“Your work is to discover your work and then with all your heart give yourself to it.” – Attributed to Buddha

In my work with leaders, and in my own life, I keep noticing how different things feel when work aligns with who we truly are. There’s a flow to it, a sense of meaning, contribution, even joy. There’s less striving and proving for worth. What a relief!

That kind of alignment takes gritty, non-linear, inside-out reflection. It asks us to understand our core essence and to be conscious and values-aligned about how we spend our time, who we spend it with, what we say yes to, and how we live and lead in the relational field each day.

It reminds me of Dan Buettner’s Blue Zones research, where many centenarians in Okinawa spoke about ikigai, a clear reason for being, or simply put, purpose.

I’m humbled witnessing and partnering more leaders sitting with a gnarly misalignment that eventually opens into something quieter and more candid from within, a desire to spend their valuable time in ways that reflect who they really are. When they allow that exploration, the shifts can be significant. Sometimes it’s a new role, a new way of leading, a different form of contribution. It becomes more about being and doing versus doing without meaning.

When work flows from essence rather than expectation of oneself or from others, meaning and alignment rise.

What are your valuable days asking you to realign right now?

As ever, with fervor,

Eva

“Integrity is doing the right thing, even when no one is watching.” – C. S. Lewis

I’m noticing a subtle yet important theme in my work with leaders and teams lately.

Our conversations are moving beyond strategy and results into how people are with each other on the daily. There’s a growing intention to strengthen communication, hold tension well, make thoughtful decisions with rising pressure, and choose getting it right over ego. Teams who are building something meaningful are protective of the trust they’re working hard to create. There’s an alignment between them that threads through their way of being together.

I see this in hiring discussions, tough calls, and hard conversations. It shows up in how leaders speak about one another, how they treat the people who make the day-to-day possible, and how they consider those they serve. When there’s a misstep, they name it, learn from it and work to repair.

The theme at the underbelly of all this feels like integrity. I think it’s brave to live and lead there. When leaders commit to leading from that place, the difference is palpable. Nervous systems settle even as heat rises, trust grows and more becomes possible.

I’ve been in leadership teams when integrity waivered and armour was head high. It was painful, exhausting, and diluted possibilities.

Sure, there is more to leadership than integrity alone, but it feels foundational. I’m seeing it, feeling it, and frankly I find it promising.

What does integrity look like for you? How does that inform your next leadership moves?

To living and leading in integrity,

Eva

 

“I slept and dreamt that life was joy. I awoke and saw that life was service. I acted and behold, service was joy.” – Rabindranath Tagore

Whether ‘acts of service’ is one’s love language or not, I’ve come to a place of believing that leadership is a precious form of service. This gives great meaning to leadership. If we accept the assignment, we get to support people in expanding their gifts and contributions. In doing so we sometimes feel a direct line to our own purpose. Joy emerges, and I think joy and service make quite remarkable travel companions.

Where might your service make a meaningful difference today?

Credit to Dr. Gary Chapman’s work on love languages and the late Rabindranath Tagore’s wisdom and legacy.

Shared with fervor, joy, and in service.

Eva

“In the beginner’s mind there are many possibilities, in the expert’s mind there are few.” – Shunryu Suzuki

Sometimes we think we’re supposed to have this figured out by now. The inner narrative strikes: we should be further along, more certain, and less unsure of ourselves. Without meaning to we add pressure, doubt, and stress.

Along the way, we may lose touch with what’s here and available in us right now.

I see this inner dialogue play out time and again with leadership clients and you bet I’ve had moments of this in myself.

Wonder and curiosity are alive when I revisit this quote from the late Shunryu Suzuki, a renowned Zen teacher and contributor:

“In the beginner’s mind there are many possibilities, in the expert’s mind there are few.”

We each come with valuable expertise. Leaning on it too much or expecting ourselves to know it all adds so much inner tension and distraction. I think we narrow what’s possible when stuck in this tunnel.

Inviting the mind of a curious beginner opens things up again. Humility, presence and… Phew. We can breathe again.

If you’re caught in self-doubt or holding yourself to impossible standards, a gentle reminder for any one of us: we don’t have to know it all to be good enough, or to be learning something that matters.

Good enough. Smart enough. Worthy right now. Still learning.

Where might you let yourself be a beginner again?

With fervor,

Eva

“One must still have chaos in oneself to give birth to a dancing star.” – Friedrich Nietzsche

Last night was the first session of a new professional development community of practice. As we shared wishes for the next six months, I named an interest in bringing real working tensions for peer coaching, learning, and growth. Those who know me know I’m always developing something and I better be to have the great privilege of coaching leaders and teams.

As I offered a brief example, my neck flushed and heart raced. Our ever-present facilitator asked what might be happening for me in that moment. I knew but needed time to listen from within.

