An Ache in Our Hearts Elaine Patterson
Driving home from my Nordic walk last Thursday I heard the journalist Sir Harold Evans being interviewed on “The Today” programme. When asked to explain Trumpquake and the outcome of the US Presidential Election he said that he felt it had been caused by “an ache in the heart of the US nation”.
This inspired me to consider the possibility that there is an ache in all of our hearts. Whether people voted for either Trump or Clinton in the US Elections or for in or for out in Brexit I think that there is actually a deep ache in everyone’s heart as we – as citizens of the world – face into unknown and unprecedented change on every front. We are all being rocked as our comfort zones, old logics and tidy habits are becoming lost to us as we become lost to ourselves. The world over, we are seeing deep deep social, economic, geographical, ideological and ecological divides. The overwhelm can render us powerless.
I think that our either / or mentality is not serving us. Easy to resort to, it might give us the comfort and illusion of a short-term fix. But it actually also unravels and ultimately damages us when what is actually being asked of us is to step into a wider awareness of our interconnectedness.
There is no magic pill, no magic strap line, no shortcut …. but by daring to embrace our shared humanity we could find a way forward. Executive Reflection and Supervision does offer spaciousness in our busy frantic world, to breathe and just be. Supervision offers a space where we can come home to ourselves, to listen to ourselves, and to inquire from a place of open curiosity. Supervision offers a spaciousness to sit patiently and creatively in our not knowing with another, so that we can find our innate courage and inner wisdom to break old paradigms. Supervision offers the spaciousness for us to be fully human and know our shared humanity and our shared interconnectedness – however joyful, messy and complex that might be. As Einstein said, problems of this scale or can be solved from “the consciousness which created them” but instead from a new consciousness. The ‘how’ lies in the short, but difficult journey from our heads into our hearts, to heal together.
As Victor Harvel said in his impassioned address as president of the Czech Republic to the Joint Session of the US Congress in March 1990:
“The salvation of this human world lies nowhere else than in the human heart, in the human power to reflect, in human meekness and in human responsibility. Without a global revolution in the sphere of human consciousness, nothing will change for the better in the sphere of our being humans, and the catastrophe toward which the world is headed – be it ecological, social, demographic or a general breakdown in civilization – will be unavoidable”.
For more inspiration and to find out about our 2017 international, accredited supervision programmes and ICRP webinars/2017 retreat, please visit: www.coachingsupervisionacademy.com
Elaine Patterson is an international coach, supervisor and writer. She is also Director: International Centre of Reflective Practice (ICRP) and Director of Creative Development at the Coaching Supervision Academy (CSA). Her passion is bringing the humanizing, energizing and creative powers of reflection into the heart of leadership and professional practices.
Elaine can be contacted on +44 (0) 7990 612646 or elaine@ep-ec.com
