Respect and regard

All human beings at some point want to be respected. It is part of who we are to look for appreciation, acceptance, regard and respect, even honor.

But in a world where everyone seems to think they can say whatever they think about anybody, respect has become an underrated value.

It has become part of an old tradition, something from the time when everybody trusts on each other. That made an age when economy was based more on values than prices and stocks.

However, in my experience guiding teams in many companies and non-profit organizations, respect and regard still play an important part.

Let’s take the interesting example of an international flight, in which the system has failed. About 400 passengers had to be checked-in without the basic help from computers… Yes, made by hand boarding passes and luggage tags.

And yet… with respect, calm and regard for each passenger, the ground crew was able to embark everybody. Each person who complains was talked separately, in low voice and in a nice way. By the way, the flight did leave around 2 hours later, just to arrive a few minutes before it time; and the luggage arrive very promptly too.

Values are more than nice words, they are part of what we all need to overcome crisis in any situation.

A life to be remembered

A big part of my life has been dedicated to three things: changing the self, helping others to change themselves and reflecting on leadership and how organizations could work.

In relation to the first two aspects, I follow the steps of someone I did not have the honor to meet in person: Prajapita Brahma, who passed way a few years after I was born, left a legacy that is an important treasure for me.

His life is an example in terms of dedication, renunciation and attainments during his own change process. He created a unique methodology of meditative yoga in which God takes the main place; by remembering God, speaking powerful words and performing actions in a spiritual awareness, he showed us that method gave good results and enabled us to change the self.

On the other hand, he created a spiritual university, challenging many assumptions about spirituality. For instance, he put women in a high position, something unheard of at that time. Also, the service done by this university is totally voluntary, so it is done with lots of love and gratitude in the heart.

This week, I was remembering him a lot as on the 18^th, Brahma was remembered, after having passed away in 1969. Remember means becoming, and so I go on my own path of self-transformation.

Another year in my life

I am not sure if the people who invented birthday’s celebrations wanted to celebrate life, but that is what it is for me, as my birthday just came and went.

Every year, when it comes, I remember about living and experiencing, and it is a time for reflection on what I have done and how much more I have to do. I hardly get trapped into my age or nostalgia… It is a time I celebrate by walking around this beautiful city and enjoy some silence.

Besides, I consider I have two birthdays in the same day. On one hand, the one my mother and father gave me; on the other hand, the one God gave me. It was in 1983 when I started this deep relationship with God as my Father, Mother and everything.

It helps me in my work and relationships. It helps me to give relevance to everything that happens to me and the things I do and I generate.

What about you, how do you celebrate your birthday? Could you consider having some other birthday, a date when you felt as you were reborn for some reason?

A reflection on this birthday

Today is my birthday. Actually, there are two birthdays! No, no kidding let me explain...

The first birthday celebrates the day I was born. However, I notice that as the years go by, thoughts and feelings become more and more, well, corporeal and conversations begin to revolve around doctors and medicine, hospitals and fatigue, illnesses and miraculous, or not so miraculous, cures and, of course, do you remember So-and-So? Just died!

But I have a second birthday and I dare to think that you too: the day I discovered I was different from what I thought I was. In my case, on the day of my birth, I entered a beautiful house, in a beautiful neighborhood of São Paulo. There I learned something completely different: I found out that it was not this body, but a spiritual being.

That impacted a lot on personal, social and professional life, because while the body is extremely limited, the soul is a flying bird that never stops and helps me to look at my body in a different way. It helps me not to let myself be limited, forgetting how amazing it is to be one more year on Earth.

How fascinating is that I solved the obstacles that at one point prevented me from reaching to this point. I GOT IT! And that is fundamentally important, because instead of talking about diseases, doctors, etc., I prefer rather to speak in what I have achieved, the accumulated wisdom that I had the opportunity to use, the growth and creativity that never ends.

Today, I celebrate being wiser than last year, being better than yesterday and looking forward at the future with a child’s eyes, always looking for the gift that life is still going to give me ...