After sitting with it overnight, I feel clearer, more centered, and grounded in how I want to meet this learning moment next time.

It was a reminder that inner turbulence is often information. When held with care within ourselves and those we feel safe and aligned with, it can become insight, choice, and learning.

Leadership and human growth rarely emerge from polished conditions. Clarity and creativity are often shaped in the messy, uncertain, in-between and uncomfortable spaces. Sometimes the messiness is evidence that something new is forming. More bravery, here we come!

Where might a creative tension be inviting you forward?

With gratitude to Simon Goland, Ph.D., PCC and all who were part of the conversation and learning community and of course Friedrich Nietzsche.

Eva

“What you do speaks so loudly that I cannot hear what you say.” – Ralph Waldo Emerson

In my coaching work, and in many conversations with leaders over the years, a consistent truth keeps showing up. Presence and behaviour shape trust long before words do. When our actions align with who we say we are, people feel a steadiness from us.

Leadership is lived more than declared, often through small, consistent gestures that accumulate over time. And when there is a withdrawal from the trust bank account, repair needs to be genuine, accountable, and supported by more than one deposit to rebuild what was shaken.

Impact and intention do not always line up, and that gap can be humbling yet a worthy checkpoint for realignment with our people.

What are your actions communicating right now?

To trust-building, on purpose.

Eva

“Between the stimulus and response there is a space. In that space is our power to choose our response.” – Viktor E. Frankl

This season can stir a lot. For some, it sparks joy and inspiration. For others, it awakens grief, pressure, or the subtle ache of “too much.” I sense many of us carry a mix. And when we’re stretched, our animal brains love to sprint ahead of our wiser selves.

The truth in a pause helps if we slow down enough to be with it.

As Viktor Frankl wrote, the space between stimulus and response is where we come back to intention. It’s where clarity has a better chance, we can call in our values for support, and we can be more conscious, centered and aligned in the choices we make, guided by meaning.

A wee pause is jam-packed with opportunity to meet ourselves and each other with a little more humanity.

What might one, two, maybe three intentional breaths open for you or, someone else who needs it today?

Shared with your fervor in mind,

Eva

“Be kind whenever possible. It is always possible.” – Tenzin Gyatso, 14th Dalai Lama

“Be kind”. I love seeing this on t-shirts. Yet I’m struck by lack of kindness we see and experience daily.

Any one of us might be unkind without meaning to. When we notice it, we often see it began in an animal-brain moment, a surge of sympathetic activation. Stress narrows our awareness, the prefrontal cortex fades into the background, and we lose fluid access to empathy and choice. In that state, we can slip out of our integrity.

Being kind is possible. When we attune to those animal-brain moments, pause, breathe, move, shake it out, we can come back to center. In short, we come back online. Sometimes we need five minutes. Sometimes we need a few days. Kind is possible.

Kind also creates an emotional and motivational climate where people think more clearly, collaborate more freely and create with more vitality. When we are conscious, we awaken to the capacity to choose kindness over a triggering “snap”. We strengthen belonging, inclusion, openness, a place to challenge each other and learn, even in high stakes and pressure.

Time and again, I’ve seen small, incremental gestures of kindness positively shift the vibe of an entire room of people.

What conscious act of kindness could open something different today?

In kindness,

Eva

“In a gentle way, you can shake the world.” – Mahatma Gandhi

We don’t have to use a hammer to get a point across, to be heard, to influence. When was the last time any of us used or experienced aggression and it worked? Assertiveness can be gentler and more effective. Assertiveness can be expressed as naming needs and wants with clarity, conviction, emotional and relational intelligence. Assertiveness can contribute to connection, mutual support and trust-building versus resentment, fracture or worse, rupture. There is a gentler, more conscious, grounded way and when we step into it, magnificent things can happen.

Hint: When we feel uncentred within, chances are, we’re “offline” (aka animal brain lights up). Access to conscious and gentler states requires being “online”. Time, space, breathing, movement, connecting with other safe humans, nature work. Five minutes in one of these versus acting out of integrity or ruminating is simple ROI.

As leaders we set the tone to move systems in either surprising or meaningful ways. Where might a gentler way serve ahead?

To shaking things up in your integrity and your very own fervor,

Eva

“Yesterday I was clever, so I wanted to change the world. Today I am wise, so I am changing myself.” – Rumi

As fellow humans and leaders we discover with time (and a few gritty experiences) the most meaningful shifts we may need to make start on the inside versus outside. When we slow down, reduce the noise, tend to the stirs and whispers from within, our decisions, relationships and presence naturally evolve. Growth from the inside out is slow, non-linear, brave work, and it is the work that paves the way for new experiences, opportunities and chapters, sometimes never imagined.

What part of you is asking to be heard, tended to, and cultivated?

Sent with curiosity and lots of fervor, in your favor.

Eva

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