These are people I know personally, who are doing powerful Evolutionary World Work. Each one of them is an example of an authentic, dedicated, creative, caring and world oriented leader. I feel grateful and blessed to have encountered them on my journey. They have all inspired and helped me to break through inner and outer barriers in my own unfolding. Thank you for the work you are doing to nourish HOPE.
Christina Baldwin and Ann Linnea Peer Spirit
Christina and Ann are among the most dedicated people I know. Through their tireless efforts they are bringing the idea and practice of conversations in Circle, as a tool for collaboration and participatory leadership, around the world. They have introduced this ancient way of listening to each other to innumerable groups, from the Kufunda Learning Village in Zimbabwe to the halls of the European Commission in Brussels. They have worked with Businesses, Churches, Hospitals, Councils and Boards among others. With a simply but clear structure they make the Circle effective for meetings, for difficult and emotional conversations, for listening to each others stories and challenges, to finding strategies and new ways of doing things together. Trusting the creative ability of their clients they help them to run Circles on their own and to adapt the Circle to their own culture and needs. Being with them doing Circle work, I experienced their ability to move the group to another level of connection with each other. And their website, Peer Spirit, is a joy to investigate.
Sheryl Erickson Powers of Place
Sheryl is a creative connector. Generous and gracious she is known around the world although she has barely left home! She is among the several guardians of the evocative and stunningly beautiful website, Powers of Place. This site, know globally, was started by a group of people who opened up a new field of study based on the idea that right relationship between people and the places where they gather offers the potential for the transformative action needed in the world today. The site has attracted over 600 articulate and dedicated members who actively participate in this project. I have discovered that becoming active with this group is transformative in itself. It expands awareness and brings depth into my everyday experiences. In her own shining way, Sheryl welcomed me into the site, stimulated my creativity with her questions and encouraged my sharing with her own openness and inquiring mind. What a gift to visit the Powers of Place just to stimulate my senses and my imagination with its beauty and clarity.
FireHawk & Pele Rouge Timeless Earth Wisdom
FireHawk and Pele Rouge are special people in the world today. They have taken a step into another world of Medicine Teachings. This is the ancient wisdom of the early Native Americans, specifically the teachings of The Delicate Lodge, where they served an eight-year apprenticeship with WindEagle and RainbowHawk. What I learned working with a group under their guidance, was their deep, abiding respect for wholeness, in ourselves, with each other and with the earth. Working with the ancient traditions of Ceremony, they create a magnificent environment that moves us deeper into our unique selves at the same time uniting all who are present into a community of Love. This is powerful Medicine. Their website, Timeless Earth Wisdom, reveals their unique qualities of attention to beauty, to simplicity, to detail and wholeness. Lucky those who sit in their Medicine Wheel or dance to their drumming.
Marilyn Hamilton Integral City
Dr. Marilyn has a bright, inventive and expansive mind! Being with her is like opening a door into a new world, especially about the future of Cities! She is an avid questioner and explorer bringing new perspectives and views into sight. Not only does she dare to plow new fields mentally, she brings her ideas into in the concrete world with innumerable tools, models, projects and seminars around the world and close to home, especially in her own hometown, Abbotsford, British Columbia (Canada’s fastest-growing city for the last decade). I have learned many new words from Marilyn, but the one I love most is “Meshworker” – one who connects networks of people to each other thereby creating an area of influence. This is who Marilyn is by nature, with a huge heart and a generous spirit she takes us into the future with her gifts. Looking in every directing for her inspiration, she spreads light far and wide.
Sandra Maitri The Diamond Approach
Sandra Maitri is my teacher of The Diamond Approach system of personal and spiritual development. She together with the other many teachers who serve this program help us to do the deep inner work of gaining self-knowledge and insight. Through this work we free up our different qualities and energies releasing our own deepest potential. Sandra is a patient, brilliant and deeply gifted teacher who steers us on a clear path to our own unfolding. She is also a well-known expert on the Enneagram, has written several books about it and holds seminars on how to use it in your life. In addition she is a gifted artist and painter. You can see her paintings on her website and learn more about the Diamond Work. I am very grateful for Sandra and the Ridhwan School that offers these outstanding programs of evolutionary development.
