These persons have an appreciation, a sensitivity, and an understanding of life that fills them with compassion, gentleness, and a deep loving concern. Beautiful people do not just happen.” ― Elisabeth Kübler-Ross

She grew seemingly out of nowhere but here just beside the path a single primrose and a single flower. She will come back now year after year and become plenty as that is what they do, primrose. Why this spot and how she got here we don’t know but here she is none the less. A surprise gift of beauty and grace in amongst the gravel hillside of the northern slope at the pond.

It was her bright yellow flower that caught our attention glowing in the morning sun. Reminding us beauty is everywhere if we are aware enough to notice

What is calling your attention wherein beauty can be invited?

We stood in the shadow of the apple tree, taking in relief from the already hot rising sun

Observing its ancient dance with the wild grapes climbing about its branches

Watching the elegance of its wisdom in symbiotic exchange with its environment

We strive to be in synbiotic exchange - a new leader to an already growing organization is worried about his relationship with one of the other executives critical to his success. He thought they had gotten off to a good start, and then what seems like territoalism showed up. You’re doing what? You’re going to take over how? These were the questions rattling around their 2nd meeting together. Oh Oh - he said, sharing with me he’s never been stressed about a working relationship like this until now. How do we regain the shared vision and align around how we’ll work together, how we see things, etc.

Recently I discovered the power of starting a conversation by asking - what do we each understand. What do we each understand about the situation opens up understanding empathy and the possibility of co-creating a shared vision.

Does the grape vine ask the tree if she can grow upon her branches? In a way I suspect she does and they form a willing dance of co-creation. What they each give each other I am not certain but they offer and receive and Max-dog and I are the receivers of beauty awe and shade from the sun.

> Where are you seeking to share an understanding?

All we need is to know there’s a patch of blue in amongst all the clouds.

It doesn’t have to be big, it just has to be there. Then we can imagine.

A patch of blue

Where is your imagination taking you?

The breeze after a rain is remarkable. An invitation to refresh and let go. To take in its cool embrace. Any worries thoughts or musings are immediately replaced with the here and now. Rustling leaves. Ripples across the water. And feeling the ground beneath our feet.

Thank you breeze for the reminder to let go and refresh

What is calling you to let go?

The clouds move across the sky offering an early warning of the speed and direction of the wind. The air moving through the yurt suggests the temperature, are moving back to seasonably cooler temperatures?

Early warning signs are important on the farm and in life. We’re paying attention to the wind as a key factor, it’s a simple sign of what’s coming

A scale-up leadership team, is trying to determine what their early warning signs are for operational excellence. Is it who yells or complains the loudest? Is it their CTO who has typically been the arbiter of product direction? The leader of business development who beats a drum of customer success? Or chief people officer who talks about the symptoms across teams in the form of bubble up complaints. What signs do they listen to?

The truth is, all of them, it’s how they collaborate to interpret and solve that’s critical to their success. Are each of the signals interpreted through soft or hard metrics they can map to trend line that informs the health of their business. Do they live the values, call them out in behaviour they see in the context of problem-solving? It’s each day that matters. Each day we pay attention and map back what we see into our operational structure for success, how our business functions, the vision we hold and the way we enliven our values in day-to-day interactions.

On the farm the wind translates to what is possible to accomplish in a given day. The vision holds the direction but the wind offers the choice of the moment. Today won’t be any big or small construction, the hoop tunnels we plan to cover the lettuce will be built on another day. Today planting onions and flowers will work just fine.

What are the signs telling you?

For the birds that hang out in the asparagus gone to seed, it may as well be an imprenetrable wall. Nobody messes with them within and they frolic with abandon throughout.

All we have to do is lean against the wall to know it is but an illusion and instead pliable whispy branches on malleable stocks that mimic Christmas trees with their red ball-shaped seeds - hardly impenetrable at all.

People can be like an impenetrable wall. Hard to understand, to relate to, to create connection with. But all we have to do is remember to lean in, and then we’re back in the plush fluffy whips of the protected asparagus gone to seed. no threat here and lots of room for connection.

