My sons and I were on the floor, coloring in the outlines of letters, before taping the cardboard to sticks. As a family we were going to be at the women’s march in downtown Ithaca. 10,000 of us showed up, according to the Ithaca Police Department, along with millions more at hundreds of marches around the U.S. and beyond.
As a family, we spent a lot of the time hanging out at the playground on the Ithaca Commons, talking to friends we ran into there. The big question, “What do we do now?” was in the air.
The top three topics: strategies for taking back power, living our values, and self care.
When I was a young activist… hold it, what? What does this have to be with building your business? Okay, let’s sit down and talk this out. Because it has *everything* to do with building your business.
Having a heart-centered business is NOT divorced from life.
As I was saying, when I was a young activist, I was fueled by anger and “stopping the bad guys” so to speak. Over the years I got burnt out on anger, and retreated from political activism for a time, while sinking deep into spiritual healing, raising kids, and the work here at Heart of Business.
In my return to activism, I find myself in a very different place. Although rage comes up in me at the injustice, deceit and complete ignoring of science promoted by the current U.S. administration, that anger doesn’t last. It unsticks my wheels from the mud of complacency, but it doesn’t fuel me, my decision or my actions.
Heart-centered businesses often have a mission, a mission that arises out of comparing what is with what could be. Seen families torn apart by conflict? Maybe you have a mission to help families be healthy, so everyone can have the safety, love and confidence that comes from a healthy home.
Your business is going to be most effective when it’s working for something larger than itself. It doesn’t have to be grandiose. A cafe can simply be there to help a neighborhood feel vibrant, to help people have a place to gain insights and deepen relationships by getting out of their usual environments.
Then there are the three topics that came up in my conversations at the march: (1) Taking back power; (2) Living your values; and (3) self care.
Taking Back Power is about looking at what’s wrong and ways that we’ve collapsed in the face of it. It’s acknowledging the pain, and worse, that sometimes is felt by yourself and the people you want to help. Taking Back Power sometimes involves anger and outrage. It unsticks the wheels, it helps people feel seen.
Question: How do you help take back power in your business? For yourself? For your clients? Do you talk about this?
Living Our Values is the journey to what could be. Part of my burnout as a young activist was the constant focus on taking back power, and that constant fighting was hard.
Here at our ecovillage, we’re preparing to plant hazelnuts, and doing many things to foster affordable, heart-centered community. At Heart of Business, we help you presence the world you want to see, helping your business thrive even in the face of a dysfunctional, unjust economy.
Question: Are you living your values, and how are you helping your clients live the values represented in your business? You may not have yet made the equivalent of a move to an ecovillage, or other big manifestation of your values, but you can start to live them. Living values is not just about integrity, but about living life joyfully, connected, in ways that are deeply nourishing.
Self-Care: My earliest and most pivotal mentor in the realm of activism was Lani Ka’ahumanu, an early bisexual leader in the LGBT movement, who told me that it’s marathon, not a sprint. “We need you around for the long term, Mark. Don’t burn yourself out.”
Practicing self care is about sane work schedules. It’s also about how you price yourself, not charging so little that you can’t make a good living. It’s about eating well, exercising, and noticing when you cross a line that doesn’t feel good to your heart.
There is much to be done in the realm of social justice. There is much to be done, no doubt, in the realm of your business. And then there’s also having room to enjoy life.
These different realms don’t have to be so separated from each other. Let the work you do be a part of the mission you carry in the world, and let it add to the alchemical mixture of love and power that is growing in our culture.
With hugs and big gratitude,
Mark Silver
Heart of Business, Inc.
Every Act of Business Can Be An Act of Love.
P.S. New Small Group Coaching group starting
Are you ready to embrace your power with love, and help your business step into a profitable place, helping many people?
I can help you focus, learn the things you need to learn for your business, and the power of the group can help your business move forward in tremendous ways. Goals for December 2017? Handled, with love.. 😉
I’m starting a new group up in February, and the focus will be on bringing out your Divine power, in ways that feel great to you, and help you impact the world. There is room for just 1-2 more people who want rocking, powerful businesses.
