Spirituality and business never seemed to mix. It appeared that there was no room in the corporate world for one to be connected to their own spirit and certainly not bring it into the office. The clash was too wide, the chiasm too deep. In the spiritual realm we focus on being compassionate and caring for others. The business world was “dog eat dog”. Everyone was out for themselves. It was all about making the most money, winning the power games and being in control. There wasn’t time or energy to put into being “spiritual”. “Let’s be practical”.
Fortunately the tide has been changing and more and more people are welcoming in spirituality into business.
The word spirituality brings up a lot of different contentions for people, so it has still be the “hush, hush” word. We have worked around it through it, looked over it and pulled it through the back door. Now it is time to bring it out into the open. It is time to accept ourselves as truly spiritual beings having a human experience. The more we live in this place, the more it becomes a part of our everyday experience and as such, it needs to be incorporated into everything in our lives. And that includes business.
So what does it really mean to be spiritual? What are spiritual practices and how do we incorporate them into our daily life and into our businesses? These are the questions that have led me to writing this series of blogs.
For me, these are questions I have wanted to explore on a deeper level. Coming out of the Spiritual closet for many of us has been a big challenge and change. I am ready to say to the world, this is who I am and stand up for myself as the spiritual being and stand up for the right of others to do the same. Saying that, I must be clear, that the way I see spirituality and the way you see it and how someone else sees it are all going to be very different on many levels. I think that is a good thing. I want everyone to be free to express their spirituality in the way that fits into their own personal life and beliefs.
Coming out of the spiritual closet was for me a 2-sided affair, maybe even 3. First of all, just being here and saying to the world, my business is about bringing spiritual practices to business is a major step. Like I said, we have been zig-zagging around the “word” spirituality. If we want to be taken seriously in the business world, we don’t mention the “S” word. We have spoken about business ethics, personal development in the corporate world, but to actually put those 2 words, Spirituality and business, together has been the “no-no”. Many people who do have a spiritual basis and have successful businesses are still, to some extent, hiding in the closet about it. “It is what I do personally and not to be shared with the world.” They want to be taken as a serious business person, not someone who is “woo-woo.”
I used to keep my 2 worlds very separate. On one hand I was starting a business working with “Spiritual women”. I wanted to work with women who were doing spiritual healing, intuitive work, psychics, tarot readers, crystal healers, etc. Those outside of mainstream healing, the alternative community. However on the other side of the fence, I am also an ordained lay minister of a Christian church.
My 2 worlds collide.
However I’m sure many in my church world had a fair idea of my other interest and connections, but not so the other way. Telling my church community of the “work” I do and the interest I have was the most difficult. I have had conversations with people over the years that have extreme difficulty with anything outside the box of their thinking. Yet, generally speaking my position and beliefs are accepted. Fortunately that is the church I belong to. It is accepting of us all having different beliefs and understandings of God and spirituality. There is celebration in the diversity of thinking. There is also a sprinkling amongst the membership of those who are moving in the same direction.
Coming out in my other world, telling my “spiritual” friends and colleagues that I am a Priest, was more of a freak out. It was something unsuspected that they did not see. It wasn’t that I was particularly hiding it, but I never felt like there was any need to bring it up. Now I felt like just being completely and totally who I am. This is who I am. Some crazy mixed up combination of my parent’s Christianity and my daughter’s paganism. Why not?
That was not enough for me; I wanted to bring it into the business world. I wanted my world’s to fit together. To me this is the only way to live. Fully awake to who I am and able to share that with the world.