59. Summer Reflection 2023

Hi everyone. I’m Saralyn Hodgkin, and this is the podcast to practice your leadership.

Taking time for reflection is productive. Full stop. In this time when things seem to be all over the map, our weeks are packed and things are going a mile a minute. I find that the most productive thing I can do if I continue to use that word, is to stop and take a breath and take a moment to reflect so that I can get intentional about what comes next.

And so what this podcast is for today is to reflect back over the year and what’s happened, what hasn’t, what that looks like. And to take a pause, take stock. So that we can look forward and say, okay, what about for the rest of the year? What does that look like for me? What have I learned? What do I wanna do with it now?

What are my intentions going forward? Because stuff changes. Things iterate. Things happened, things didn’t happen. And part of practicing your leadership is about taking that moment to reflect so you can now make conscious choices about how you wanna move forward so that you can lay down the best of intentions now.

We have a workbook, all. That goes along with this podcast, you can download it for free from our website. You just go to holonleadership.org/newsletter, H O L O N leadership.org. Slash newsletter and you can subscribe to our monthly emails.

They’re packed with value and resources that help you practice your leadership. And for those already in our newsletter community, just check your inbox, cuz it’ll be one of the free resources we send your way this month. So pause here if you need to and grab your copy to follow along.

So part one, uh, and I’ll, I’ll lay down the prompts. You can write down the prompts if you want, but here, here, here we go. Part one. Okay. What happened? What an easy question and a hard question. Hey, take a moment and think back, look back over the last six months, just reflect on the significant happenings in your world over the last six months.

Jot them down. What are some things that have happened where, and, and for some of you, you may wanna tap into your calendar and take a look at that, or, or you may wanna cruise through your phone or you may, whatever it is, or just, uh, capture the top 10, right? That just come off of your mind and curl from there.

But, take a moment. Take a breath. And reflect on the last six months what’s happened in your world, and this is your whole world. For now, I wanna keep this in your whole world because you are a whole person. You are a whole soul. So reflect on the last six months. It may come to you in themes, it may come to you just like a word cloud or a a mind map.

However it starts to come down. Maybe it’s linear jot notes. Whatever it looks like. Hopefully I’m giving you enough prompts here. I want you to just reflect on the significant happenings over the last six months and start jotting them down. What’s happened in your inner world, your inner self, what’s happened in your family, in your community, in your work, wherever it is, what’s happened?

Start, start jotting that down and then. Beside that and press pause at any time all if, if, if I’m going too fast, right? Alongside what’s happened, right? Maybe you’re pausing this just to capture some of that. When you’re ready, alongside that, what didn’t happen, you were dreaming up at one point before these last six months happened.

You were dreaming up what was gonna happen. Some of that didn’t happen. Write some of that down, capture some of that. Here are some of the things that I thought was gonna happen and it didn’t happen. I just want you to have those down. Right? Okay. Next prompt here, folks. When you look at what did happen and what didn’t happen, give some context here.

Now, this might be a separate section for you, or you might do it beside the items you’ve already captured, whatever it is. But why did those moments that have stuck out for you, that you’ve captured, why did they or did they not happen? Give them some context. Give them some texture. It’s not like a thesis or a 20 page document beside each one.

Just give a little bit of context, right? Why did these things happen or not happen? Right? The purpose of this is, is to A, to not be judgmental, but to be curious, a curious observer, to see just what is the data, what happened, what didn’t happen, and it also allows you a different entry point. You might capture new things that happened or did not happen here.

Great. Write ’em down. It is just a way of reflecting on, yeah, what has gone on the last six months. So go ahead and take your time with that. Next prompt here, folks, again, pausing wherever you need to pause. What are the implications here? So when you look at, with curiosity, the data in front of you of what has and has not happened, what are the implications of that?

What has been the result of that? It might be emotional quality that has happened. It might mean opportunities that didn’t come to fruition. It might mean implications here, might mean that different ripple effects took you down a different path, right? Whatever it is it is not a moment of judgment, guilt, shame, any of that stuff, right?

If you need to capture that and get rid of it, bring out your emotion wheel, circle down what’s coming up for you in emotions, and then just put that to the side please. This is a moment to get curious about the context of what the last six months have been about and what we’re, we will take that into a place of what it means moving forward.

So for now, it’s just, here’s all of the elements of what’s happened and hasn’t happened, what are the implications of that for you? Why do they matter? Is another way to, to enter into here. Why have you written these things down? Okay. Pause if you have to. Next prompt here is trying to integrate what it means for you in a way that, again, isn’t like a 500 page book, but more what does this mean in terms of what you wanna commit to or prioritize now.

