2022: Go With The Flow

That has been my mantra for 2020 and beyond – go where the intuition takes you with a sense of wonder and surrender.

For me, it meant:

That I pay closer attention to my thoughts and feelings (intuition) that emerge out of my understanding and experience of the outer world. And once I acknowledge how I feel (or want to feel), I act on that feeling to create the desired outcomes for myself and people I work with. Our corporate conditioning as well as constant onslaught of information disables us in this regard.

Like a river rapid that quickly finds its ways around the boulders, going with the flow means being adaptive, agile and curious. External conditions may not always be in our control but how we respond to them, learn from those experiences and adapt to create value is in our control.

“May what I do flow from me like a river, no forcing and no holding back, the way it is with children.” – Rainer Maria Rilke

Beating distractions and resistance by engaging in activities that are immersive for me and add value – to the self as well as the outer world. For me, that looks like internalizing great ideas, having inspiring conversations, co-creating meaning through sketchnotes, helping people grow and enabling organizations/teams to be more effective. And since most of these activities are non-repetitive, they tend to challenge me differently each time.

In Practice

I had to learn to embrace the fluid nature of things. I started out with high-level themes but deliberately stay away from creating elaborate plans – something that is so NOT me. In my professional circles, I am known to be very process-oriented, planning focused and meticulous, so this shift was really tough. The pandemic also taught us that plans are only our estimations that reality can quickly knock out.

In 2021, I stepped out of matrix after 23 years in corporate life playing diverse roles in technology, communications, corporate quality, consultative selling, team leadership, functional leadership and organizational leadership in global environments. This did not happen reactively but there was a deep longing since last couple of years to reinvent myself and shape-shift completely. And so I took a leap into the unknown, knowing firmly that only after I leap courageously, the net will appear (and it did). That once I start moving, the purpose will reveal itself.

In April 2021, I started out as a solopreneur and in a short span of 9 months:

• I worked with some of the largest companies in the world helping them with clarity (visual thinking, visual facilitation, strategic storytelling and graphical recording) as well as capability (talent development, executive coaching, organizational consulting, guiding company operations through board positions  etc.)
• Conducted immersive visual thinking workshops in independent cohorts as well as within organizational context. Through these workshops, I introduced 800+ people to the power of visual thinking for collaboration, problem solving and learning.
• I was invited to several podcasts and events to share my journey while my sketchnotes continued to go viral via LinkedIn, Twitter and many other social networks. It has been a joy to know of stories about how my visuals connected people with ideas and people with each other.
• The business started off very well and exceeded my own expectations on how well it could do in first few months. The time I was able to spend with family (and stay safe from the onslaught of second wave in mid of 2021) was a huge bonus.
• As an independent professional, I am able to bring my full expression into the work I do beyond the confines of roles, responsibilities and organizational matrix that mostly helps but often binds.

“Of all the virtues we can learn no trait is more useful, more essential for survival, and more likely to improve the quality of life than the ability to transform adversity into an enjoyable challenge.” – Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi, Flow: The Psychology of Happiness

Resonance

Just as I am writing this, I get notified of a new post from my friend Simon Terry who shares the theme of going with the flow and writes:

Water flows and always finds its level. It’s the same way our dreams and desires push us along even when the circumstances are against us. Even when we go with the flow, we are still carried to the sea. We merely choose how we arrive there. The force of our desires is a source of energy and momentum for our lives if we let it flow. Damning this flow is so often counterproductive. – Simon Terry

That sums it up perfectly.

Over to 2022 – Wishing you a glorious one!

Visual Thinking and Sketchnote Workshop – Jan 2022

We remember and process visuals 60x faster than text. Enroll today in this immersive workshop to learn about how to leverage the power of visual thinking to collaborate, create, learn and solve.

Register here.