it is, the fear.  Let's call it what it is, and maybe we can shift it. The very foundation of who we are as a society requires us to speak up, ask difficult questions, and know that we are safe to do so. When did it become so unsafe? Where are the pockets of openness, honesty, and genuine dialogue that honor our contributions and support our accountability? 

What I find right now is a genuine knowledge and wisdom just waiting to burst forth into open exchange.  There is a strong desire for change, and a passionate awareness of the need, no the urgency, to change.  And, there is silence. 

This silence is a gaping hole; we appease others, and go along, and don't rock the boat.  I've been there myself.  Not wanting to risk being seen as the one who spoils dinner, who stirs the simmering pot of conflict, I remained silent.  And I watched as the cultures of those companies I worked for and where I witnessed this pattern, diminished, slowly at first, and then rapidly.

The way forward is in cultures of openness, thoughtful patient dialogue, connectedness, and engagement.  Cultures that embrace discomforting discussion, and allow the full range of self expression within the boundaries of respect and integrity

Ask yourself today: where are you in appeasement?  Where do you choose to remain silent when your inner voice would have you speak up to shift a discussion or a decision? Do you work in a place that honors your voice and your wisdom?  And if not, how come you work there?

The Truth stands on its own, is heard for itself, and withstands even the harshest of critiques. Speak the Truth, say what is so, and be known as a person of high integrity. We need your leadership, NOW.

Nah, not just the weather.  The feeling that's floating around me is hard to shake.  It's been a tough week.  The weekend's events shadowed the week.  Monday, I said good-bye to a fabulous client as she finished her work and is off to Africa!  I am thrilled for her and will miss her.  I gave a presentation at the University of Washington this week.  I usually love doing that, working with the students, offering them insights into their personalities, as we discuss the ways that humans affect the outcome of any enterprise.  Sigh.  Presentation fell flat.  Energy kept shifting. 

Rest of the week, more of the same.

Now I'm sitting here trying to figure out what's up.  Is this just me? Or are others feeling the same way?  My mind wanders back to Arizona.  Am I more affected by the shootings in Arizona than I have acknowledged? Are others?

I read an article this week that is rolling around in my head.  George Freidman wrote the article and in it he suggested that America is a Republic that accidently became an Empire.  We created this country to be one thing, and it became another.  Now it fights itself, Republic vs Empire, like the Black and White Wolf, a never-ending battle.  ( See below, Right Leadership:  A Story of Two Wolves.)

I realize I am more like the black wolf tonight: edgy, a bit frustrated, and itching for an argument. I set an intention for this week to be productive and full, energetic and prosperous.  Despite my best efforts, didn't happen.  My intention devolved to attachment, and now I feel disappointed and crappy. 

I am searching my knowledge for the nugget that applies here, for the wisdom that my teachers have shared with me and that I can pass along. 

At first nothing comes, and the edginess takes a firmer grip.  Slowly, though, like a wafting feather, something tickles me at the very back of my mind.  Tugging at this resisting thought, I finally yank it free.

"All energy is neutral, Kelleen."

I expel my breathe, the shoulders come down, I allow my head to hang for just a second. All energy is neutral, neither positive nor negative.  We transmute it, make it into something, and this alchemy touches the inner core of who we are and reflects back to us through the lens of our outer world. 

This discernment, wisdom's ancestor, is what went lacking this week.   I lost touch with my ability to discern truth and hold a vision.  It is a good lesson.

All energy is neutral. We make it otherwise. 

And that could be why Power came looking for me this weekend. 

Somewhere back in the annals of history someone made the connection between the word 'power' and the word 'manipulation.' This became the origin of my logic, my knowing, of the word power.  My thinking went like this:  If you were powerful, you were likely to be someone who got things done, at any cost.  Power therefore equated to manipulation, the ability to control, force, demand, even change the natural course of a thing.  It is the antithesis of everything I stand for. 

This weekend someone mentioned that the work I'm doing, the research and the mentorships, "are very powerful." Oh my!  I was thrown into the deep end, no lifejacket.  We spent an hour discussing power and I emerged with my confidantes' beliefs ringing in my ear:  "Everything we do, say, or think, must always be viewed at the very least as a ploy for more power. To deny this, is to be dangerous to ourself and others."

I've spent the better part of my life, denying power its due. Rejecting it, resisting its presence, I see now how I forfeited many opportunities to express myself effectively, to listen actively, and to show up.  With new appreciation, I accept that Power IS the ability to manipulate AND it can both force an outcome and/or illuminate one.

With integrity, wisdom, and humility, we can step into our personal power, be impeccable with our words and actions, and illuminate and expand possibilities.  It is when we aren't in right relationship - when we lack respect for all things and deny service to a common good - that we fall prey to the dark side: control.

The Native People have a saying, "How do you corrupt a righteous man?  Give him one follower." In many tribes there is no word in the language for leader; each is a leader, by the fact of their existence, by original design. And that is the genesis of a deep sincere compliment expressed this way, "She is a leader without followers."

Now, today, when we are demanding accountability from our institutions, our governments, and our communities, take a moment to look to your own right use of power, to the moments when you sought first to clarify and illuminate, and, to those moments when you were impatient, 'certain' of the 'right' outcome, and determined to get it.

Notice the difference.  Be a leader without followers.

Choose to illuminate.