When Do You Feel Good Enough? 

A Lesson About Leadership from a Flock of Birds

During my stay at Plum Village, I had the opportunity to participate in a Q&A session with the monastic community on one of the Days of Mindfulness.

My question was: I have a need to change the world I’m living in, but also, I have much exhaustion from it, and a desire to change my old habits. What should I do? While asking it, I felt both an internal feeling of urgency and burnout. Does this resonate with you? Do you also feel guilty at times for not doing enough?

You know you possess the energy, power, and calling to create change, lead, and take responsibility. Gently examine this energy. Recognize your potential emerging through it. Breathe into it, but do not act upon it just yet. Allow it to nurture your presence. Notice your breath, your pulse, how the energy lands on your body, and how your body holds or perhaps cannot hold it, thanks to certain changes in your life.

So, I ask myself, in these challenging times of leadership in the world, how do I manage the leadership energy that I hold, and that has held such power over my mind?

The monastics continued, saying:

“Consider a flock of birds, where each bird knows its place and is prepared to assume leadership when necessary.”

So, I recognize and acknowledge I have the energy, but perhaps it is not the right time for me now to be at the head of the flock?

When do you grant yourself permission to acknowledge your ‘doing’ and social action-oriented energy, pause, breathe into it, step back, and explore whether it truly benefits you at this stage in your life? Perhaps we can learn just to sit and be with that energy?

May we learn to navigate our energy like birds, knowing when to step forward, step back, and observe, that we might hold the energy, but not necessarily need to act upon it.