Where’s your invitation to lean in?

Those are childish thoughts. Let God speak within you, and your thoughts will grow silent. You are anxious because your path leads away from mother and home. But every step and every day lead you back again to the mother. Home is neither here nor there. Home is within you, or home is nowhere at all. - Herman Hesse

Nasturtiums have self seeded throughout the greenhouse. Growing between rows, at the edges and in between - they add colour and nutrition.

Along the western wall a group has formed pushed up against the plastic, and along side the dill and tomatoes. Beautiful spots of orange, yellow and red pop out from among the striated green leaves.

Even with the feeling of being pushed up against it, the plant offers beauty and food. It can’t help itself.

What can’t you help yourself to express?

Peas are finally ready! I planted them as a new vegetable to me this year, worried I had done it right. Would they germinate? Would they grow well? How tall might they get? How abundant? Would the way I laid out the rows enable easier picking? All these worries and here we are picking the abundance of peas.

They are at the end of their run having given us great joy and Max dog too. This has been our morning routine, to come by pick some peas for breakfast and then head out on our walk about the pond.

Harvesting the last of the peas, to ensure we’d got them all so as to pull the plant and dry a few leftover for seed. We’d have to go back over each row to pick what was missed. There was always something missed.

Becoming consciously incompetence is like that. Realizing we aren’t good at something we thought we were or starting at the beginning of mastering a new skill. We have to go back over the same ground again and again finding what was missed. What else is here to learn to experience to know in order to gain the abundance of a new way.

It can be frustrating to have to keep coming back only to find more, more to master more to learn.

Didn’t we get all those peas?! Nope - always a few hiding within a branch or under some leaves and the gift they can become when we miss them - seeding a new future of learning and growth.

> What tread do you need to revisit? What do you notice that’s there for you?

Without thought and in complete symbiosis

It stands almost 6 feet tall just outside of the greenhouse. The flower a thorny cone structure with a band of delicate lavender pink minitature of miniature flower petals in a band around the middle. What is this incredible beauty?! Made perfect for a certain type of pollen collecting insect. Without thought this dance of sustenance takes place.

Where is the ‘without thought’ element of symbiosis at work? It is the alignment to mission and functional expression in projects. The dance manifests between people and teams - and therein the complicating factor we wish were made simple. How we align to our shared purpose - our mission - how we communicate in the dance. Does the bee ask the flowers - do you trust me to not take too much and give back by way of pollinating you? No, it is, they offer each other and receive fully by divine design.

In teams if we’re good we ask - how will we build and sustain trust? We act from the belief that our intentions are good and a way of inquiring when we are surprised. We communicate by asking, sharing, listening consistently. We must actively design.

What is calling for deliberate design in your life?

When we look into the heart of a flower, we see clouds, sunshine, minerals, time, the earth, and everything else in the cosmos in it. Without clouds, there could be no rain, and there would be no flower. Without time, the flower could not bloom. In fact, the flower is made entirely of non-flower elements; it has no independent individual existence. It ‘inter-is’ with everything else in the universe. Thich Nhat Hahn

Quote: Jiddu Krishnamurti, The Book of Life

It was a bold move. Coyote left a large poop on the main trail - right in the middle. That’s serious.

The tracks around the pond revealed the size of the pack at least 3 or 4, likely two femails, unsure the rest.

What is the threat?

Our focus and response.

Last week was full of triggers for the Executive new to their team, A deep fear-based emotional response overriding healthy perspectives and clarity of focus. Recognizing the situation, they called in support. A coaching conversation to explore what’s real and strategize the response and learnings about themselves, the other leaders and the team dynamic.

Coyote wants Max-dog to join the pack or be eaten. He is an asset either way.

We both project the deception of territory. When we let that go we can focus on the clear next steps and whats most important.

Tomorrow we’ll move our camper to the back pond to be sure to stake our claim. They have the forest and our old apple orchard - plenty of room for both of us. No need to be in our garden. Thank you Coyote, we will be careful with Max-dog for the next while and be more mindful in our shared space at the pond.

What’s your focus and response?