Experiencing Authentic Leadership at ALIA Europe 2010
Posted by jamesk | Filed under Aikido, Stuff
During my journey to the conference, I bumped into Michelle – who I’d met at Paul Linden’s workshop last June – at Schipol airport, and was delighted to find that she was going to ALIA too. We nattered and caught up all the way to the conference centre, hidden away in snowy woods, populated by wild boar.
The Sunday evening saw us all come slowly together in the main hall, where the walls were covered with our intentions, sent in soon after registration; conversations started; groups formed and melted; ideas already started to provoke.
The next day started with breakfast together, during which Michael Chender spoke about Authentic Leadership, clarifying for me that leadership at a global scale is, or should be, the same as leadership at a personal level: the times are uncertain; any answers we had have run their course, leaving us in the current state of confusion over climate change, peak oil, population growth, etc. His speech was quite brilliant, although I struggled to remember much of it afterwards – I’m still waiting for the audio to be made available on the website for another listen.
Thereafter, we all sat for meditation talk and practice. I’ve never meditated with that number of people before, or with gongs, bowls and bows. It was tremendous. This took place morning and evening every day of the week, and was a wonderful sanctuary of peace amid a hectic week.
Then, in order to focus all our minds on why we were there, a world café was held to investigate the question “what time is it in the world?”. I joined in lots of conversations, and witnessed the summation of others. And that little piece of magic aligned us all together for me, because we were all seeing similar problems and opportunities, and we were all being driven by similar hopes and fears.
That afternoon, we had the first session of our chosen modules – this was the Embodied Leadership course with Wendy Palmer that was the reason for my attendance. In a just-large enough room, with bright winter sun bouncing off the snow in through the windows, we started. Suffice to say, it was excellent, fascinating, and challenging in equal measure.
That evening, we had a fabulous treat – a piano quartet playing the most hypnotic piece by a Dutch composer that I could have imagined. It beguiled me into it with simple repetitions and variations. I thought I was simply listening, but when it ended seemingly mid-note, I stopped breathing too, and realised that it had quietly taken control of me in the gentlest, sweetest manner possible.
That was an amazing evening – to be the audience at a private concert was an incredible privilege (and not the only time I felt that way during the week).
I learnt much with Wendy and her other students; with Liane Stefan who led the Deep Listening creative workshop; with the leaders of the meditations, with the speakers, and also with my fellow participants. The hosting group refered to us collectively as a community from the first moment, and I learned that ‘community’ is the right term. We are not a group of people who have come together, had a good time, and gone our merry ways. We are a community spread right across the globe, one that I hope will grow, and one of which I have every intention of being an active member.
I had revealing conversations almost every time I said hello; in fact, one of my deepest conversations used no words or noise whatsoever. I was surrounded by people who were curious, intelligent, and who are experts in asking questions.
My vague thoughts and feelings crystallised over the week, by immersion in this testube, into an intention that I can work with, that I can find a first step for. It amuses me that, even now, I can’t quite verbalise that intention – I have no elevator pitch for it yet – but that might be because, as Valmae said on the first evening, it’s the questions that pull us forward into the future.
The week closed with music, drama, dance, massive calligraphy, and a communal witnessing along Quaker lines, where those moved to speak stood up and said their piece.
I came away refreshed and full of so much hope for us – if we can all learn to be this open, this interested in each other, then surely there is no problem that we can’t overcome.
Tags: alia
February 2nd, 2010 at 10:07 am
So glad to have met you on this week – looking forward to the April workshop with Wendy now! And of course, ALIA 2011!