'Tis the season to plan for love in the face of fear. With rising uncertainties, with holiday stress mounting, with anxiety from anticipated changes and threats, many people we work with or see each day are moving through the world in fear.

Today a friend called. At just the right moment, she dialed my number. I kept coming to her mind. She didn't text me. She didn't reach out to set up a time.

Jim and I found our seats in the Studebaker Theater in downtown Chicago. With a friendly greeting to our aisle mates, an older woman and a younger man stood so we could slip by. We quickly took our seats and soon the show began.

Can you imagine meeting THE “World Champion” in your field?

This week I did!

I met Craig Valentine, the World Champion of Public Speaking 1999!

All Loving Leadership begins with empathy and proceeds to compassionate actions that create love.

Connection! We thrive on it. Some of us in small, occasional doses; others with high volume and frequency. But we all need human connection to be safe and healthy.

Who doesn't like to experience the energy that uplifts? I sure do!  We all need wind in our wings to elevate us from our doubts and struggles!

I stood at the front of the room at DECA’s Western Region Leadership Conference in Bellevue. The deep, cavernous room quickly filled with 50+ students at round tables. I had no mic, and it was after lunch.

I flew to Chicago last week, and my hardshell bag came out on the carousel cracked in half from top to bottom. While this was disappointing, the airline team member who assisted me was caring, kind, quick, and helpful.

We grow dahlias inspired by our neighbor's beautiful garden. They burst with shades of red, pink, and yellow blooming all summer and late into the fall. It's a delight to enjoy them sitting in the garden, to cut them to share bouquets with friends and to gently tend them so they continue to bloom. 

As Loving Leaders, we can express our love and care by getting to know them as people, taking time to help them learn and grow…But it will all be negated if their organizational experiences are dehumanizing. 

Whether our tears are welcome or not, there are times and reasons when we don't want to cry.

Is it possible to make that choice when we have a strong urge to without unhealthy denial or disconnecting from ourselves? 

Do you welcome the urge to cry at work? I do. Here's why.

We are in a meeting to explore a complex issue. Each team member has the chance to share their ideas, concerns, and perspectives. The topic is important to us all. We take our time. I try to listen to understand, sensing, noticing, tuning in to each one. And as I wait for my turn…

Disagreements and disappointments happen in loving organizations and on loving teams, just as they do in any group of people. We are not immune from these just because we are committed to love. 

 We miscommunicate and misunderstand. We make mistakes and misinterpret each other. We are sometimes not our best selves. We have differing styles, views and needs that lead to conflicts. 

I have been called the Queen of the Obvious a time or two, which makes me smile. This is just fine with me. Afterall, someone has to be! 😉

And, just because something is obvious, doesn’t mean it’s easy or unimportant! In fact, in the case of Loving Leadership behaviors, quite the opposite is true.

We are Loving Leaders in the real world with pressures and challenges. Sometimes after we’ve done all we can do, we find ourselves needing to negotiate for something else in order to do right by our team members and ourselves.

It was sitting on the curb at the back of the grocery store parking lot on a hot July day. Dry and shriveled, its tiny pot was wrapped in pink foil. It was intended to be a gift, the kind you might pick up for an ailing aunt or for friends hosting dinner.

Jim saw it sitting there abandoned. A tiny rose plant. 

Our work as Loving Leaders can be complex. I've been feeling the tugs and pulls from many directions. I've been hearing it from leaders too.  After all, we are responsible for enacting love in various forms in multiple relationships and places simultaneously. Our route is not always clear.

Respect is often identified as a core value by individuals as well as by teams or organizations. And, I've learned through numerous discussions and facilitations that “respect” means wildly different things to different people. 

People will declare, “Every human being deserves fundamental respect!” as often as others will say, “A person has to earn my respect!”

When we are acclimated to poor conditions, then new conditions can feel better than they actually are. The absence of these terrible experiences will be a relief.

But that said, the absence of harm is not the same as the presence of care.