What Works in the Crap of Life?
I want to know how you access your wisdom even when the crap of life comes raining down, before the highly contentious meeting at 3:00pm today, after your colleague just dissed you in front of your boss, when your friend didn’t include you in the invitation list. What works then?
Grinding anger doesn’t promote wisdom, nor does fear. Denying hurt or other feelings doesn’t either. Neither does self righteousness or victimhood. Yet, each of these can catalyze an opening , a reminder to dig deeper for wisdom. Use the fire to ferret out the wisdom that lies below.
Isn’t wisdom caring? Yes, but, pleasing others, acting nice in intolerable situations, and being non-threatening don’t cut it either in bringing wisdom to the fore. So what does?
Presence. We can all tap into the same multidimensional wisdom, the wisdom of our body, the wisdom of our mind, the wisdom of intuition, the wisdom of our senses when we are present, in this moment, in the here and now.
Wisdom is not something we can grasp and hold onto. It is pure Knowing, seeing things exactly as they are. It’s not a memory of something or our hope about what it might be. It is what is so and how it is so – right now. In this moment. Changing in the next moment. What is. Now.
Before speaking in the contentious meeting Martha clasps her hands together under the table to give herself a reminder to breathe into her WiseCore. Susan recalls unwise decisions in the past and visualizes expanding her feminine wisdom to include more possibilities than her momentary reaction can generate. Jeremy finds a clear quiet well inside and lets a new solution arise.
What works when you are ready to do or say something that might ultimately be unwise? What stops your flash of reaction and expands your possibilities of responses? What shifts your hurt? How do you become a wise leader, every day, even when the crap of life comes raining down?
I’ve developed 4 Steps that I use every day to strengthen my wisdom so it’s available in (almost) every situation. Over the next week I’ll tell you what works for me, when I lose it and what I do to re-find it, and how I’ve seen these applied. Love to know what works for you as well.
Celebrating your wisdom,
Karen
http://www.thewisdomconnection.com
Karen Wilhelm Buckley 
Hi Karen
I enjoyed this blog; the questions you raised and your answers to them. For me, being Present, in the Now, is the key to my responding wisely rather than reacting unwisely in a tense situation. I had to learn how to embrace the anger, the frustration, rather than shove it away and pretend it’s not there. Being in the moment allows my awareness to just watch, like an observer, all that transpires in my mind, and, be beyond all the ego judgments of the situation.
I’ll take a few deep breaths that allows me to let the raw feelings flow through me rather than my becoming immersed in them. Again, it’s obtaining the state of being the Witness. Now I can smile at my mind’s wanting to play victim, or judge, or whatever. And more often than not, something laughable comes out of my mouth that I’ve never thought of or said before. And that laughable something breaks the tension in the situation.
I guess everyone has to find what works for them. I use meditation on a regular basis to develop a Witness awareness that I can carry with me through the day (have lot’s of work to do on that though). I’ll also use affirmations, one-liners, that help center me.
There are lots of techniques. Those are my favorites. Practice makes perfect.
Joy and light,
Ken Obermeyer
Ken, Yes, – I love the way your wisdom turns to laughter! Isn’t it so true. Blessings, Karen