The Flow – the process of transformation

Tension – the starting point

Tension – the starting point

You are in a change process - yourself, with your team or with your organisation. You have a goal and a longing and you are not satisfied with the way it is going.

You regularly experience tension in team cooperation and the change process. That can like irritation, frustration, a sense of competition between people, or maybe even outright conflict. Some people hesitate, others point fingers, some attack each other, others retreat. If you are honest, you also display reactive behaviour regularly, which is not helpful

You, as an individual or within your team or organisation, have already undertaken a lot to realise the necessary changes, perhaps in the structure, or in the processes or on IT-side. Maybe you have also undertaken actions to foster behaviour change and culture development. However, these have not yet led to the actual transformation that you were hoping and striving for.

You realise deep down it is time to go about it differently. You decide to call Aikido@Work. How to move on from here? .

Transformation – the change process

Transformation – the change process

Step 1 – the courage to look in the mirror

Change processes stir up a lot of emotion. They make you experience uncertainty, vagueness, feelings of fear, impatience, misunderstandings, differences of opinion, view and interpretation.

Often it is not vision or understanding which is lacking. People usually understand what is necessary. Still they do not manage to make the change work, because daily reality is obstinate, as is human nature. Achieving real change, for yourself or with each other, requires courage and endurance.

The change process, the transformation, begin with yourself and subsequently extend to your team. How do you contribute, individually and collectively, to sustaining counter-productive behaviour? The potential for change starts with the courage to look in the mirror.

Step 2 – learn how to let go of tension so you can make different choices

Change requires you to act and respond from a different basic posture, a mindset that enables you – no matter what comes at you – to choose in each moment what to do from a place of openness and connection. When you learn to let go of the tension that arises from situations, you are able to see what is really happening and what needs to happen. You no longer act reactively out of habit.

This requires the physical and inner posture of a good Aikido martial artist: centered, open, receptive, alert, energised, aimed at win/win under all circumstances instead of on the ego which wants to win or at least not lose. Acting not at the expense of oneself nor at the expense of someone else.

Step 3 – continued practice

Over and over again. Enter into dialogue with yourself and with each other, prepared to see each other’s truths, able to be with uncertainty, tension, setbacks, different opinions and conflict WITHOUT falling into survival instinct and related behaviour. Learn how to shift into the Aikido basic posture, especially when the situation gets difficult.

Thrive – the result

Thrive – the result

When you do this for yourself or with your team, you will notice that the internal tensions start to diminish. You put the system into motion and change the underlying conditions.

What a relief! You are now noticing space, mutual support, cohesion, willingness. All of a sudden, things start to move in the right direction.

Of course it still feels tense sometimes, and you fall back into old habits, but you are now able to recognise this and continue to work on the new patterns. You can handle more, you feel lighter, more joyful, able to deal with situations, work through difficult issues which you approached with great reluctance before. You grow as a person, as a team and as an organisation.

Do you recognise this? Successfully responding to and achieving change often fails due to habitual behaviours.
It is not necessarily unwillingness. Human nature and reality simply are obstinate.
Your potential to navigate change stands or falls with your ability to break through fixed patterns and habits and subsequently substituting them with new ones.
That requires courage!
My work will support you to grow and practice this courage.

Aikido@Work
Empower yourself, empower your team
Lead lasting change!

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