The Path of Soul-Based Leadership - Part 2

I support leaders to connect to the power of their spirit, download their soul purpose, and pioneer it in the world.

In this work, I’m constantly amazed by the intelligence of the process that people move through.

It's like I get to see the magic of how life works and it has always been such an affirmation to me of the loving intelligence behind our paths.

Over this 3-part series of articles, I want to share a few pieces on how I witness this path unfold for people, pretty much uniformly.

If you want to access support for your own soul-based leadership, get in touch.

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Part 2

In the last post we saw how those called to soul-based leadership first get the download in what wants to come through them, which feels great, and then get the upload of the trauma they gotta face to fully express who they are, which generally feels sh*t.

This is the goldmine though. And it’s the valley of our own shadows that leads to the peak of our liberation and full expression.

Stay tuned. This is about you…

So, let’s explore that valley.

In my experience, some of the challenging pieces people need to let go of in this cleaning up process are unique to each individual. It might be a person’s relationship with their parents, childhood trauma, attachment trauma, relationship wounds, or some particular event(s) that scarred them.

A bunch are the same for almost everyone.

One very common piece that people work through is about family, belonging and community. The fear that comes up is, if I really step up and step out, taking a stand for my soul purpose in the world and leading from that place of inspiration and alignment, will I be cast out? Will I be excluded from my tribe? Will I be judged, excommunicated, isolated and punished?

The story of what happens to those who take a stand for soul, love and purpose in a world that can be very unfriendly to those qualities has pedigree in human history. You don’t have to think too long to remember examples of when that has gone really bad. This has produced a fear that lives in basically everyone about coming out and taking a stand for their soul in the world.

Add to that the extra little thing of the collective primal, animal-level trauma that lives in everyone around being cast out from the tribe, and you get a potent mix! Indeed, the forces of resistance here are so potent that they keep many souls back from fully coming forth with their purpose for quite a while. Sometimes decades. Sometimes lifetimes. Familiar anyone?

Again though, in my experience, there is amazing intelligence to how this process unfolds. What it asks of the emerging leader is to be willing to jump, whatever the consequences. They are inevitably taken to a place of deep aloneness, where they must decide how committed they really are to what wants to come through them. They are asked, by their soul, to take a stand.

No one can make this choice for them. No one can fake it. And no one can offer support in such a way that can make it easier. It’s like the soul isolates the individual to force the questions:

Are you serious about this?

Are you really in for this?

Are you clear within yourself on what you’re here for, on the most fundamental level, in a way that isn’t dependent on anyone or anything else? That isn’t about whether you’re comfortable or not, whether you’re safe or not, whether you’re liked or not?

The answer “yes” will come sooner or later. The individual will either be ready then, or they may need a few more points of crisis to be pushed back against the wall enough to eventually take their stand, and complete this phase of the leadership initiation.

The beauty of it is though, that once they have been willing to take this stand, in the silent and private space of their own commitment, they start to realise they are not alone. They start to see, meet and come into connection with others who have also gone through the valley, and made that choice to stand for what their soul wants to bring through.

With this, they get to radically update their experience of family, belonging and community. Now they are coming onto contact with others who would never excommunicate or punish someone for taking a stand for who they truly are and the purpose that wants to come through them, because that is precisely the process that each of them has moved through to arrive where they are.

And because such beings are committed to soul, they see each other as souls. They recognise each other in the integrity of their inner being and the love and purpose they are seeking to bring into the world.

This seeing offers an entirely new level of intimacy. This is soul intimacy. When you are known and seen at a soul level, there is no wobble of your personality stuff, your reactivities or your shadows that can stop those bonded to you at a soul level from remembering who you truly are.

Yes, you might lose your sh*t sometimes. Yes, you might have shadow hanging out of your a** some days. But is that who you really are? No. It’s just the stuff you’re working through, just like the stuff each of these beings is working through. Who you truly are has been seen and known, and that is unshakable.

When this is the foundation on which a leader is standing – full commitment to what wants to come through them in a way that isn’t dependent on anyone or anything, and deep soul intimacy, community and belonging with others on the same path, they start to really mature into their leadership.

They learn the lessons of what it means to pioneer their purpose in the world. They learn the lessons of how to create from alignment with their soul. They learn the lessons of how to integrate money with their purpose. They learn the lessons of how to manifest their purpose in the world. They learn the lessons of how to lead and inspire others.