#02 / new visions in conversation with Karolina Iwa
(Opening Ceremony of Leadership Festival 2019, BUFA Berlin)
Karolina Iwa is one of the founders of Leadership Festival, an event that gathers transdisciplinary social innovators to explore transformative, awareness-based, impact-oriented leadership. She is all about exploring, connecting and experimenting in the search for leadership that can serve the greater good.
AB: As a person that I know through Leadership Festival that you co-organize, I would like to ask you first what comes to your mind when you hear the word “leadership”?
KI: I believe leadership is something innate to us. I believe this is a sensitivity we have walking in the world, to impulses that show us what's needed now and how we can contribute. What gets my attention these days is the overwhelm that many people have when they sense this call, and they feel rather unequipped to reply to that. And how that then perpetuates over time to where you no longer have the connection to the initial impulse and you don't know why you started doing it.
I'm often fantasizing about a world in which people act from their leadership and leadership is understood as serving the social field, what is needed now and in the future, for the best possible future in which we can create realities that benefit all beings.
AB: One of the aspects that you brought up is how it's like an energy present in every being. What's your relationship to the idea of collectivity when it comes to leadership and how do you embrace that or practice this?
KI: These are fields where I'm very humble and very careful and very slow. Lately, I realized that actually I'm slowly reemerging to understanding that we want to look into systemic transformational leadership which I understand as expanding your view to see where we are investing our energy, thoughts, and feelings as humanity now on this planet around the things we do, around the things we dream of, around how the spirit moves through us, around how we tap into essence. around how our individual and collective stories have shaped us to be those that we are, and what of that needs shedding. How to do this shedding in the most loving and kind way without allowing too much time to pass. The feeling I have is: we have globally been living embedded in agreements that the majority of us knew were fraud. Many things have not gone the way probably anybody would have intentionally created. They happened and then we haven't made that break to say "let's think about what's happening and what's needed. And - where needed - let's sit with the hurt that has happened and see how we can learn how to not perpetuate it”.
AB: Thinking about your life path, I'm very curious to hear how you got into the place where you are right now and what brought you here? Which events or which stories are the formational experiences for you?
KI: There are many paths that form that river and one that is very strong and very alive in me, also, because I was dreaming this morning that my late mother was resurrected. That's a dream I keep on having as it's like the 10th time I've had it. And I have a very strong connection to my feminine lineage. I come from a mother who was a witch, who never was able to embrace it. Due to societal constraints, let's call them. She was trying to comply with the society rules and be nice. There was a strong connection to nature, to the river of life, the path I would describe as one that is in a shaded forest with moss. Very moist. There was the calling in her to be a tall woman who stands up and speaks a clear voice and she wasn't in a place where she could embrace it or have the guidance around her. Her mother was also a woman who was marvelous and magnificent. And had an amazing amount of love to give. And her whole life has been suffering from something that in Woman who runs with Wolves Pincola calls Hambre de alma, the hunger of the soul. I have many conversations with her trying to understand her vocation and it was more than family and more than the business she held. They started a very big family, a multi-generational family with an open house and an open door, and many parties and friends. But her calling was larger. And so was my mom's. And both of them didn't find the completion of that. And I could see how their bellies were hungry, and how deeply sad it is when you cannot live into your calling. My brother has a daughter, and I see her as the lineage as well. And this is the story that brings me here, a story of transgenerational storytelling and healing. I have a lot of humility for that - where you come from, in trying to understand it and embrace it. At the same time as for your being and becoming your individual being in the world.
(Open Space for the Forum of Socially Responsible Bussineses, Poland 2016)
AB: What is the role of spirituality in your work and your life? I believe that it's intertwined, that it's not necessarily separated.
KI: I've learned throughout the years to act from a place of deep trust in the guidance that is there. The challenge called life, the challenge called humanity. It's so huge. And I am so small, we are so small. My contribution is so tiny and irrelevant. And relevant. If I didn't have the sense of belonging to a larger order, the way how I'm composed, I'd be doomed. The role is life-saving!
