The WHY of resilience...

(Click image for photos)

The L&H 2016 class began with one simple question - Why are you hear? Some climbers articulated and discovered clarity, others contemplated, while others were provocatively haunted by the greater meaning of passion, perseverance, commitment, and courage. The question and experiential journey was complex, difficult, painful, tearful, yet hopeful, beautiful, and purifying. Student climbers have returned with volumes of stories, learning, and implications that stretch far beyond the mountain. Implications were revealed and relate directly to their higher sense of purpose in life, a renewed understanding and practice of leadership, and infinite implications for organizational strategy, team development, and organizations. The mountains have taught us much, as they have historically for others. The wilderness impacts, clarifies, and refines the mind, body, and spirit. 

Our last night on the mountain, students were asked to think about what they brought to the mountain, what they left on the mountain, and what they were gifted with on the mountain. This invitation was a primer to prepare in sharing what they learned about themselves from the context of this course and our shared climb. As students, what will you do with the content of this course? What are some implications of these experiences for leadership or personal life as you challenge yourself to live principles practiced on the mountain. The focus is on translating and scaffolding this transformative experience to personal & organizational life. You have license to be creative in how you capture this reflection and how you share words and images of your story. These are just some simple prompts to get you thinking about this final reflection. Please do not allow these prompts to confine who you are, but rather give you permission to blaze your own trail. 

Most importantly - Have FUN and ENJOY your story of leadership & hardiness.

"Will to Meaning"

Dear Visitors

Students in the ORGL Program at Gonzaga University are off to another great adventure in the Leadership and Hardiness course, studying the attitudes and mechanisms of personal and organizational resilience. As in previous years, this course continues to embrace Ignatian principles of action by challenging students to not only study various theoretical frameworks and complete projects, but also apply what they learn through an experiential adventure-based simulation of climbing Mt. Adams. Along this journey they read many seminal works that contribute to a refined and ongoing understanding of resilience. They are beginning this journey by studying Victor Frankl's story - Man's Search for Meaning - as a process of entering a contemplative state of considering their own search for meaning.

Frankl's gripping account of "life in a concentration camp as reflected in the mind of a prisoner" brings to life a story filled with realistic depictions of the experiences of camp life and how these experiences show that man does have a choice of action and in finding meaning in all forms of existence, even in the most dyer of circumstances, and thus a reason to continue living. Through readings and classroom discussions, students learn about existential analysis in the context of their life, families, organizations, and community. 

Leadership & Hardiness Reunion this Friday

Hi Everyone!

Meru is showing at the Magic Lantern this Friday night. Send me an email if interested and we will organize. Check out the website since your city might also host a showing in the near future.

Learn it...experience it...live it!

(click on image for pictures)

Dear friends and colleagues...

The class of leadership & hardiness 2015 returned from Mt. Adams several days ago. It was an epic climb as 22 students and 8 guides faced Denali like conditions on Mt. Adams. The weekend began as any other summer adventure in the pacific northwest. The sun was out, yet a brisk air progressively engulfed the mountain from the trail head campground to base camp and certainly onward. Our hike to base camp was sunny, dry, yet unseasonably cool. The cooler temperatures contributed to more vigor and perhaps our earliest arrival at base camp. The teams looked strong, calculated, unwavering to team commitment, maintaining resolute hardy attitudes. Upon arrival at base camp, all teams committed to assigned duties of setting camp and boiling water for hydration and our first warm meal of the day. Although fatigued from a long trek, teams noticeably found a reserve that sustained attitudes, emotions, physical stamina, and a disposition of commitment and regard for the larger team. It was beautiful to watch and listen as each team supported individual members. All they had was each other and a reliance that was paradoxically complex in the setting of physical and emotional challenges, yet their response was simple, elegant, and beautiful in sharing food, warmth, a kind comment, laughter, and gratitude. Oh how we long for these positive organizational behaviors in our daily lives!

A meal and hydration partially readied our bodies to reconvene as a class and plan the activities of the next morning. In brief, the plan was to unfold with a 2am wake up call and a 3am alpine ascent.  We turned in for the night to the warmth and serenity of down mummy bags as the mountain was progressively engulfed by ominous clouds and a steady wind. And then it happened, like a scene out of the 1996 Everest disaster. Weather not only moved in, but the howling 40-60 mph winds with periods of freezing rain provided a challenging stimulus that heightened and flooded every sensory response in the body. It was loud, freezing cold, wet, and dusty. Some tents were nearly blown out of camp while trusty jet boil stoves could hardly start in the midst of these conditions.

