About Transformational Presence

Hi!

In my previous post, I briefly touched upon transformational presence as one of the important cornerstones of my work and life. Let me say a few words about this as, in the next posts, I will probably refer to it rather frequently I guess…..

In his book “Transformational Presence, How To Make a Difference In a Rapidly Changing World”, Alan Seale (www.transformationalpresence.org) describes it as:

“showing up to life and leadership in a way that creates the best possible conditions for transformation to occur. We cannot make transformation happen – that’s called “manipulation!” Yet we can create environments and cultures that encourage transformation to unfold.”

There are a few things that you may or may not notice reading this. First of all: “showing up” means here how you choose to show up. Rather than being pushed around by whatever is going on in your life, and hence being in response mode, this is the first distinction: to operate from choice. We can’t always change the circumstances right away, but we can choose who we choose to be. And that alone makes quite a difference.

“…to life and leadership…” it refers to Transformational Presence not being the latest fad that you can apply in your professional life for a while to finally discard of it as the fad doesn’t really work. Transformational Presence is potentially a profound re-orientation on your life altogether. It is always open to what wants to happen in any given situation. And also, who that is asking you to be, which is completely different from what you want to happen in a situation and what should change (probably excluding yourself) in order for that to happen. Now you might think that being open to what wants to happen means, giving in to that. This is most definitely not the case. By being open to the potential in a situation and also to who is that asking us to be, it opens up the possibility to flow with that instead of fighting it. Flowing with it is different from ‘going with the flow’. To me, the latter lives in a domain of resignation, of giving up, of powerlessness. Flowing with what is happening comes from expanded awareness and alertness for us to act when the moment is right. I will re-address this in subsequent posts.

“…. that creates the best possible conditions for transformation to occur.” In our rapidly changing world with so many people speaking and acting to serve their goals and interests, it will prove to be a hell of a rodeo trying to make things happen and trying to control every step in that process to get a guaranteed outcome. The question ‘are you talking to life, or do you let life talk to you?’ comes to mind while writing this. Living your life grounded in the practices of Transformational Presence allows you to partner with your potential if you like. It’s about flowing with what wants to happen whilst being very candid about the question who that is asking you to be. And indeed it does mean that you’ll allow change into your life. Perhaps even a more profound change from time to time. Like change across form. A transformation so to speak.

I hope this is helpful as a start. Share any questions you may have!

Geert

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Picking it up again

Heya,

It’s been a while. I confess. Mea culpa. Of course a lot has happened, like getting more actively involved in playing and also creating music. Two CD’s have been published: a live album with the FFB Bigband from Barsinghausen, Germany (https://ffb-bigband.de/music/ffb-live/). And a CD under the name of Gallagher’s Twin with originals for the most part written by my buddy Robert Schramm (https://www.reverbnation.com/Gallagherstwin/songs). And there is more (https://soundcloud.com/geerthn/hip-hot-happening). I must have mentioned it before: music indeed is my first passion in life.

But also my professional development has gone on. I’m continuing to work internationally as a Senior Executive Coach and Facilitator, working with leaders, managers, and professionals. The focus herein has shifted somewhat though. From being a bit on the traditional transactional side to fully transformational. A great source of inspiration is Alan Seale from the Center for Transformational Presence in Massachusetts, USA. (www.transformationalpresence.org). I invite you to take a look at his website and learn about his views on transformational presence and the Great Breaking Open. I’m sure you’ll like it.

So…this is it for the moment. It feels good to be back here and I’m looking forward to being around here more often as of now.

Best wishes,

Geert

The Next Event

OK,

so we had our shooting in Paris (not sure if anyone considers the daily casualties in places like Nigeria, Syria, Libya, Iraq to name just a few) and all in the western world seem to be grabbed by the drama, the strong emotions that come with it. Take a look back at this post https://geerthofman.wordpress.com/2012/02/01/on-human-interaction-four-levels/. I learned from Alan Seale (http://www.transformationalpresence.org) that a distinction can be made in four levels of human engagement:

1. the drama; whose fault is it?
2. the situation, the facts, how do we fix it as quickly as possible? It’s about making things OK again.
3. level of choice: who do I want to be in this situation?
4. opportunity; what is it that is really wanting to happen? What is the gift?

On levels 1 and  no learning takes place. It might be where mass consciousness is living.

On levels 3 and 4 things start to shift as we redefine our relation with the drama.