Today, I celebrate having as many friends as you, people who inspired me and whom I inspire, people who are not allowed to stop no matter how high the mountain of obstacles ... For me it is a happy birthday, and for you, a happy reflection.

About stages of change

Change in nature takes place gradually. In fact, I am not sure there is any sudden change that happens in a natural environment. Well there are disasters, but it could be said they are also part of the change process.

But we, sweet humans, by not being content with that, we started something called civilization and we change everything. Yes, we change the change.

More precisely, we started many centuries ago to manipulate the pace and stages of change, according to personal or collective convenience, creating the times we live nowadays, when we are not sure what will happen next or how.

There are basically four stages in change and all goes through these.

Change is a non-creative name for the first stage. Sometimes I call it Transition, and it indicates soft and subtle changes. In a whole process like the yearly seasons, everyday there is a change in the temperature, humidity and wind, but we are not aware as they are very subtle.

Besides, they are expected. For instance, if the present season is spring, we are expecting that as time passes by, temperature increases, at least after a certain inflection point. And we are ready for that.

For us, we have maybe tens or hundreds of changes in just one day: clothes, hunger-food, hair style, smiley-serious, humor, opinion, tastes, etc. The key here is we are expecting them, so they don’t shock and many times we are not even aware of them.

But at some point there is a crisis. During the year, rainstorms come, snow falls and the weather becomes quite unpredictable. Crisis is a type of change that is unexpected and normally disruptive, quite often is considered as negative – although we could talk about good crisis when all of a sudden, during winter, the Sun heats our day and hearts.

It is necessary to provide the time and space so that the next season will replace the present one.

I don’t know anyone who is not afraid of a crisis, which name by the way in Chinese does have a character with the meaning of danger, but it is part of the stages of change, there is no way to avoid it without avoiding the whole change, and that is very difficult to do.

We need a certain level of preparedness to overcome the mean effects of a crisis. For the worst case scenario, leadership is necessary to help a person or any collective to come out of it. It is important to keep in mind this is necessary, because only by going through a crisis you can move on with the change.

Another point that distresses people is the fact that changes in our human society don’t happen in order, as in nature. That means, crisis can come and go, and come again during the same change process…

The worst part (apparently) of any change process is chaos, when the lowest or highest temperature takes place, or when floods or drought happens. It is totally unmanageable and besides going for a shelter, nobody can do much.

Not even by excelling in preparedness or the best leader in the world can help when chaos comes, and we, humans, try to prevent them. And yet, it is a stage we all have to go through if we want to come out of it and reach the last and final stage.

Transformation, also called metamorphosis, is that point when there is no resemblance between how things were at the first stage and how they ended. Try to explain to a little child that those leafless and dead trees will be soon blossoming with life… It is impossible to imagine it is true, but it is, because after chaos, after the worst part of a change process, when all looks like lost, life comes back again.

As humans, we don’t embrace transformation as we should. After all, to reach that point we do have to suffer in a way, passing through several stages – and different than nature, repeating those innumerable times – until one day we are transformed.

But we should embrace it, as we should embrace the chaos, crisis and the little transitions in life, because they all give us something much more valuable. See, nature will never transform something into another thing that is worse than the previous form.

Transformation always means good. Excellent. Incredible. It means our lives that reached their worst point and look deprived of energy are now totally different and we have another chance to live.

So, instead of fighting against the processes embedded in changes, it is better to learn about them, prepare yourself and use them for the good of many.

Has anyone seen 2016?

Some would accuse it of being the worst year, but the reality is that it was so fast, very few could reflect on it. Properly reflect on it.

What is going on? Some claim the Earth is speeding its rotation, others say something else. Reality is: our lives are accelerated.

There are many more things to do at the same slot of time than a persona sixty years ago. With the technological facilities, we have increased our actions in so many ways.

This is why, we need to stop a bit and think of what really happened. Maybe it will be difficult to think of what happened in the world, but at least we can make up some time to think of the self and understand my own process.

In this why, we will be able to feel the year that flight away and be suitably thankful in relation to all the benefits received and all lessons learned.