Holistic Leadership - the basics

Our place of work should become our space of flourishment and growth. Like the firms and systems we serve, our being needs to be encouraged to a prosperous future, not only short-term financial benefits but long-lasting growth opportunities. Therefore, to work should be equal to self-actualization because of our finite resource invested– time. We all intrinsically crave to climb up Maslow’s pyramid of needs to fulfill our potential and not just mechanically follow instructions. As a leader, I’ve witnessed along the time how deeply indoctrinated the ideas of working men, “feed my family,” “just doing my job,” and “have to pay the bills.” This thinking keeps people in a vicious loop of self-diminishing vibes, victimization, and unhappiness. A few years ago, I considered gaining experience as a career path. Still, today, I see that each day is an opportunity to help someone break these harmful thinking patterns, find joy in helping, and create windows of sunshine to illuminate even the most hidden sparks of divinity. Even though we are dealing with collective numbness and a sense of absence in involvement in the workplace, there is a way to eliminate this and leave room for creativity. And it starts with you!

Through a holistic approach, tense situations settle with little to no drama, people contend with their contribution, more ideas are brought to the table, more potent team synergy, and most and foremost, progress. What is a holistic approach to leading? It starts with first creating a relationship with yourself. When the relationship with yourself is good – you are free of conflict. This means you have cleared within yourself any sensible points that can be triggered in a dispute. For example, a holistic leader cannot get angry with someone as he/she understands its limitations, the nature of human naivete, and the role of the ego leading most people’s lives. To reach a state of comprehension such as this comes from a deep inner search and the wisdom that rises from the higher self. A holistic leader will hear when he is listening and talk when he has something to say. The holistic leader will always be on an evolutionary path, a transformation, through connectedness, which enables the flourishment of ideas, a sense of belongingness, and growth. This transformation is not a trajectory that follows a set of points. Still, it is a continuum spectrum that is ultimately a way of being.

Businesses should shift their approach towards supporting their employees’ personal and spiritual growth and emphasize positive social impact. Holistic leadership emerged after the pandemic as a way of leading with care. Leaders need to get out of their comfort zone and embrace evolution. People need to be directed not only with the rational mind, which enjoys control and firm strategies, but with the heart, with love and respect towards the magnificent light in each of us. Leaders must learn to access inner wisdom, use not only emotional but also intuitive intelligence, and drop all habits of judgment. Yes, you will use your rational and intuitive abilities to shift from doing to being. The details behind this approach are rather elaborate. Still, at the core, when leaders are self-aware and emotionally stable, they can quickly become more inclusive, recognize potential, and welcome new opportunities. One can rewrite one’s beliefs, overcome one’s fears, reframe reality, and become free of restraints to live a life of serving and helping others. That is the holistic way of leading.

Be well,

Monica