So in relation to the ‘drama’ in France (or any other of the many dramas around  the world) : What is the opportunity? What are the missing conversations? What wants to show itself that we have not been able or willing to see? My quick guess at the moment is that it is calling for a different  way of living together on the planet as one humankind. We can’t go on exploiting the earth and its inhabitants in the name of free market economy. As if trying to make as much money as possible is the dharma of mankind. We can’t go on cutting people out from the abundance we create. We can’t go on locking people away in endless suburbs with no perspective to a meaningful and fulfilling life. On account of the free market economy. So again, what wants to show itself through these acts of terror? Why are so many people immensely scared?  Why haven’t we been able to hear them? To listen to them? And work out a different way of peacefully and prosperously living together? Away from any kind of dogma. Why are we trying to make things OK again? OK for who? It’s time to change the game. We’re in this together…..

Peace be upon us,

 

Geert

 

 

You’re back home again #MH17

 

Rescue workers working a field in East Ukraine looking for bodies of passengers of flight MH17. Copyright ANP/Pierre Crom NRC Handelsblad 19 July 2014

Heya,

This text kinda emerged from somewhere when I was pondering the events around the downing of flight MH17 and the flying out of the bodies of the people that had been killed in the event. I wrote it because it wanted to be written. First in Dutch, then in German and now in English. If one thing should stand out, I hope it’s the desire, the necessity for all wars, and the immense suffering they cause, to end. Where ever on earth they take place and for whatever cause: they mainly cause unimaginable human suffering. It’s time we learn to see we share this home together. And that our joint efforts should be aimed at making this truly a home. For all of us. Please read the text and let me know what you think.

 

You’re back home again

 

You’re back home again

And that makes me happy.

Yes, indeed, happy.

A foreign emotion amidst incessant

Powerlessness. Anger. Disbelief. Grief.

Above all grief.

Despair.

Void.

 

You’re back home again.

I wanted to ask you how it was.

But it’s all so different now.

Share with me how you remember your last moment in this life.

I want to comfort you, take you in my arms, caress you, hold you against my heart and whisper that all is fine.

But I can’t do that.

 

You’re back home again.

And at last we are permeated again by the senselessness of war.

It doesn’t matter whether it’s a shot from a machinegun.

A machete.

A bomb.

The broken glass in the hand of a drunken idiot.

Or a missile.

It doesn’t matter.

It doesn’t bring any good.

 

You’re back home again.

Back home again after an unexpectedly long journey.

Finally back home after you had to wait so long.

Caught in a game played by scared pawns of power.

Left under the mercilessly scorching sun in a field far from here.

Robbed of the last dignity that was yours.

 

You’re back home again.

See all of those, who have come to greet you.

See all of those, who stand around you.

Perplexed.

United

For a moment.

 

You’re back home again.

And I see the infinite void in our heart.

 

#MH17

 

Geert Hofman

 

I’m just wondering

Hi y’all 🙂

Off late I’ve been wondering what would happen if we were to live without money. This comes after witnessing the economic debates, on how to get us out of the crisis and which have been going on for more than 5 years now, and having talked to Charles Eisenstein (http://sacred-economics.com/).

As you may know, money (the digits on a computer at the bank, linked to your name, which will be positive or negative) gets created out of thin air (a few mouse clicks) as interest bearing debt. This necessitates paying back more than you received which means, in shorthand,  finding a product or service to generate the money with and it means necessary economic growth. Right up to the moment where all commons have been taken and everything non tangible (which used to be available for no money as well). I mean for an individual it may still be possible to find a new niche but it’s clear to me that for the entire system this is a dead-end street.

And hence I’m wondering: would really everything collapse and would we revert to being undeveloped, uncivilised creatures? Miserable, sick, starving? Stealing away scarce resources from another? Violently unhappy and perpetually unfulfilled? That would be a case for the money game to start all over again.

Or would we see that we can have access to enough (as opposed to never having (owning) enough)? All of us. And if so: what would become available to all of us? Which is not available now under this monetary-scarcity paradigm?

What are your thoughts?

Namaste,

Geert

 

www.geerthofman.com

 

 

 

 

 

For a year that matters

So, well, yeah, the year 2014 has started. How many of your resolutions are still alive? How many have already been buried? How many did you make in the first place. For me, this year will be dedicated to three things:

1. continuing my transformational and exec coaching work and workshop facilitation
2. composing and playing and recording music (and finding out what I really want here)
3. writing

Ad 2: I started the year with a recording session in a studio here with by buddy and we’ll have a few more next week. The idea is to have an EP out on iTunes this spring. And: (OMG) I registered for a course Songwriting via Berklee College of Music!! I’m so excited!!