You’ve reflected on these significant moments in the things that have happened and that have not happened, their context, why they matter. So now what? Now what does this mean for you going forward? Three things, folks. Just three commitments. Three actions. Three elements that you wanna hold going forward for the next six months.

Write those down, right? All of that learning, I know to boil it down into three things. Come on now. Or maybe some of you’re trying to stretch three things. Are you serious? Saralyn, right? Stick with me. Stick with me here. It’s trying to make sense of what matters to you from those six months and what it means for you going forward in a way that is manageable.

We’re trying to go with manageable. Okay. Capture those as you can. 1, 2, 3. Let’s move into part two. We’re now gonna look through your, your leadership lens, right? Leadership is a practice. Leadership is a way for us to align who we are, who we intend to be with our behaviors of trying to make the conscious choices of how we wanna move forward.

So now we wanna take a moment to look at my learnings and what they mean for me and my leadership and what that looks like. So, We’re gonna look at leadership as a practice, and here are some props. Take your learnings and let’s apply them to what they mean for a couple of categories. Now, if these categories aren’t meaningful for you, then just skip it.

Just don’t even worry about it. But as you look at the last six months, what’s happened, what hasn’t happened, the implications, what you’ve learned, and so on. What does it mean for A) boundaries. Practicing your boundaries? When you look at the last six months, what are you learning about your own leadership as a practice when it comes to boundaries?

Number two, what does it look like? When you look at the last six months, how does it affect, or what does it look like for how you give and receive feedback? We do that all the time, every day. How does it look for how you’re communicating, processing the emotional quality of giving and receiving feedback?

So one is boundary, two is feedback. Three, what are you learning about the stories you tell yourself? These might be stories you tell yourself about you, about making sense of different situations that have happened about you, the stories you tell yourself, the voices that you give power to in your head, right?

This is tapping into the power within yourself to be able to manage your stories and give power to the voices that serve you now. So when you look at the last six months, what are you learning here? About the stories you’re telling yourself, you might even wanna jot some down about the voices in your head, like the judger, the critiquer, the hyper achiever.

Uh, I dunno, you might wanna call one sparrow for some reason, don’t know, right? But this inner team that you have that talks to you in your head and your heart, wherever they live. What voices are you giving power to within yourself? What are you learning about this, folks? What are you learning about this, about yourself?

So capturing some of that. What are you learning about your confidence? What confidence means to you? What confidence looks like for you, what that word looks like, what the practice of confidence looks like.

Another prompt here folks is what are the conditions for you to thrive? What are the conditions for you to practice resiliency? Capture those.

Another prompt around imposter syndrome. What are you learning? And again, this might not relate to all of you, so leave it out if you, if you don’t, if this doesn’t resonate, for those of you who it does resonate for, what are you learning about imposter syndrome in your life?

What does that look like for you right now? Look back at the last six months, what are you learning about what imposter syndrome looks like in your, in your life? And lastly, when you review those prompts and what you’ve written down, just make a couple of notes about what you require to be your best self.

What do you require to be your best self?

Okay, folks, now it’s time for part three. Part three is about cultivating the conditions for the next six months. What do you wanna do? What do you wanna let go of? What do you wanna keep? The adaptive cycle is really helpful here. So draw a sideways figure eight and I’m gonna walk you through this.

For those who have the workbook, you’ll, you’ll see the image in the workbook, but here we, it’s just a framework, folks. Um, uh, if frameworks don’t work for you, then just follow along with prompts, no problem. But the adaptive cycle is a way, it’s a, it’s a reflection tool. We can use it as a reflection tool, as a framework to help us get intentional about what we’re trying to maintain and keep in our leadership practice, what we wanna compost and let go, what we wanna seed and, and start to sprinkle those seeds into some soil and what we see that’s already growing and deepening. And so it’s, uh, a way of capturing this. So let me walk you, let me walk you through it.

So at the top, on the right hand, again, that sideways figure eight on the top right, that’s our section for what in the ecocycle world is called conservation. It’s what you wanna maintain. So thinking about your leadership, your leadership as a practice, learning from the last six months, leaning and yearning into what you want for the next six months.

Without judgment, like, come with compassion all please, and some love to be your own advocate. You know? Um, stand in that place of being your own best friend. Whatever it is that works for you, the world needs your light to shine, folks. So come on in. Stand in the powerfulness of your soul on the planet at this time.

So, there’s the stance and, uh, starting at the, the top right, what do you want to maintain in your leadership practice and who you are and how you behave and the stories you tell yourself? What do you wanna keep doing? What, what are the patterns you wanna keep maintaining? They may not be perfected by any means.

