Hello, World!
Hi. Thanks for visiting and welcome to my new blog, where I will use my true voice to explore my deepest beliefs. I believe it’s time for me to say what I believe more often, to know and own my truth.
I spent 2017 getting in touch with my true purpose and recalibrating my life to help people and companies find their purpose. This includes a significant amount of personal development and life simplification.
My purpose is to still the world so it may hear its own heartbeat.
The world is a pretty big place, so I started by launching Lead From Love, my purpose and leadership coaching practice as well as a unified leadership framework. I help leaders embrace clarity and confidence through a steady pursuit of purpose, where they learn how to focus on what matters most to them and share their greatest gifts with the world from a source of deep love.
I believe the world is winding itself up so tight and fast that it forgot where it came from and what’s truly important. “Bigger, faster, more” seems to be the mantra of the modern age. It’s time to slow down, pause and take a deep look inside ourselves to remember our way home. Clarity of purpose is an incredibly effective tool to help with this profound self-reflection.
The Bias of Being Human
I spend a lot of time evaluating communication patterns, mostly online. I’m quietly observing and mindfully interacting to see how people react. I’m noticing interactions between people. And the more I’m able to stay in an emotionally aware state of mind, the more I notice the power our bias holds to convince us that our behavior is somehow better than what we’re fighting against. In the end, we’re often just fighting against ourselves.
So then it’s something deeper that creates this cycle of human despair. It’s something universally and intrinsically human, regardless of race, gender, class or creed. It’s the frayed relationship between each person’s head (ego) and heart (soul), where we feel accomplished by moving around the pieces of the puzzle we can see rather than pausing to absorb the whole picture. A heart-generated purpose creates a beacon of truth for us to follow in our lives.
Our sense of self is a critical part of being human and defined by the ego, which I do not hold as a negative term. I believe it’s impossible to deny the ego’s existence and counterproductive to try. Bias comes from our ego’s true-false system of judgment, which is fundamental to our well-being and survival. We must be equipped to evaluate the world around us to determine what’s truly dangerous and what’s not. Second only to our physical protection is guarding our carefully constructed worldviews.
But these binary ego judgments tend to be generous in assigning risk potential because this is generally perceived to be the safest way to proceed. An overreach in labeling a person or element of the world as more dangerous than it is can work against relationships and community as love is replaced with fear.
Trusting these binary absolutes beyond what is necessary for our survival is literally killing us. They drive us apart. They are the root of all fear, hatred, bigotry, bias and segregation. The world is infinitely complex. Humans even moreso. So why do we settle for black and white answers? Because it’s easier. I believe it’s time for people to choose self-knowledge and self-love over the laziness of following what’s easy. I believe that we should all find the courage to find and speak our truth.
Why Does This Matter?
The human race is on the precipice of transcendence or self-annihilation. People are suffering and dying. We’re killing ourselves with the mass production of products we don’t even fully understand or need. Capitalism has created more global prosperity than any system before it, and yet it’s taken a turn toward greed and over-consumption that requires each person to take action.
This action begins with self-awareness from a place of love rather than judgment or fear. Every day billions of people perform trillions of invisible kind acts of love that hold the world together. What if we had even more?
Our imaginations are the most powerful tools we possess. They make anything possible for those with open eyes and hearts, and can guide us toward purpose. That’s what is so amazing about being human. I believe in the power of your imagination to co-create a purposeful world that’s better for everyone. Are you ready for the incredible journey that lies ahead? This is how we lead from love.
With purpose,
Andy Swindler