Learning Journeys: Putting The Engaged Identity® Approach Into Action

Our Learning Journeys might seem new and exciting to TheContactProject friends and family who’ve been following our work over the years. (I hope they do!) But as I reflect on what inspired this organization into being, where we’ve been and what we’ve accomplished, offering these journeys feels like coming home. In many ways, everything we’ve been working toward has led us here.

These experiences will be a constellation of the pieces we’ve been picking up along the way for a decade: contemplative practices that we’ve incorporated into our work, neuroscience that has been woven into our approach since our founding, and the human adaptive capacity that describes the way we develop as human beings–from cell to system.

The Engaged Identity Approach, in many ways, is the reason we’re making the changes we’re making. The people we work with continue to inspire and enhance our work. Our relationships are based on this mutual growth. And we want to run a company enriched by this dynamic.

In our last blog post, I shared two stories that I remember often, stories that touched me deeply, stories I remember when we face challenges–those moments we all have when life offers more tension than ease, more struggle than flow. When you’ve been swimming against a tide that seems determined to halt you. They keep me going.

I don’t want us to stop having stories like those stories.

This next phase of TheContactProject, and our renewed commitment to this work is the result of what has become our own version of the Engaged Identity training. The listening project has been that for us, and what we’ve heard from our partners and friends has expanded our identity–and reinforced our values. This is who are we, and what do we do. And this step is a natural extension of the work that supports us and makes us strong and happy and effective.

This commitment to growth is what today’s challenging global landscape calls for. And it’s what we expect from our partners. If you aren’t willing to take a deep knee bend and really show up, then you should sit back and make room for those of us who are willing to do the work.

Because we’re at that point.

This can’t be a children’s game. It will take childlike creativity and awe, willingness and wonder–not degrees and egos and resume-boosters.

Our Learning Journeys will welcome people with the commitment to do their work–for themselves, and with the awareness that their growth enhances their capacity to change the world. Individuals who have reached a place in their life’s journey where they feel a knowing in their bones that it’s time for a shift. And who are willing to show up to make it happen.

In our next post, I look forward to sharing more about our own journey–and how it’s led us to the place we are today.

Originally published at thecontactproject.com on November 4, 2017.