Awareness in the Workplace

By David Latendresse

CEO Really Living Enterprises/Sojourners International

Partner, Vision, Strategy & Operations Aldebaran Associates

 

Whether personally or professionally awareness is about being the conscious “cause” in connection, response and relationship with your own life rather than becoming the unconscious “effect” of your reactions and being erroneously informed and manipulated by the environment and energies that surround you.

Do you choose to live a conscious life or do you choose to live an unconscious one? Are you a victim or do you face life straight up and take on what is coming your way? Do you choose to take responsibility for the circumstances and results of your life or do you project onto and give away that responsibility to others?

Putting yourself in context and spatial relationship to the world around you while remaining centered in the dimensions within you and developing clarity in the choices that relate to these places and spaces while you’re moving in them is at the heart of awareness. It’s all about choices and being the cause of your own life, knowing yourself and understanding the power of this tool available within yourself. Bringing choices to the forefront in the most engaging and clarity driven way possible protects your potential and stops you from succumbing to the endless distractions and fragmentations of who you are. The impact of the choices you make steer how you move in the world, which impacts your life. It’s a simple equation.

There is no escaping the fact that choices are at the heart of everyone’s life. Your choices make up your life and there never is a shortage of them. If one thing is consistent in life it is that there are always choices to be made. To know this and to not make a choice is to make a choice. To not know to what extent choices are available to you or how you can apply them is simply lack of awareness. Knowing that you always have the choice to make a choice is fundamental to your survival and thriving in the world. Not identifying the parameters, facets, angles and nuances around choices, actions and movements puts you at a distinct disadvantage within the frameworks, competitions and achievements we are all dancing, living in and painting the canvas of our life with.
 

The practicalities that surround these dynamics intertwine, craft and shape our lives personally and professionally in real world circumstances and are the representation of who you are. You are at the center of your life which means you are at the center of your choices. You have the choice to live the life you were given in relationship to the Truth of who you are and how that looks and applies to every facet of your life. Do you know that you always have a choice within everything that is happening and all circumstances in your life? The awareness that you always have a choice to make a choice is the first step in working with awareness.

From the professional standpoint ask yourself “How am I impacting others in my organization and how do I let others impact me?” This question is key to the path you are traversing and will persist throughout your career. Job roles and responsibilities vary greatly, as do employee environments, but the one thing we have in common with each other no matter where we are and who we work for is our capacity to be aware of the spaces, places and people around us.

Giving yourself a much clearer view and understanding of the landscape in which you are operating in and from, utilizing and managing your consciousness intelligently to maneuver through an organization will make the difference between holistic success or empty success, between the fulfillment and reaching of your potential on the bigger scale and order of things vs. being a habitual and chronic smaller version of who you are which limits your contribution to those and the world around you.

You can only start from where you are, so explore and identify any sticking points, resistances, or consistent patterns in your career by making a list, drawing an image or writing in a journal. Talk to trusted friends and associates, see what they might see that you don’t. Meditate on this and take notes on what your insights are. Identify and nail these areas down in whatever way you can and begin the process of bringing as much awareness around them from a fundamental standpoint and it will go a long way in giving you the opportunity to achieve your vision of your life in how you see yourself achieving in an organization.

Being in relationship and collaborating with co-workers from a heightened sense of your awareness will give you a competitive edge. To see everything from the standpoint of awareness is to know yourself, which will give you more insight into others, equating to more intelligent interactions, helping you to maneuver through the organization while keeping your goals and vision alive.

Cultivating a relationship with your awareness is a lifelong endeavor. Just like any relationship, interact with and nurture it daily giving it time to develop and grow. Direct and apply it to different parts of your life, learn from it and it will pay great dividends over time.    

Awareness Mapping™ is a process I developed, a tool that actively keeps a person in conscious relationship with all dimensions of oneself while moving through one’s life journey personally and professionally. Bringing elements of personal enlightenment to your professional empowerment will bridge the gap and create momentum for the blossoming of an already exceptional career, but also for the otherwise unfulfilling or stagnant career path while opening the doors to a great deal of possibility, choice and creativity.