AB: I resonate strongly with what you said - I'm part of this universe and it's not all on me. I'm contributing, and I'm important, but I'm not the most important.
KI: Yeah. And it is acting from a place of surrender. I have my moments of being very human and having very many strong opinions that are really not from a place of surrender. Life still is confusing and still is frustrating and still feels futile on many occasions. But spirituality has a very stabilizing function.
AB: I believe your work and our work is a lot about building connections and bridges. What are the bridges that you are building and which you see needed in a world we happen to live in currently?
KI: This concept I know through Gisela Wendling. It is called “chacaruna” and it's a concept of being a living bridge. I'm often connecting to the challenge of being this living bridge. One of them is: you're not part of one group. Sometimes it's difficult because you are part of this group, but you are not them. You don't belong. You belong now & to this extent. I'm neither Polish nor German. And none of my languages is fluent anymore.
The bridges that are getting my attention are the bridges across time, because many of the interventions in the field we work in last half a year, if you're lucky. I'm interested in ways of relating with one another in our work that can hold many years. And that can allow us to fall and fail and take the wrong turn, and come back together because there's a purpose that binds us that is stronger than that. And this is something that we're beginning to call professional friendship. That means if I fail, I can tell it to you and you're going to be there to hold me in that. And if I under-deliver on my values, you're gonna be there to tell me “what the fuck?!” and you're not going to allow me to drop below my standards. I'm looking at these bridges that are across time and that can endure a storm or two.
AB: You have already shared different challenges that you encounter in your work. What is this that concerns you currently the most about the world? Where are the biggest difficulties for you in the work that you're doing?
KI: Today I read the news just really briefly, and I read that the camp in Moria burnt down and, just yesterday, Sea-Watch and other organizations have set up 13 000 chairs in front of the German parliament to say “we have place for these people, you promised to accept them at this time to act on your promise”! I was thinking of the position of a government, of politicians in a situation like that. Where, on one hand, it might be that there are people for whom, in the position of power currently, for whom it's completely clear: yes, we need to accept these people, full stop. And even if this is their way of thinking, then there is the second way of thinking that doesn't exclude the first one, which is: there are elections, and we have a huge problem with the right-wing, and if we're gonna let these people in, long-term, this is a greater danger to democracy potentially, than when we don't let them in. And then there are these choices. And that is absolutely complex, heartbreaking, and almost impossible. And there are these moments when despite them being there you have to make a choice. And I'm wondering what is the support that people in these positions need to be able to make the best possible choice and to live with the choice they made and the consequences of that?
AB: Thinking about the work environment and organizational structures, how do these conversations come up?
KI: I work with the European Commission every now and then and this is a conversation we're having very often. What is the long term we want to achieve? What is possible midterm? What are we going to do now, short term? A wonderful colleague of mine from the SPD (Social Presencing Theater) community Manish Srivastava from India, presented the theory U as the large U - this is what we want to achieve, and embedded in that is a smaller U - this is what the client wants now or what we want now. Then the question is what are the resources in terms of time, money, people, possibility - this is the smaller U.
I really liked this, because this is a very simple framing, which allows us to have a conversation around what it is that we're doing now and how it relates to the larger time. Where do you want your company to be and how do you want your company to contribute to society? What is the society you imagine? What is the future of work you would like to be part of? I am never bored of asking my clients “what is the societal change you want to contribute to”? And they're like: “yeah, maybe we're gonna do it some other time”. And I'm like: “that's absolutely fine, but what would it be?” By having these conversations, they become part of the process we're doing, even if it's just a simple workshop of one afternoon.
AB: That's beautiful. Can you tell me which are the values that you want people you work with to be very visible and clear from the very beginning?