Why these three things? Because I enjoy doing those, they all make me happy in a way. And also because they allow me to interact with people from around the world and potentially touch their hearts, be a bit of inspiration, comfort. You tell me 🙂

In order not to forget to focus on these three things and also in order not to revert to this old habit telling myself I can’t do this (and hence revert to petty daily stuff only), I was so lucky to come across this beautiful poem by John O’Donohue. May it serve as an inspirational reminder for you as well. Let us live the life we’re called to!!!

For a New Beginning

In out-of-the-way places of the heart,
Where your thoughts never think to wander,
This beginning has been quietly forming,
Waiting until you were ready to emerge.

For a long time it has watched your desire,
Feeling the emptiness growing inside you,
Noticing how you willed yourself on,
Still unable to leave what you had outgrown.

It watched you play with the seduction of safety
And the gray promises that sameness whispered,
Heard the waves of turmoil rise and relent,
Wondered would you always live like this.

Then the delight, when your courage kindled,
And out you stepped onto new ground,
Your eyes young again with energy and dream,
A path of plenitude opening before you.

Though your destination is not yet clear
You can trust the promise of this opening;
Unfurl yourself into the grace of beginning
That is at one with your life’s desire.

Awaken your spirit to adventure;
Hold nothing back, learn to find ease in risk;
Soon you will be home in a new rhythm,
For your soul senses the world that awaits you.

John O’Donohue

Here’s to a year that matters! To a life that matters!

Blessings, Courage and Love!

Geert

What has changed

Heya!

It’s been a while since I’ve published my most recent post. Let’s talk shop right away, if you don’t mind.

In spite of all these fantastic ideas that, me too, I’m having, you know ideas and thoughts and emotions and what not about what is ahead of us, I’ve decided to start sharing my personal experiences here. Rather then trying to paint a bigger picture. Personal experiences relating to living the life I believe I’m called to. And of course to let you know about the battles I’m fighting with me old and persisting beliefs that stand in the way of fully opening up to, of completely surrendering to and embracing that which wants to become manifest in my life.

It’s the most important reason for the decision I took at the start of this year to allocate more time to engaging with music. It’s always been there and at a young age I decided to move it off radar – giving in to pressures of my parents of course and in spite of me having full clarity of how to proceed with my life and education. If you wanna have a look and a listen what that now is leading to, be my guest: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cLNteTJ1jX0

So again, this blog is going to be more about me and my – hopefully – growth to living the life which is mine and the contribution it may hold for all of us. With three purposes, well for now that is:

1. to serve as an example and perhaps a source of inspiration for you out there in a similar situation as what I’m sharing with you is basically walking the talk. Not to prove anything. Not to tell you you’re wrong. Just as an invitation.
2. to show how that positively impacts myself and others
3. to contribute to a different game on the planet. The money game has shown us what is capable of both positively and negatively and it’s time for a new game: the human game for all of us on the planet. But hey, I don’t need to be the guru here holding all the answers as I know I’m not, as it’s all of us holding the pieces of the answer as to how to move on to the next stage in human development. At the same time I don’t want to remain silent and want to take responsibility to progress matters,

That’s it for now. Stay tuned for more stories soon!

Namaste,

 

Geert

 

 

I wonder….

Good day!

So there’s another few states violently trying to beat down protests. And yet another few are so afraid of its own citizens and neighbors that they have started to collect as many expressions by them as possible in huge databases. In order to be able to throw a suspicion at each of us at the whim of some bureaucrat/s at whatever point in time

So I wonder where this fear comes from and why it is so persistent. Why do people like Erdogan (but it’s not just him) believe they can get away with oppressing the people in their countries? Why do they think they can stop a process which is inevitable and irrevocable since it finds its origin in a different source. What would it take for them to leave throw their petty political and personal agenda out of the window and make room for that which want to become manifest?

Why can’t those so-called leaders not see what wants to emerge? Is it that they identify so much with the role they have? Do they take themselves too seriously? And mind you: I’m pretty sure it is rather obscure for many of the protesters as well. But still they have the courage to respond to this new universal signal: no longer is it one for all. (And speaking of courage: what to think about this individual Edward Snowden?) We’re in this together. Leadership is a distributed function, and leadership roles will be inhabited by those who can  make the contribution which is required for as long at it is required.