Work with me, Mark, or with Steve Mattus. (Yollana is not currently accepting new clients). Check us out:
Small Group Coaching
15 Responses
Hi Mark thanks so much for this clear, calm and incisive post. This is the balanced approach that is needed for these challenging times.
Carolyn- You are so welcome! I’m glad it was helpful. 🙂
Reading this post got me thinking in surprising ways.
I’ve been an activist for 40+ years and my business has always been fed by progressive ideals, in particular feminism. But it was only as of last fall that I decided to put my activism *front and center* in my business, to work directly on the issue of women’s power and freedom. Then Pantsuit Nation happened, then the election, then millions of women marched, all around the world. Wow… that’s amazing. Spirit has guided me into this work at the *perfect* time, woven me into this amazing, enormous tapestry in such a grace-filled way. What an astonishing blessing.
When I saw the title of the blog post this morning, I smiled. Uniting business and activism. Yup, doing that full time now. Yay. So, while the title felt serendiptious in a season filled with serendiptity and synchonicity, I didn’t expect this blog post would surprise me all that much.
And then it did.
You asked ‘How do you help take back power in your business?’
And then you added ‘For yourself?’
Ohhhhhhhhh…..
And that’s the creative healing edge for me. That is the challenge here.
To go beyond martyrdom and suffering, which is old school thinking. Beyond martyrdom in my activism, in my money and business. To let this business succeed financially, new school thinking, happiness for all. After all, if my activist business does not succeed, then it does not serve the women I seek to serve.
So that’s the lesson here. Taking back power for all of us, including ourselves. Dissolving the duality of martyrdom, which honors others at the expense of ourselves, always giving to others and never receiving. Dissolving that duality completely, until it is all One Love.
And yes, of course, that is practiced on a daily basis with self-care, even in these beyond-hectic days of activism.
That is the creative healing edge for me. That is my lesson and my challenge.
So mote it be.
Thank you for this blog post, and all the work you do. Thank you.
Louise- I’m so grateful for you doing the work- we all need to be holding hands and climbing, as Hafiz says. And I’m doubly grateful that I could contribute to you in this small way. Rock on!
Here’s a quote I love from my website
“Ours is not the task of fixing the entire world all at once, but of stretching out to mend the part of the world that is within our reach” Clarissa Pinkola Estes, author of Women Who Run With The Wolves
I too, back in the day, fueled my activism with anger. And then there was the inevitable burnout. The same happened to many of my friends. Then most of us shifted priorities. We got careers, bought homes, fancier cars, raised families and somehow we forgot that the world needed people like us.
Now, my spirt is back. My business, Gilded Hippie, was born prior to this current movement. Born prior to the need, kind of thrown in our faces, posed by this current administration.
I guess the Divine had me tagged and was get me warmed up for this new era.
Mark, thanks for all you do.
Karen- bless you! And yes, we’ve been preparing all our lives for the next moment. And the next… Woo-hoo!
thank you Mark.
Megan- you are so welcome.
Thank you for this post. Very timely. I am also trying to keep in mind that the current state of the world and our country can be an opportunity to cultivate divine qualities rather than sink into anger or despair.
Norah- you are so welcome. Onward! With love…
Yes, yes, yes!!! Thank you so much, Mark. I appreciate you and your work so much.
Elinor- rock on! Thank you for taking the time to say.
Mark, would you please say more about “take back power”? Maybe give a specific example or two to deepen my understanding of what you mean? Or even write a longer post about it? I know there is something important here (and in the rest of your post), as, step by step, I claim more of my own power. Thanks, Marilyn
Hi Marilyn- great to hear from you. There are many ways we assume that some choices aren’t allowed, or that certain actions aren’t possible. There are ways that we work hard to help people not get ruffled at the expense of our own sense of what’s right. This is both personal and also functions on a systemic level. I’m curious what kinds of examples of this come up for you.
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