2023 is well underway and my wish is that you are finding some space for joy and to breathe and appreciate the extraordinary beauty of life – amid the many demands and fluctuations you encounter.

Finding these moments is an important step in claiming your ability to positively influence the conditions of your life and better support those you interact with.

Cultivating moments of joy and appreciation are essential to your ability to hold a steady centre, regardless of what is happening around you and within you – to rise above the fluctuations of your own thoughts and feelings and the polarities we are faced with.

Even taking a couple of moments each day can help you to direct your will into creating a more positive reality.

To bring greater joy and freedom into your life and to liberate yourself into greater Self-Authorship practise the following:

• Each day, take some moments to disentangle yourself from the wills, thoughts, and feelings of others, be one with yourself, connect to nature, and spend time with children and animals.
• Over time, learn to watch and observe the fluctuations of your thoughts and feelings and their impacts, as they occur.
• As you observe your thoughts and feelings and notice what you set into motion with them, learn to consciously author your responses to your world (rather than react unconsciously).

Generative Questions for reflection and conversation

• How do freedom and responsibility interconnect?
• How does the polarity of freedom and responsibility operate in your life and relationships?
• How do your ideas of freedom entrap you?
• How can you ritualise pausing between stimulus and response in your behaviours and decisions?
• What could you take greater responsibility for – that would (ultimately) liberate greater empowerment and joy?
• What are you taking responsibility for that you don’t need to?
• What rituals and practises could help you to live and interact with greater joy?

“Between stimulus and response, there is a space.  In that space is our power to choose our response.  In our response lies our growth and our freedom.”

Viktor E. Frankl

Recommendations for further reading

Creating Freedom unpacks the limiting constructs of our social and cultural conditioning and helps the reader to understand how freedom has been packaged to the human consumer in a way that impedes liberty.  It does all this by weaving insights from neuroscience, criminology, psychology, politics, climate science, economics, and philosophy together whilst also opening the possibilities for true freedom.

The classic Jonathon Livingstone Seagull by Richard Bach helps us to reflect on the vast potential and possibilities we have – beyond our current constraints.

And back to basics, Stephen Covey shares some timeless perspectives and methods for taking greater personal responsibility in the 7 Habits of Highly Effective People.

Have you read Leadership for the New Millennium yet?  The book is available in paperback, e-book, and audiobook (narrated by me) and you can grab it on Spotify.

BUY BOOK HERE

What are you going to do to bring more joy and freedom into your life today? Join The New Millennium Leader Academy to discover more.

It has been so much fun exploring the joy and freedom of response-ability with you. Send your thoughts or reflections to alison@alisoncameron.com