Craig and Patricia Neal Heartland, the Convening Company
Craig and Patricia amaze me with their energy and reach. These two have founded more Futuristic organizations over the years than you can count. Passionate and creative, deeply grounded in the fields of leadership, change, ecology and spirituality to name a few, they are also great fun to be with and full of smiles and ideas. Just to mention one thing, they have hosted Thought Leader Gatherings once a month over the past twelve years. I believe that their current book The Art of Convening will help leaders to move to a new level of clarity, awareness and competency in bringing people together to work co-creatively. Lucky the people of Minnesota that have these two in the Heartland, but not to fear they are on-line and radiating around the world!
Anne Rød –website
Anne is a firebrand of wit and competence. She has a laser sharp intuition that helps her to pin-point just where the problem lies. A formidable coach, facilitator and trainer, Anne is almost always on the move from one country to another. Her two key skills among others are in the areas of organizational systems coaching and intercultural competence and management. She creates trust easily but can quickly spot any lack of authenticity. Working together with Anne is a joy and a pleasure! Creativity erupts, connections are quickly seen, logic and structure appear and fun abounds! She is fast as lightening and as passionate about her own deep development as she is about developing leaders, organizations and individuals. Keep your eye out for her essays and articles, they give good clues to evolutionary development.
Suzanne Lahl – Lahl & Egan, LLC
Suzanne is courageous holistic researcher who over the last thirty years has put together always innovative and leading-edge programs in human potential, leadership and organizational development. I love sharing with Suzanne because there is always something exciting on her plate. She pushes the envelope and puts together approaches and topics that enhance the experience of learning. Her current work together with Terri Egan will surely stretch the participants into new areas and new actions – as they say themselves in their website “not for the faint of heart”. This feels like Suzanne, who is not afraid to test all her proposals on herself in a deep and long-term way. Watch these two, I believe they are leaving a mark in current academic leadership programs through their action based learning based on latest discoveries in neuroscience.
Barbara Shipka – Barbara Shipka Designs
I experience Barbara as a visionary and an artist who sees the sacredness in the Earth and in each person. She uses all of her gifts to lift leaders and organizations to new recognitions and insights. She is an avid learner and knows how to follow carefully what the newest generations are thinking and doing, perhaps on the lookout for evolutionary trends. To my amazement, Barbara has designed and made her own website, gracing it with her own stunning photography and amazing graphic drawings based on Crop Circles! She is an inspiration and a deep well of knowledge, insight and reflection. She is passionate about helping people around the world and has many stories to tell in photos, videos and written vignettes. I especially love her pages called A Cycle of Sustainability: Earth as Nature, Human-Fashioned Earth and Our Human Family! Barbara was ahead of her time when she published her book Leadership in a Challenging World: A Sacred Journey in 1997. Her writing was relevant then and is even more relevant today!
Bill Veltrop – MISA
Bill Veltrop: The first thing you notice about Bill is that he is tall as a tree – his head in the sky and his feet on the ground. This is a good metaphor for him because he is an extreme visionary who actually puts his ideas into action. His energy, enthusiasm and clear vision attract to him partners, pioneers and co-creators .
He is the co-founder of MISA (The Monterey Institute for Social Architecture) with Mike Thomas, FireHawk Hulin and Peter Gaarn. MISA is a growing community of allies committed to maximize its contribution to the well-being of all life — for all time — through the metamorphosis of our social systems. MISA’s Regional Metamorphosis initiative, to be launched in early 2012 is intended to promote and support the reinvention of all of these social systems (education, health care, finance, governance, commerce, etc.), in regions throughout our planet. They see the region as the most effective unit of design. They propose a “generative action-learning expedition (GALE)” approach that, over time, involves all of a region’s inhabitants in creating a future that works for all of life. Their new website, GlobalGEA is attracting major attention and their social architecture design ideas for “all life – for all time” are spreading to other regions and cities. This project is worth watching!
Marilyn Veltrop – Pathfinder Circles
Marilyn has always been an inspiration and role model for me with her shining and loving nature, deep insight into leadership and connection with the Native American tradition. She has the ability to see potential and positivity in each situation, always encouraging and supportive. She sparkles with enthusiasm, curiosity, energy and insight, touching others with her joy. Marilyn’s work with Pathfinder Circles has given many leaders an opportunity to discover and live their passion through their commitments to their own transformational journeys and the lasting difference they make in the world. She is surrounded by crowds of highly developed people who can’t say enough about her grace and positive influence. She lives fully everything she teaches and more so. Marilyn also serves as a transformational guide attracting clients from around the world who meet with her by phone or on Skype. Lucky them!