That’s okay. But you’re working on them. They’re, they’re like that, that really, um, grown old growth forest kind of thing, right? Where it’s like, yeah, this is an established forest of my practice and I’m maintaining these behaviors, these ways of seeing the world, these habits, whatever it looks like. I, I wanna keep these patterns in my life staying in that place, folks.

Jotting some of that down. You’re yearning over and dreaming up the next six months. These are the things I wanna keep doing. And then you come around the right hand side of, of the infinity loop, so you’re, you’re in the lower right hand quadrant. Here, this is all about the letting go.

In the Ecocycle world, it’s the creative destruction. It is the composting. It is the releasing. It is the unlearning. What am I saying no to? What am I actively letting go? What am I trying to release from my practice, from my thoughts, from my behaviors? It is an active practice. It’s not just throw it out and then somebody else deals with it.

This is an active practice of coming into a place of saying this no longer serves or aligns. I want to unlearn this. I want to release this. I wanna start saying no to this. Whatever that looks like. There is no judgment here. Right. Life in its arc provides us with so many different opportunities to learn into and to learn to let go of. It’s a part of it. Right. So capturing some things in that quadrant there folks. Because what that does is it provides the space for us to then embrace the seeds that we wanna sow.

And that brings us up through the middle, towards the left upper hand side of the figure eight, the sideways figure eight, and then we come up to that quadrant and this is the section of, of starting to flirt with the seeds I just wanna sprinkle into the ground. I, I don’t know if it’s gonna go anywhere, but there’s something about planting even planting sounds like pretty solid, but it’s literally like the sprinkle of these seeds, these different elements or essence of what I wanna embrace, what I wanna cultivate here.

What that looks like, how I wanna cultivate different things here, what that might looks like. The header of this quadrant is germination, right? It is about, now that I’ve made space from letting these things go or saying no to these things or releasing these things, now I have some of this fertile ground where I can start sprinkling these seeds.

Don’t know if they’re gonna go anywhere. That’s okay. That’s all right. It’s hard to be sometimes in that space of dreaming up what might go in there, but just do your best and then you’re gonna come around the right hand side. So now you’re in that lower left quadrant, and this is the area of where you’re intentionally providing nutrients and, and actively trying to grow new practice, new perspective, roots that have taken hold and those plant leaves are coming up and through and you’re like, I wanna tend to that more. I wanna make space for this more.

And here it might be around things that you planted, the seeds that you’ve sprinkled in the past and you see them taking root and you’re like, yeah, more of that. Um, and that’s taken some time. Other things that might be like, wow, that was seeded? I didn’t even know it was seeded now. Wow. I’m totally paying attention to that now. Right. Um, it’s being able to say, okay, what do I wanna grow even deeper? With the intention that that comes in, in time, that that starts to come up the middle, um, up through the middle section of the infinity loop.

And it starts to be something that for now anyways, you can imagine, starts to come in to the forest that you wanna maintain the practices and patterns that you wanna keep going with, right? As you’re taking that down, again, pausing wherever you need to, let’s do a second round.

Let me talk you through it, right? To be able to reflect on it and add, so here at the top, right. Uh, taking another look. What is it that you’re maintaining, patterns that you’re keeping, what that looks like when you come down and around to that creative destruction zone of releasing. Are there things that you’re conserving and you’re avoiding looking at them as done?

And actually, I want to be rid of this element. Is there, is there something that you’re avoiding and, and bringing it down into the releasing and bringing it down into the. I’m saying no to this, at least for now. What’s preventing you or avoiding you from bringing more from that space and in that creative destruction zone?

Not suggesting that there should be, suggesting that you just take a look from a different angle to explore that maybe there possibly is, right? Maybe there are things you might be being rigid about in, in the letting go. Okay. What are you holding onto? Why are you holding onto those?

Here down in the, in the creative destruction zone is there any maybe sentence you wanna write around what you wanna start saying no to, or not yet to, maybe you even start creating a list of all the things that, wow, would be lovely to see that or keep that going. But you know what? I’m putting it in this list of no right now. Okay. Sure.

Put it down in that quadrant. There’s no perfect science to all of this. Coming up and through the Infinity Loop, do you have any further inspirations of those seeds that you wanna sow? Maybe they’re brand new seeds, maybe they’re seeds that are just starting to crack open a touch, whatever that might be.

Maybe they’re seeds that you’ve sprinkled, but you, you have fear about growing them. Why? What? What are you fearful of? How are you going to handle that fearfulness? Doesn’t mean you have to just burst right on through, but if we look at fear as false evidence appearing real, is there any intelligence in there for you?

