A Simple Question to Ask Yourself
Does your workplace require "misalignment with Self"?
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Survival Tool #33: Align With Self
When I started this newsletter in February, I had intended to focus primarily on practical tips for navigating a toxic workplace — drawing on my own hard-won experience. My intent was — and still is — to lighten the burden carried by others stuck (for now) in a toxic workplace, while alchemizing the mistakes I made into principles to help others avoid common pitfalls.
As the project has progressed, I’ve come to realise that there may be no sharp line to be drawn between the “Survival Tools” I’ve begun to identify, and the larger questions life poses all of us at some stage around the nature of trauma, healing, and personal empowerment.
Increasingly, I’m noticing a kind of “bleed through” of insights from spaces that might ostensibly have very little to do with the duplicity of HR departments, or how power dynamics operate within corporate hierarchies, but which seem to speak directly to workplace dilemmas.
This happened a couple of weeks ago, while I was watching a dialogue with Ashanti Kunene in the excellent The Future of Consciousness seminar hosted by
and .Kunene was speaking about a painful family situation, and the questions that she had confronted around belonging. She said;
“And then I think the other thing about courage of conviction is: Do you want to belong to the group? If the engagement requires misalignment with Self?”
This phrase “misalignment with Self” leapt out at me.
Kunene’s words captured a knowing I’d reached about the cost of remaining in my toxic workplace — but hadn’t been able to put into words.
Looking back, it would have been easy to have become paralysed with endless analysis of the rights and wrongs of what had happened, and the pros and cons of leaving. But ultimately, I knew deep down that I couldn’t stay in a situation that required “misalignment with Self” — I just hadn’t named that realisation back then.
(As it happens, the nature of the “Self” was the subject of a dialogue with my friends Roberta Boyce and Dallas Gudgell I’d just published for
).Kunene’s memorable phrase crystalised my growing conviction that the higher purpose of our our toxic workplace ordeal is to call us into deeper relationship with our Self. Ultimately, establishing a healthy ego-Self alliance will prove more potent than any number of “Survival Tools” — vital as these may be for navigating particular challenges as skilfully as possible.
I intend to write more about how we can leverage our toxic workplace ordeal to establish a deeper relationship with our Self in future editions. And, as ever, I love to hear from your on this and other topics in the comments.
Meanwhile, I offer an apology in advance: By the time this post is published, I will have just started a seven-day silent retreat in the Netherlands, so the next edition of
may appear a little later than usual.Wish me luck!
Summary
“Your toxic workplace ordeal inevitably involves a ‘misalignment with Self.’ The remedy lies in building a deeper relationship with your Self — that part of you that knows your deepest values, and can point you towards the actions you need to take to embody them as you navigate a path to freedom.”
Starting Tuesday: This online event will be a fantastic resource for anyone seeking to gain a deeper understanding of how to heal individual, trans-generational and collective trauma. I served as a co-host in previous years (when it was called the Collective Trauma Summit), and I can attest that this is a truly unique gathering with wisdom to impart. Register here.
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