KI: I think the two we speak about fairly early is work that is purpose-driven and creating realities that are beneficial for all. That means that we're working in a systemic and in an emergent way. And we're always looking to who belongs to the ecosystem, who are the ones that need to be included and informed because they're going to be impacted. One more thing is: we're working beyond the prefrontal cortex. That means that we're going to try to find ways to include other types of intelligences in our work than just the one where answers sit. So we're going to be trying to create what sometimes is called “generative we-spaces”. A space where I can sit with you without knowing the answer, and it's okay because you're gonna hold me for as long as I make my journey to wherever I need to make it and then I'm able to put it into words to share it with you. There is another one which is the systemic aspect. We create spaces, where people contribute as lenses that perceive the system through various points of entry / perspectives. These insights inform the system, helping it to deepen the understanding of the challenge and needed solution and allow it to act in an informed way.
AB: What's the role of hope in your work and how do you cultivate it? Where do you find hope in your work?
KI: Sometimes I see hope as the new currency. In the western world, we have plenty of money, it's a very, very, very privileged world we're part of. And hope is something that we haven't learned to manage, as well as money. And this is where I find hope: that there's the story of the gentleman in the Mediterranean Sea with his little child on his shoulders, who just got off a refugee boat. That's a picture from four years ago, I believe. And the other week I read their story of the whole family who is living in Berlin and living a happy life. It is the individual stories of impact that show you it makes sense. All of that is all our contributions. You're contributing, contributing, contributing, and the result is never gonna be a direct result of YOUR contribution. And it's fine. It's the only way how it can be. But every now and then you need to be able to verify it. Get to any positive end. So, these stories, they actually make me cry.
There is the setting of the world and the societal change and there is the setting of business that is very important to me as well in my work. And there where I find hope is when people speak about how important a certain conversation was for them, saying “I haven't had this heart to heart with my direct boss ever and he's such a lovely person, I actually like them a lot”. Or say, “I've been able to identify what is my true reason for being here”. And that changes everything. And that can be an automotive company, it can be a welding company, it can be a fishing company, it doesn't matter. There is something about understanding how what you do relates to your vocation or your purpose that makes you so deeply embedded in your manifested task. This is creating these deep connections and creating spaces where people can tap into their deep connections. That's like one of the most transformative parts. And how people then have the opportunity to become way more vocal allies of what really needs to happen and what really needs to stop happening.
AB: It's also connected to the trust that you were talking about before, that you feel connected with something much broader.
KI: Yeah. Is it just me or am I rather part of something greater? And that gives me courage and right now that gives me the right to speak because I'm not speaking on behalf of Karolina but I'm speaking on behalf of white women.
AB: Is there any lesson or advice from your work that might be helpful or supportive for people doing similar work, doing impact work, that you will be willing to share?
KI: I think it's actually gonna be the two stickers from the last two editions of the festival. Funnily enough! The one from this year is “Be bold, be humble”. For some of us we need more encouragement to what we are connected to and what we know, what we see, what we experience, what needs to be named, to give it names and to speak out. To find a voice that allows us to communicate that and then stand with it. Do not let yourself be made insecure by your shoes, by your hair, by the way you choked at the beginning. But stand up. Hold it. And to others of us it is more about being humble. Be humble. Like, I know when we learn mental abilities, when we read these books, when we find out things, it feels very exciting on the inside. And that's great, that's doing all the work it should be doing. But before you start acting from that place on others, be humble. And the other sticker of the other speaker from last year is: Own your shit.
AB: Will you also be willing to share one grounding practice that helps you stay balanced?
KI: That is something that I learned amongst others from Kelvy Bird, who learned it from Arawana Hayashi, who knows it from Shambhala Buddhism, which is just a very simple breathing practice. How I do it is: breathing into my center, breathing out to the core of the earth, breathe in from the core of the earth, breathing out to the sky, breathe in and from the sky to my heart, breathing out to all the creatures on this planet and breathing into my heart, and that very often is sufficient to help me remember who I am and why.