Beyond ‘Work Smart’ to ‘Work Light’: Part 1
What if we are only scratching the surface of what’s possible? What if, beyond ‘work hard’ and ‘work smart’, we can ‘work light’, or even ‘work joy’?
How might we unleash more of our collective potential?
Here are my three top working hypotheses, and three associated practices still deepening my praxis 30 years in.
1. Make inner shifts in where we are sourcing from: Groundwork
2. Work with fields, including the loving intelligence of Life: Conscious Co-creation
3. Trust the wisdom of not knowing and invite the “unknowing knowledge” that is beyond the (conditioned) mind: Unpacking Flirts
Of course, there are other worthy hypotheses and practices that offer both wise insights in the moment and, over time, cultivate our mastery. If this article sparks you to name or reclaim your custom-tailored pathways to wisdom, insight, and presence — Hurrah!
Meanwhile, I’d love to unpack a bit more, as I believe one of the most powerful ways to support so-needed creativity, innovation and breakthroughs is this type of inner work — ways of being/working that leverage intention, perception, intuition and consciousness.
1. Make an inner shift in where we are sourcing from: Groundwork
Perhaps you can relate: There you are, with a hammer, wanting to bang in a nail. If you are centered in confidence, patience, and peace, you can sink the nail with relative ease. When you are caught in agitation, impatience, or anger, the same hammer hits your thumb, bends the nail, or dents the wood. The different outcomes reflect the differences in your inner state.
Similarly, if your intention is to get your way, prove you are right, impress people, or other ego-based agendas, you will have limited results. If you come from fear, righteousness, or despair the outcomes will also be compromised. Such a version of your “self” is a less effective instrument of change.
Groundwork gets us to shift where we are sourcing from. The word ‘sourcing’ invites us deeper and upstream. It invites us to connect with the quiet, calm stillness within, under the turbulence of our more ordinary ways of being. With practice, we can get better at making this shift — even, or especially, in moments of high uncertainty, conflict, chaos, or distress.
To cultivate this capacity, here is a three-step practice called Groundwork you can use to lay a foundation for your day, every day, and many times a day.
GROUNDWORK
1. Center through self-awareness
If awareness is like a lamp, we tend to spend most of our time illuminating things, people, and ideas around us, and very little time shining light on ourselves.
The moment I bring awareness to my breath, or to my shoulders, or to my core (the solar plexus), it is as if I snap back “home.” Other ways to become centered are to meditate, do yoga, chant, sing, go for a walk, or spend time with a tree. Pausing for a moment and simply intending to find your center works too. Being centered is a key foundation for effective work of any kind.
For a further deepening, source from the still quiet place within. For most people this is located in the lower belly. Its colour is usually black and it is both calmly quiet and vibrantly alive.
You can proceed to the next step even if you feel upset or out of sorts as long as you are centered enough to be aware of how you are feeling. Being self-aware is synonymous with being centered, even if one is emotionally agitated.
2. Set intention
Once I am centered, I set an overarching intention: “May my being and doing serve the greatest good for all concerned.” Sometimes I say, “May I serve what wants to come through.” Both phrases are deliberately “big picture.” They are not narrowly focused on a specific outcome. I am not saying, for example, “May my work with the group help us achieve X, Y and Z.” Rather, I choose words that express my highest aspiration, unconditioned by a specific outcome.
Your words may be different. To connect to your highest aspiration, you might say, “Thy will, not my will.” Or “May I serve God or Gaia.” The goal is to find a phrase that shifts your center of gravity away from ego-driven, small “s” self to big “S” Self. It is like flipping a railway switch to take small “s” self off-line and activate big “S” Self, or Soul.
When you find the right words (and these may change over time), you will feel a shift in your awareness. You say or think the phrase and feel more centered, and connected to a greater depth that comes from being in alignment with what matters most.
There is also a humility in setting such an intention. We cannot know what outcome would serve the highest as our perspectives are inevitably limited. Setting an overarching intention is a way of asking that we be guided by Life to what is truly of service.
3. Open
After setting intention, the next step is to become open or receptive.
Moment by moment, like clams in a tide pool, we open and close our “shells” — sometimes open, for example, to learning from what a team mate has to say, and other times not.
Serving the highest involves being centered in Self enough to be willing to open to other ways of seeing. This step involves a moment in which I check in with myself to make sure I am open to new perspectives and insights, and to different ways of doing and being. I have found it helpful to tap into my faith and trust that this is a safe and wonderful thing to do.
Here I often think of a question posed years ago by my brother, Stephen Sutherland: “Is Life your lover or your betrayer?” Many of us have a foot in each camp. My practice is to “center” myself in the camp where I see Life as my lover.
If you are a person who sees life as neither a friend nor a foe, neither good nor evil, the core of this step remains: choose to open to new ways of seeing — and therefore of doing and being.
Groundwork in Action
To write this piece, I reached out to a friend of mine, Michelle, who works with families on matters of governance and generational transitions. In her work, she draws from experience and a range of disciplines and practices, blending systems thinking with transitional consulting frameworks to help families navigate the complexities of wealth and family dynamics. I asked her how she incorporates Groundwork into her work. She said she does so mostly by stealth.
“I try where I can not to name a tool, or set aside time on an agenda for it, but try instead to incorporate practices or tools like Groundwork in the course of conversation, looking for the right moment to include a story or example to inspire its use. Once a family has experienced the value, we can then make it a standing agenda item!”
In Michelle’s experience, Groundwork is essential to gain access to “new thinking or ideas contrary to current understanding”, for example when reaching for big decisions, or when there is a diverse group, difference in opinion, deep hurt, or a history of lose-lose interactions.
Over the years she has developed a knack for finding simple centering practices acceptable to each family, often by tapping one family member for advice (Step 1). Onto that, she layers their co-created concise aspirational statement of shared intention (Step 2). And she helps the family develop a “code of conduct to better conversations” where the guidelines cultivate openness to new ways of seeing and being (Step 3), as examples: Reach for shared understanding; ask open and curious questions; if feeling stuck — pause and inquire with genuine curiosity.
If things “go off the rails, we regroup and use our guard rails to stay open.” Michelle humbly knows that she doesn’t have answers to pull out of a hat. Families often come to her when there is a deep stalemate. She says, “The way forward is going to emerge. Groundwork is essential to creating conditions for emergence.”
Michelle adds, “We are not introduced to Groundwork in business school and most of our work doesn’t require it. But when we are confronted with seemingly intractable problems, we need to access learnings not only from the past, but from the future. Groundwork invites us to be present and to listen more deeply and empathically to each other. It allows us to access a much deeper pool of wisdom!”
Three dials
In practicing Groundwork, it is as though we are adjusting three inner dials: first to centered awareness, second to serving the highest, and third to trustingly opening to new perspectives and ways of being. This ground then creates a spaciousness in which we are far more able to be present with what is as it unfolds in a group or system.
Try the three steps of the Groundwork practice now. You will know you have done it well when you sense an inner shift: You are coming from a different place. It feels more expansive, grounded, and still. You have tapped into the ground of your being.
The Groundwork practice is equally fundamental to helping groups thrive. Regardless of your position or role, if you do the practice before or during a group session, it will contribute to the level of trust and presence and awareness in that group. This is because there is as field effect (as we’ll explore in Part 2) from you being connected to your inner most essence: It radiates to others — bringing more coherence and vitality, and helping to create conditions for emergence.