Coming down into that area of growth and what you wanna tend to, is there any other ahas you have or anything else you want to capture here? So taking a moment all breathing it in, not gonna be perfect. We’re just trying to get some things down. That’s no problem. Right? When you’re ready, taking a step back, looking at what you’ve written. First of all, being proud of yourself for even getting this far and just capturing what you’ve gotten captured.

Well done. Maybe adding in some color or whatever that looks like. Go for it for sure. Here. What we’re gonna do is we’re gonna go into part four. I think I may have said that there are three parts. Anyway, people, there are four parts because here, what I’d love for you to do is to take this intention. You know this, this really gorgeous way of capturing your intentions for the next six months about what you wanna keep doing, what you wanna let go of, what you wanna seed, and what you wanna grow, and I want you to bring that in to designing a form of alliance with yourself. Here are some prompts to do that. Again, thinking about the next six months, right?

Looking at the next six months. So when you’re looking at the next six months, what are you yearning for in those next six months? What are you yearning for? Why? Give some texture to that? And as you’re yearning for that and you’re, you’re landing your why around what you’re yearning for, what are you going to hold as your why for the next six months?

Meaning if I asked you to detail what’s your why for the next six months, right? Not for the rest of your life, but just for your next six months. Uh, different words would be what, what is, what is your focus? What are you waking up for? What does that look like? And again, here folks, let’s keep this scoped in your leadership practice.

If, if other things are coming up for you around community, family life, whatever. Sure. Why don’t you note it? Go for it. Go for it. Here. When, when I’m providing this prompt, it’s what are you yearning for in your leadership over the next six months? Why are you yearning for that? Where is that coming from?

Does that give you any further intelligence? Where do you feel it in your body? Right? What does that tell you? What emotions come up? What do they tell you? And then second to that, what is your why here for the next six months? If you look at what you’re yearning for, is there one statement of what your focus is, what your why is for the next six months, and then a touchstone.

A word that you’ll use to help tap into your why. This is hard for people to choose one word, and remember, words mean something different to everybody. If you say joy, it will mean six different things to six different people. So this is your word with your definition of it. You’re going to imbue your meaning into it.

That’s why we’re trying to use one word, one word that when you say it over the next six months, it brings you right back to what I’m yearning for, why I’m yearning for that, what is my focus? What is my why for these six months? How I wanna be with that? Why with my yearning. Here’s my one word, right?

The invitation here is for it to act as a touchstone. That brings you back to your intentions, especially when things go wibbly wobbly, right? When you’re going off course, when there’s 500 different switchbacks in front of you, right? Whatever word that you want. Whatever that looks like, creating that touchstone.

And then next, let’s draw out how you want to be with yourself. You’re looking at these next six months, you’ve got this idea of, of what you wanna keep, what you wanna let go of, what you wanna seed, what you wanna grow, what you’re yearning for and why. And even a touchstone of a word. How do you need to be with yourself now?

Write down what it is you need. What is it that you need? Maybe it’s self-compassion, maybe it’s curiosity. Maybe it’s advocacy, maybe it’s power, maybe it’s empathy. Maybe it’s ferocity. How do you need to be with yourself over the next six months? What does that look like for you? What does that look like for you?

Great. And then I have one last one. The last one is for you to capture who are you at your best? As you’re learning into the last six months, you’re dreaming up these next six months. The continuity of all of it is you. Learn about you. Who are you at your best? Capture it.

Wonderful job all. Take time. Sit with the reflections, chat about it with, with a buddy. You can swap and share with each other and just the witness and accountability that that can have in talking this through with somebody else: gorgeous. You can use whatever you’ve written it down in or the journal that accompanies this. Use it as an artifact to just look back at.

You can even, uh, schedule in your calendar just looking at it once a month and say, what did I intend? What was that looking like? Not to judge, just to tap right, to tap in. Your, your one word touchstone, you know, put it on a sticky on your forehead, like something, right. Something where you can just tap into it.

You might even have that word and pick up an artifact and have that artifact, uh, somewhere where you are at every day, like at your desk, for example, right? In your kitchen, by your sink, whatever it is. And just looking at that artifact, you’re like, oh, yeah, tapping in, tapping in.

Leadership is a practice, all. Reflecting is a part of it and it is powerful to reflect as we learn in this case from the last six months and dream up our next six months so we can take accountability and responsibility for our path in all of the beauty of its growth and, and fears and learnings and wibbly wabs, you’re doing great.

You’re doing great. Thanks all. Keep reflecting. Stay in the practice.

Thanks all. I’m Saralyn you can find me at holonleadership.org. I walk alongside you as you practice your leadership.