The American people are on a diet of fear. And once more: they’re not the only ones. It may be the consequence of us living our lives under the illusion of separation in a hostile environment, as Charles Eisenstein illustrates so beautifully: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EEZkQv25uEs And inevitably that has gotten a solid political foundation as well. Why is it that no one seems to ask why the American people should be afraid? And of what exactly? And what it would take to get rid of the fear? And again: the USA is not the only country where this is going on. It’s omnipresent.

People like Alan Seale and Otto Scharmer talk about remembering the future that wants to emerge, which to me makes a lot of sense as figuring out where to next is no longer really possible. In his July 1994 speech in America, Vaclav Havel said:

“There are good reasons for suggesting that the modern age has ended. Many things indicate that we are going through a transitional period, when it seems that something is on the way out and something else is painfully being born. It is as if something were crumbling, decaying and exhausting itself, while something else, still indistinct, were arising from the rubble.”

The modern world as we have come to know and understand it, has ended. I know. Many of you know. When will enough people know and act responsibly in allowing the future that wants to emerge to actually do so.

Peace,

Geert Hofman

www.geerthofman.com

A New Economy?

Salve!

For some time I’ve been wondering how long our current economic system can continue as it is based on scarce money (or better: interest bearing debt), the repayment of which necessitates perpetual growth and leads us to believe we’re separate from each other and that we have to compete for this scarce money.  There are several authors who are pointing this out as well, like Mark Boyle and Charles Eisenstein (www.charleseisenstein.net)  for instance. Since the beginning of this century, money has been even further disconnected from the real world as it ever had been. It’s numbers on a computer at a bank and some tangibles like slips of paper and metal coins with symbols on it that do magic to the otherwise relative worthless paper and metal. And the funny thing is: we all agree to it. We all play along with the money game and are all howling at the Euro crisis with every government in Europe fearing for a worsening of it and for their country slipping into a recession. That triggers panic in the political decision-making centers. If the number of paid transactions decreases and possibly (their average price level too) it is feared that eventually the economy will collapse. Well, yeah, if we continue to believe money is the only thing that matters in a human life, it may so happen and we’ll all end up hungry, cold, miserable and grumpy. To put it mildly.

A recession is a decrease in the number of paid transactions form one period to the previous. OK, technically speaking, this has to happen two quarters in a row. I am aware that wealth is not evenly distributed around the planet and that there still is poverty around the globe. But what use is it for those in the “developed” world to get more stuff? More stuff doesn’t make us happier or having more fulfilled lives. More stuff primarily seems to be driving forces in our society who need the power that comes with accumulating money. Big corporations, all kinds of institutions, the state itself….

I do not have clear view on what exact path will be followed by the change that is increasingly taking place but it seems to me we have to get used to having and acquiring less stuff. I’m not saying we should become poor and wait out our time because that won’t help anybody. But what WILL we be doing all day? Some say we’ll spend more time growing and producing our food, which will be of a higher quality than the mass-produced, chemically intoxicated waste we drop dow our digestive tracts right now. And that would be one condition for a higher state of awareness. This is one thing I can see happening: the world as one global, inclusive community, with on average a (much)  higher level of consciousness. Hence I choose to believe that eventually, in the new cosmic era (Aquarius/Leo) the world will be flat. Or as Charles Eisenstein puts is in chapter 11 of his book Sacred Economics (www.sacred-economics.com)

“In this chapter I will refer to “government” in the context of currency issue, but keep in mind that like all of our institutions, government is going to change dramatically in coming years. Ultimately, I envision decentralized, self-organizing, emergent, peer-to-peer, ecologically integrated expressions of political will. Parallel to this, I envision an ecology of money as well, an economic system with many complementary modes of circulation and exchange. Among them will be new extensions of the gift, freeing work from compulsion and guaranteeing the necessities of life to all.”

What fascinates me how we are going to get there and what changes we have to incur in our thinking about everything but about economics in particular. How can we make sure we make his shift, by not staying stuck in the current political and economical debate that is ruled by fear. And how can we make this shift in a safe and peaceful way?

What do you have to say about this?

Love and Blessings,

Geert

www.geerthofman.com

Why Poverty?

Howdy,

Earlier this week I landed on the Arte TV-channel here in Germany that had dedicated that day’s programmes to the theme ‘Why Poverty?’ Having studied economics at Erasmus University Rotterdam, I guess I could answer this question using economic theories and would probably come up with some kind of an accepted answer. But watching young Chinese adults reluctantly engaging in a struggle for survival, either by trying to get accepted by some top university (thereby ruining their family’s monetary reserves to cover for the cost) or by trying to find whatever job that is available amidst countless competitors, made me sick. And those are considered the lucky ones.