Conscious Leadership

Learn how to lead with more awareness, alignment, and intention.
  
Part I

What Is Conscious Leadership?

Many of us are taught that “leadership” means a combination of making smart choices, inspiring others to act, and having a vision for change.

While all those things are important, conscious leadership is based on a different way of thinking about leadership.

What if leadership is less about knowing what to do and more about deciding how to be?

Conscious leadership centers around becoming aware and honest about who you really are so you can align your work and life with your passions, strengths and dreams. If you aren’t clear on what is important to you and why, how can you help anyone else?

 Conscious leadership isn't a set of unrealistic expectations that are impossible to achieve. And it isn't a laundry list of a dozen principles you can't remember.

Conscious leadership is about being, not doing. It has three core components:

  • The call to be aware;
  • The choice to be aligned; and
  • The invitation to be intentional.

Learning More

AwareLeadership-600

Aware

How Present Are You?
 
Become more conscious of your inner and outer landscape – what you notice and experience in each moment.
 
Tap into the power of your presence by asking, "What do I see, sense, and feel right now?"
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Aligned

What Do You Want? 
 

Alignment is living in accordance with what expands you. It means acting on your awareness—choosing what works for you and what doesn’t.

Ask yourself, "What is working for me and what isn't?"

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Intentional

How do you want to feel?
 

Intention is choosing how you want to feel as you live and lead. It is your ongoing commitment to make choices with greater awareness and alignment.

Empower your day and way by asking, "What do I want to experience?"

        
Part II

Practicing Conscious Leadership

Here are a few ways you can practice being more aware, aligned, and intentional, as written in Chapter Three of our book, Leading with Light: Choosing Conscious Leadership When You're Ready For More.

Expanding Awareness

Seeing What Is

“Seeing what is” is a powerful approach to observe where we are and where we want to be. Understanding how others perceive us, as well as how we perceive ourselves and our natural personality traits, tendencies, leanings, and longings, can all help increase our self- awareness. Assessments are one of our favorite ools for getting to better know our light, our style, and our unique makeup.

The Lantern Leadership Assessment

Self-assessments can be powerful tools to help you see yourself in new ways. Join over 13,000 conscious leaders who have taken the Lantern Leadership Assessment to help you see what kind of leader you are—and get clear on what kind of leade you’d like to be.

Choosing Alignment

Roles Inventory

Allow yourself to think of all the roles you play in your personal and professional life. Again, note that we’re not talking about “titles.” Instead, we mean the roles you play within those titles. For example, you may fall under the title of “mother” to your children. The roles within could range from coach, listener, and mentor to quarterback, dishwasher, and nagger. Some roles within each title are likely fulfilling, while others are draining. Other examples of roles we hear are things like partner, champion, trusted adviser, listener, convener, get-it-doner, planner, confidant, creator, cleaner, pick-it-up-er, gardener, beautifier, IT support, musician, athlete, and so forth.

Once your list feels complete, take a blank page and draw a large T on it. Separate your page into two columns, “Aligned” and “Not Aligned.” Under the Aligned column, list roles that harness your passions and your strengths. Under the Not Aligned column, include roles that you don’t want to play anymore—or put differently, roles that are not aligned to your light.

  • What do you notice?
  • Are you ready to drop the roles that are not aligned to your light anymore?
  • Can you delegate those roles to someone in your family or team?
  • Do you need to hire them out?
  • Or have an honest conversation with your coworkers or family about who is doing what?

Acting with Intention

Here are some examples of how and where you can set intentions.
  • Set your intention for the day writing it down in your journal, phone, or computer.
  • As soon as your feet hit the floor after you’ve woken up, set the intention for how you want to feel at the end of the day. You can say it to yourself, verbalize it out loud, or write it down.
  • At the top of your meeting agendas, write down your intention for the meeting. Share it with your meeting participants at the beginning of your discussion and ask them to help actualize it during the meeting.
  • Before you walk with a friend or have a meaty conversation with a loved one, set your intention. How do you want to feel at the end of the exchange? Again, you can simply get clear inside your mind or share it with the person you are spending time with. 

