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“Whenever you become anxious or stressed, outer purpose has taken over, and you lost sight of your inner purpose. You have forgotten that your state of consciousness is primary, all else secondary.”
~ Eckhart Tolle, Philosopher and Author
VIM Executive Coaching is not about teaching philosophy or deep truths, but rather helping executive leaders to be more effective, engaged and connected.
Talk about resolve
Some like to call it purpose, but we like to think of it as resolve. Many of those around us, especially after the pandemic, seem to have lost their resolve to continue. We don’t mean to sound dramatic; clearly VIM Executive Coaching does not delve into the world of psychology, rather business coaching, however, we are becoming increasingly concerned with terms such as “Quiet Quitting,” “Disengagement,” and more simply, “walking away from everything.”
As the quote above suggests, outer purpose or at least a good fake copy of outer purpose has taken over many lives. When cracks begin to appear in that wall, stress rushes in and it is often difficult to see any inner purpose.
For many executives (and we know these people), it is far easier to run away, sometimes without purpose, than to reconnect with an inner voice. We know of one executive who incessantly moves from one state to the next and another who cannot still their mind long enough to spend more than five minutes off their digital devices; even waking from a deep sleep to see the latest from cable news.
When the resolve to be an effective leader leaves, and cracks begin to appear in that artificial wall of forced routine, stress mounts and flight ensues. It is a no-brainer, a capricious side-step, a quick song and dance to want to walk away, ditch all responsibility to self and sleep-walk in place.
Unfortunately, purpose is all-too-often usurped when executive leaders decide that running away is more attractive than taking the necessary inner journey.
The age-old problem is that truly, as our old pal Confucius noted, “And remember, no matter where you go, there you are.”
Quiet quitting?
The executive leader can always quit. The movies and television programming that come into our lives are filled with examples of unhappy marketing executives who become baristas or run cupcake shops or executive vice presidents who launch wood carving businesses or start goat-milk farms. The option of quitting is always out there.
However, the reality of it all is woefully different. Quiet quitting usually leads to open regret. An important caveat: we are not suggesting the head of orthopedic surgery is incapable of becoming a tomato farmer or that a CFO is inept into developing into an MLB umpire, however, none of those moves comes without reflection, introspection, planning and fully understanding the journey.
No matter how purpose is defined, without mindfulness and an understanding of what it means to be authentic to oneself, as the ancient quote from Confucius explains, nothing will substantially change. In fact, it could be made much worse.
Capricious quitting or dropping out is a choice and there will be consequences.
If resolve or purpose has been lost, only an internal quest and an understanding of oneself can help restore and re-engage the career path. If outer purpose has failed, and stress takes over, the idea is not to jump to the next place, or next thing or next thrill but to be mindful and to see what is being felt and why.
Change is all around us, and it’s fine to change, but change for the sake of change is simply scrolling down one screen to find another. As we know, it is a limitless, blind pursuit.