Soul Work for Leaders: Ignite the Power of YOU

This book, authored by Barbara Bouchet, will be available in 2009. To be notified of its release, simply send an e-mail.

The following excerpt is taken from The Introduction.

"The world needs you! It needs the potential that is locked up inside you to be released and fulfilled for your benefit and for the benefit of others. This book will give you the basis for deep, inner confidence that will support powerful and positive action as a leader. You’ll learn how to influence others with integrity and vision, so others will want to engage.

Along the way, you’ll discover the clear thinking and feeling that is necessary for highly effective communication. You will be prepared for challenging conversations. This will help you build collaborative relationships and get difficult relationships back on track.

This book was written with one goal: to show you how to become a more powerful, mindful leader that is deeply anchored in your essential being – your essence or soul. With your power ignited in this way, you’ll find faster and better ways to manage yourself, manage others, and to get the results you want.

When you act from the center of your being, balance and renewal are possible. You will be able to see your blind spots, fill in the gaps, and have the ability to not only recover gracefully from mistakes but to inspire others to do the same.

Your essence can be expressed in your life in a way that is more powerful than you may imagine. It’s already inside you as potential. You probably have had glimpses of it. But unless it’s activated at important times and in effective ways, it remains just a possibility. This book will show you how to unlock this potential.

I will show you how to develop who you are as a person and as a leader, for the benefit of both you and those around you. My approach draws on established psycho-spiritual principles and proven techniques. It draws on what works, rather than faith. I won’t ask you to believe, but I will ask you to reflect, consider new perspectives and try some new behaviors.

Leadership can be exercised with or without being in a formal position of authority. It can operate on a large or small scale. Leadership can occur internally, when you lead yourself, and externally, when you lead others. It can apply to executives or to someone at the beginning of their career.

If you are an executive, manager, or have been identified as a person with high potential, this book will support the fast track and keep you on track. If you are a business owner, entrepreneur or leader of a non-profit, you’ll find necessary tools to stabilize your own balance and the balance of your organization. If you are a helping professional or human resources professional, you’ll learn a very clear model for supporting the growth of others. If you are a social, political, or religious change agent, you’ll find a way to inspire others by communicating your vision more effectively. If you dream of being a better leader or if you just want to grow personally so you can guide your family, this book will provide a map and a process for doing so.

Enlightened leadership can be demonstrated in any situation that calls for a better way. It comes from the spark of vision inside of someone who is paying attention. When this vision is acted upon in skillful ways that move a system toward transformational change, you see leadership in action.

This book will give you the means to recognize your own untapped potential and will show you how to work with others with skill and respect in order to create something of value for the world.

Working with your enlightened edge will give you a distinct advantage at work, at home and in any area of your life where you want to be at your best. You’ll find that as your awareness becomes more expanded and enlightened it will guide your actions. Choices and actions tend to be wiser, leading to more joyful and life affirming outcomes for everyone involved.

Where did this information come from? I have been working as a psychotherapist, adult educator, executive coach and consultant for over 25 years. I own my own business, have been the director of a non-profit corporation, started a consulting firm, and worked for and with other consulting firms. My clients have consistently been my greatest source of information and inspiration. They have allowed me into the privacy of their lives, their relationships and their organizations with the often unspoken but most intimate of questions: “Can you help me with this?”

This question deserves more than a pre-formulated response. I have read hundreds of wonderful, powerful, enlightening books that have helped illuminate the path for my work. I consistently draw from these many minds and their careful models in my day-to-day work. Yet when it comes down to it, each person, each group, each moment is unique and needs its own unique solution. I never know exactly what the solution will look like.

This book distills best practices and processes that have been tested repeatedly not only by me but by hundreds of close colleagues and thousands of clients. It is a guide to what has been shown to create reliable, positive change. The processes have been applied to individuals, business owners and executives, to couples, groups and teams, to large and small businesses and to profit and non-profit organizations.

Until now, many of the models and processes outlined in this book have only been available through the coaching I offer to executives and professionals. This book now makes available for you, the same information that has helped high powered executives become even more capable, wise and balanced leaders.

If you apply the principles you read about to your own unique psyche and situation, they will help you access and leverage the power and spirit that is already within you. Since the focus will be on you, much of what you see will be familiar. But you’ll see yourself and others in a new way.

By working with your enlightened edge, you will discover how to lead yourself and others in consistent, transformational ways. Think of this as a guidebook for helping you make the shift from a limited, guarded, constricted you, to a more fully alive and powerful you who can become that rare person—an inspiring and enlightened leader."

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