Deepening Your Practice

    
Part III

The Four Lights of Conscious Leadership

To help you practice conscious leadership, we have developed the Four Lights of Conscious Leadership. Whereas most leadership models consider what leaders should do, the Four Lights help you reflect on how you could be.

This subtle difference is the open invitation to reconsider not only what leadership is but what life has to offer us. 

1. You Are Light

First and foremost, conscious leadership is about shining and sharing your unique light for yourself and those you lead. At the most basic level, leaders recognize that everyone, including themselves, has a light within them that is unique, bright, and purposeful.

Every human being has a light. Some call this the soul or spirit. Others might call it innate talent or the inner spark. Whatever you name it to be, your light has a unique quality to it—as unique as your thumbprint. Your light is the life force that brings vitality, purpose, wisdom, and direction to your path. It is your truest essence. Do you have a relationship with it? Do you look outside of yourself for answers first? Or do you turn within to listen?

Your light is beyond your physical form, and it can be the beacon that shines the way for you and others. It leaves an indelible impression on everything you interact with. How we shine it and where we shine it is up to us to choose.

To do so, you must become aware of who you are. As a conscious leader, you can always choose to become more awake and aware of your light, noticing the quality of its presence—noticing when your light feels strong and vibrant, when it feels dim, what environments support its illumination, and which ones don’t. When you become more aware of your own light, you can more intentionally choose where and how to show it and shine it.

2. Your Light Is Always On

Even in our darkest, most insecure, and fearful moments, we still have everything we need to be leaders.

Your light may sometimes feel dim, but it can never go out. No matter how you feel, you can trust that your light is always on, no matter what. When you feel worried or fearful, you can consciously look for the light within and all around.

What if our lowest moments have something to teach us? What if our experiences of stress and worry are there to remind us of our humanness?

Beyond a healthy level of humility, negative self-talk and harsh self-criticism don't serve us well. Leadership, at its core, starts with self-love. Are we ready to embrace the weakest parts of ourselves, knowing that they help the strongest parts of us grow?

3. You Only Have To See What's Right In Front Of You

Conscious leaders don’t need to know all the answers and seldom do. Instead, leaders learn to navigate the unknown, step by step, moment by moment, with presence and alignment to their beliefs, values, and purpose.

Imagine for a moment that you are walking alone through the woods at dusk. You’ve been walking at a pretty good pace, but as the sun dips beneath the horizon, it’s getting harder and harder to see the path. You slowly go further until you reach a fork in the trail.

You squint around in the dim light and realize you aren’t sure where you are. You’re lost. You put your backpack down and find the lantern you had packed before you left. Time to shine some light on the subject! As you turn on the lantern, it begins illuminating the darkness around you. You stand there in gratitude for the glow and lift the lantern slowly over your head. The lantern only illuminates a space of about ten feet around you—not one hundred feet, not one thousand feet, and certainly not miles and miles. Bringing your full attention to the present moment illuminates the next step you need to take. And, when you take that next step, the light comes with you, illuminating what to do next. This takes the pressure off of needing to figure it all out.

In moments of uncertainty,  we only have to know the next step. Life will illuminate the right next step.

4. There's A Larger Light Guiding You

 We are connected to something greater than ourselves. Call it God, Goddess, Spirit, the Universe, Divine Intelligence, or Jesus Christ. Call it Christ Consciousness, Buddha, Nature, Fate, or Source. Call it Evolution, Math, or Science. Whatever you name it, we believe there is a larger light guiding the world around us in a way that brings order and structure out of entropy. We believe this light is intelligent, benevolent, and good.

Whatever you name it, conscious leaders realize there are larger forces at work. The sun rises without us having to set an alarm on our cell phones. The seasons change without needing a calendar appointment to do it. There is a grand set of forces working all around us. Those forces sometimes communicate to us via insight, intuition, and synchronicity.

Conscious leaders polish their intellectual skills but are just as willing to follow their instincts, feelings, and hearts as they walk in awareness.

 

        
Part IV

Our Conscious Leadership Services

Your growth is our focus.

