When an organization is trapped in survival mode, it doesn’t just face external pressure. It suffers an internal collapse of energy, creativity, and coherence. Chronic stress becomes the culture, innovation dries up, and people burn out trying to keep the lights on. But just as individuals can heal from trauma, so can organizations, if leaders are willing to shift from constant doing to conscious being. 

In this episode of the Happiness Squad Podcast, Ashish Kothari and Mieke Jacobs explore how energy mastery and systemic intelligence can help leaders break free from the freeze response, reconnect to purpose, and restore wholeness to their teams and systems, unlocking the kind of flourishing that outlasts any crisis.

Mieke Jacobs is a Belgium-based leadership advisor serving as Transformational Faculty and Senior Executive Coach at Mobius Executive Leadership. Drawing on two decades at DuPont in operations and large-scale change, she now guides executive teams worldwide with systemic intelligence and energy mastery. Mieke is also the author of Poet Assassin and co-author of Emergent: The Power of Systemic Intelligence to Navigate the Complexity of M&A.

This episode is your invitation to lead differently by slowing down, tuning in, and trusting that wisdom lives not in doing more, but in being fully present.

Things you will learn in this episode:

• What happens when leaders create space for silence and stillness

• Practical energy mastery tools for leaders and facilitators

• Why systemic intelligence is essential for modern leadership

• Rituals to shift team energy—songs, silence, and charged fields

• How to spot invisible dysfunctions hidden in your company’s “order”

• Ways to create workplaces that energize rather than deplete

Stop chasing productivity and start leading with presence, energy, and wholeness. Take a pause and check out this episode.

Resources:

• On Children (Poem) by Khalil Gibran: https://poets.org/poem/children-1 

• ‘Stop Treating Well-being as a Side Hustle’ with Ashish Kothari: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ij4WcZWFMTg 

Books:

• Poet Assassin by Mieke Jacobs: https://amzn.eu/d/aPfsENl 

• Emergent by Mieke Jacobs: https://amzn.eu/d/1To2DOK 

• Hardwired for Happiness by Ashish Kothari: https://amzn.eu/d/1To2DOK

Books mentioned:

• The Prophet by Khalil Gibran: https://a.co/d/3pPl6Ea 

• Hiring the Heavens by Jean Slatter: https://a.co/d/4waFDhI 

• The Body Keeps the Score by Bessel van der Kolk: https://a.co/d/4oRfck8