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I am on my third trip into Rocky Mountain National Park in ten days. Oh, the deep joy of living in Colorado! 🙂
The picture you see is my view of hikers approaching Emerald Lake, just below Hallett Peak. Today’s trek into this magnificent wilderness is being done by people of all ages from around the globe.
As a leadership mentor, I’ve proposed purpose-filled times of meditation and reflection to these mentorees as we further explore and discover their hopes and next steps for the 8 Dimensions of their lives in their own Circle of Life.
These emerging leaders, on the grow, who “dare” to take this day-long pilgrimage are extra serious about becoming all they have been designed to be. In this day long trek (usually over 15 hours, trekking 10+ collective miles, from before dawn to well after dark) we circle to 5 places of extraordinary beauty via both car and foot. We celebrate how far these leaders have grown in their own unique lives. We share moments of deep thanks for where they have arrived, and are continuing to evolve, as they circle through the hours of each day.
As we circle around through the park on the twisting roads, one doesn’t have to be a religious person to know that being up here is a series of holy moments at every turn in the trail or road. Eventually we will circle back into Estes Park for a bison burger and then head back to Denver.
Up here the Circle of Life, taking intentional time to ponder, gains added meaning and value for the future of each leader. Frankly, wherever you and I find ourselves, the Circle of Life for each one of us rolls on through the circling 24 hours of each day.
Circle.
What a common word.
If you think about it long enough it even becomes a bit of a strange word. In nature there are no totally geometric perfect circles. Man, over the millennia, has taken the advantage to bring circles into being.
We don’t have square tires. We have __________ ones.
Early watches, big clocks (Big Ben), are often __________.
Wheels on shopping carts are __________.
Circles abound all around us. We use them every day. Uniquely, those we use every day, use best, do form almost perfect, round circles.
We intentionally use the term and illustration of a circle, not in a literal object sense, but as a life metaphor to begin to get us thinking, pondering, exploring, discovering one’s whole life.
In every circle, physical or in metaphor, there is a center, a core from which one determines the whole.
I invite you to two websites that let you know more about circles than you may have ever wanted to know. I found this one at Wikipedia and this one at WordPress to be helpful to illustrate why we encourage “thinking in circles.”
But even as I wait for the leader I’m with today to join me up here at Emerald Lake, after he finishes an intentional care-filled evaluation of his life, we will be thinking through what is currently taking place at the core of his life, his own ordained, unique Circle of Life. I look forward to listening to his thoughts.
Tires all have axles at the core. Ancient Roman cities, if you look at ancient maps, almost always were built in some semblance of a circle for protection to ward off the enemies. Stonehenge, with the mystery of how tons and tons of rocks were moved to that place, forms a circle that is almost perfect. Current cities, though not perfect circles, have hubs from which move the life of the people who live there.
I hope you are gaining the creative focus of why we use circle to give us a workable image of living life. Some eternally-curious questions are…
…what is at the core of your own life?
…from where do you find your center, your focus?
…what, at the very center of your being,
brings life-giving,
life-challenging,
life-changing definition
to who you are now
and who you are in the process of becoming?
…a month from now,
even one year from now,
or into the future as you might get to be as olde as me (73),
who do you hope to be at the core of your life then?
…what is taking place today
to get you there in each of the 8 Dimensions
of your own whole life?
Answering those questions, and many more, is part of what we are about within Leadership Design Group for those who choose to be fully alive in all of their life. How might we be of further encouragement to you as you grow forward with your own one “wild and precious life”?
…and now
if you’ll excuse me,
my friend is walking up the trail to join me
on the continuing adventure of this specific day
that will be impacting the rest of his life…
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