When you're ready for more, our conscious leadership retreats, coaching, books, assessments, and meditations will help you lead and live with more awareness, alignment, and intention. 

 

        
Part V

Profiles of Conscious Leadership

We've helped thousands of leaders, teams, and organizations improve their results through conscious leadership. Here's one.

Derek Allen
MA ACTP, Executive Vice President and Chief Operating Office
Starr Commonwealth

"Starr Commonwealth has used Plenty on multiple occasions over the past six years. We started with their Meridian process to help us revitalize our strategic plan and then brought them on to help us innovate our fundraising growth. I could attend Lantern, Plenty's retreat for conscious leaders through those engagements. Aside from our organizational growth, personally, Jennifer and Jeff's coaching has been a game-changer for me.

Before working with Plenty, I was passionate and sure I had a purpose. But none of it was aligned. I felt tired and unsure. They helped me find the alignment I've been missing, and now I’m leaning into life. It's go time."


We're honored to work with Derek and be part of so many similar conscious leadership stories. Browse more below. 

Lantern Is Like No Other Leadership Retreat
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Lantern Is Like No Other Leadership Retreat

"What a profound experience! Lantern is like no other leadership retreat. Jen and Jeff gently guide participants to create a brave space that fosters …

January 11, 2024 1 min read
Beautiful Magic
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Beautiful Magic

"There is a beautiful magic that happens at Heart Space as the team at Plenty walk you through Lantern. Being able to experience it with strangers whi…

January 8, 2024 1 min read
A Transformative and Inspiring Experience
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A Transformative and Inspiring Experience

"Lantern is a transformative experience that has been life impacting! To step away from the daily routines and focus on my passions, what inspires me,…

January 5, 2024 1 min read
Tremendous Gift
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Tremendous Gift

"Lantern II is a tremendous gift for those seeking to discover the source of their confidence, their strength and their light!"

October 5, 2023 1 min read
Forever Grateful
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Forever Grateful

"Lantern and Lantern II have gifted me space to dive deep but with the support of a soft landing. In Lantern I opened the door to possibilities and th…

October 2, 2023 1 min read
Truly a Blessing
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Truly a Blessing

"Lantern II is not easy, but having the space, time, support and expertise to guide me through my challenges and coming out the other side more balanc…

September 28, 2023 1 min read
Absolutely Refreshing
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Absolutely Refreshing

"Lantern was exactly what I was looking for that all others failed to do. Jen, Jeff, and Sierra concentrated on me as a person first instead of treati…

July 15, 2023 1 min read
Thank You Lantern, For Fueling My Fire & Helping Me Grow
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Thank You Lantern, For Fueling My Fire & Helping Me Grow

"I walked into lantern with no expectations, & came out overflowing with love for myself and others. Contemplating how I can’t wait to bring this …

July 11, 2023 1 min read
I Cannot Recommend Lantern Enough
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I Cannot Recommend Lantern Enough

"The Lantern Leadership retrreat was exactly what I wanted it to be. There was lots of time to do introspective work, it was nice to go deep in a cozy…

July 5, 2023 1 min read
        
Part VI

Conclusions

Unlike much of what we are taught in academic leadership and management, conscious leadership isn't about achieving a certain level of competence. It's not about earning a credential. 

Conscious leadership is an ongoing practice to be more of who you want to be.

We'll let this passage from our book say it for us:

We’ve found that the practices of being a conscious leader—the Four Principles of Conscious Leadership—serve as an easy guide for people who want to navigate life with more awareness, alignment, and intentionality.

The principles become a kind of leadership touchstone—when we use them, our lives become lighter, freer, and more fulfilling than we could have imagined. This is the blessing of our path, and we want to share that blessing with you.

You are ready. You are all that is needed to light the way. You are the light you seek.

Contributors:

Shuck - 2024 Profile

Jeff Shuck

Principal and Author

Source:

Much of the content on this page was excerpted directly from Leading With Light: Choosing Conscious Leadership When You're Ready For More, by Jennifer Mulholland and Jeff Shuck, published by Modern Wisdom Press, ISBN 978-1-951692-36-0. © 2024 Plenty Consulting, Inc.