We had arrived at the monumental and unscripted challenge that would test our class. The reflections and stories you will hear are partially contextualized by these challenging circumstances. The stories will be told by students. Their reflections may inspire them to share how they applied principles of hardiness towards strategic resilience, connection, transformation, flourishing, and success of the larger group.

Students: Most importantly, what did you learn about yourself from the context of this course and our shared climb? What do you plan to do with content gained from this course? What are some implications of these experiences for organizations or your personal life as you challenge yourself to live in these moments. You have license to be creative in how you capture this reflection and how you share words and images of your story. These are just some simple prompts to get you thinking about this final reflection.

Most importantly - Have FUN and ENJOY your story of leadership & hardiness.

Please comment on this blog with your reflective posts when ready.

Robert Sapolsky is a brilliant and highly awarded Neuroendocrinologist at Stanford. He has contributed to our understanding of stress on our bodies and how social standing can make us more or less susceptible.

From baboon troops on the plains of Africa, to neuroscience labs at Stanford University, scientists are revealing just how lethal stress can be. Research tells us that the impact of stress can be found deep within us, shrinking our brains, adding fat to our bellies, even unraveling our chromosomes. Understanding how stress works can help us figure out ways to combat it and how to live a life free of the tyranny of this contemporary plague. In Stress: Portrait of a Killer, scientific discoveries in the field and in the lab proves that stress is not just a state of mind, but something measurable and dangerous.

Please view Stress: Portrait of a Killer (also free on Netflix) and consider the following questions for discussion. As leadership scholars and practitioners, as well as students of resilience theory contextualized by Jesuit education, what are some implications and generalizations of this work? Enjoy learning about these principles through this scientifically grounded, yet witty documentary. Consider the following questions as mere prompts for discussion and to inform your creative responses:

• What can we learn from this study in the context of human social systems, organizational life, climate, culture, role of hardiness for leadership etc.?
• One of the findings in the study indicated that the amount of control is directly related to where you are at in the hierarchy. What is the prescription for individuals not at the top?
• What is your role in contributing to a work setting that allows for human flourishing from the context of this film and other readings? Discuss struggles and successes and weave in hardiness principles, coping & self-care.
• How might Jesuit principles of 'cura personalis' (regard for the entire person) and 'Magis' re-contextualize the impact of perceived stress?
• What is the role and/or responsibility of leadership in understanding indicators of stress & adversity?
• As leaders, how can we contribute to or mitigate 'healthy' versus 'chronic' stress?
• How do we create healthy 'opportunities' for stress, adversity, and failure in order to grow?
  

In search of meaning...

Dear Visitors

Students in the ORGL Program at Gonzaga University are off to another great adventure in the Leadership and Hardiness course, studying the attitudes and mechanisms of personal and organizational resilience. This course embraces the Ignatian principle of action by challenging students to not only study various theoretical frameworks and complete projects, but also apply what they learn through an experiential simulation of climbing Mt. Adams. Along this journey they read many seminal works that contribute to a refined and ongoing understanding of resilience. They are beginning this journey by studying Victor Frankl's story - Man's Search for Meaning - as a process of entering a contemplative state of considering their own search for meaning.

Frankl's gripping account of "life in a concentration camp as reflected in the mind of a prisoner" brings to life a story filled with realistic depictions of the experiences of camp life and how these experiences show that man does have a choice of action and in finding meaning in all forms of existence, even in the most dyer of circumstances, and thus a reason to continue living. Through readings and classroom discussions, students learn about existential analysis in the context of their life, families, organizations, and community. 

In reading Frankl's story, it is encouraged for readers to interact with the text by reading and making notes, asking questions, defining terms, and marking key passages. Keep a journal while reading in order to record reactions and responses. Make this book a singular focus to allow for deep reflection and contemplation. Ask yourself: What did I learn from Frankl's story and his life at a concentration camp that has implications for leadership, personal, and organizational resilience? What is the relevance of understanding existential analysis to explore meaning and growth in adversity? What is the relevance of logo-therapy or tragic optimism for leadership? These are some pragmatic yet important questions to ask in authentic living, let alone in preparing for a class simulation that will stretch the mind, body, and spirit. Explain Frankl's theory of success. Do you agree or disagree with him? What is the "ultimate freedom" according to Frankl? According to Frankl, how do suffering and death complete life and give it meaning? According to Frankl, there are three main avenues for reaching meaning in life; what are they? Analyze and discuss these with regard to your own life.

These are questions and thoughts to stimulate but not isolate your thinking and posting.

As visitors we invite you to join our discussion or simply follow our journey throughout this summer.

Leadership Hardiness...the

We are one week away from launching another memorable journey in Leadership & Hardiness, a leadership course at Gonzaga University in the Department of Organizational Leadership. 

View the Trailer in anticipation of this formative journey by clicking the photo: