 ‘Stop scrolling. Start doing.’ (Kati Kaia) You see the headline. Another war, disaster or existential threat looming on the horizon. Your breath shortens, your heart tightens and for a moment, just a split second perhaps, you feel that primal rush of adrenaline. Your body is gearing up for battle – but there is no enemy in front of you. There’s no fight to be won and no obvious action to take. Just a screen, glowing with catastrophe, and the realisation that you are completely powerless to stop it. This is the fight-flight-freeze response, an ancient survival mechanism designed to protect us from immediate danger. But, in the digital age, it’s being hijacked. Instead of running from a predator or standing our ground in a real-life threat, we’re reacting to the relentless tide of global crises flooding our news feeds. And the worst part? There’s nowhere for that energy to release and dissipate. When faced with a real, tangible danger, our nervous system activates to help us respond – fight back, escape or play dead until the threat passes. But when the threat is abstract, distant or beyond our control, this energy has no resolution. Instead, it lingers, simmering beneath the surface, manifesting as anxiety, burnout or even physical symptoms like fatigue, headaches or stomach cramps. Chronic exposure to distressing news can lead to what’s called ‘headline stress disorder.’ It’s a psychological phenomenon where constant exposure to crises keeps the nervous system in a perpetual state of high alert. The body can’t distinguish between immediate danger and an article about geopolitical tensions. The result? We’re left feeling exhausted, restless, and emotionally drained – and yet, somehow. unable to disengage. While I believe it’s important to remain aware of global events, especially given the international scope of my own interests and work, we don’t have to sacrifice our mental well-being in the process. Here’s are some tips for how to break the cycle (that I’m practising too): 1. Recognise the physical response: The next time you feel that surge of stress while reading, listening to or watching the news, pause. Notice your breath, your heart rate and any tension in your body. Awareness is the first step to regaining control. 2. Limit your exposure: Set boundaries on your news intake. Try checking the news only once or twice a day instead of constantly refreshing your feed. Consider turning off push notifications for breaking news unless it’s directly relevant to your life. 3. Engage in physical activity: Since the fight-flight-freeze response is designed for action, find a healthy outlet for that energy. Exercise, go for a walk or even shake your arms and legs. Physical movement can help regulate your nervous system. 4. Focus on what you can control: Instead of fixating on problems you can’t solve, redirect your attention to actions within your reach. Chat with others, write to your MP, support a local cause or do related volunteer work to restore a sense of agency. 5. Balance negative news with positive (*see below): Despite media narratives, the world isn’t only crises and catastrophes. Seek out stories of resilience, innovation and positive change. Follow groups that highlight solutions, not just problems. 6. Practise grounding techniques: Breathing exercises, prayer, meditation and mindfulness practices can help signal to your nervous system that you are safe. Simple techniques like the 5-4-3-2-1 method (naming five things you see, four you touch, three you hear, two you smell, and one you taste) can pull you back into the present moment. Yes, the world is full of challenges, but it is also full of people who care, who take action and who make a difference. And that includes you – even if your first step is simply putting down your phone, taking a deep breath, saying a prayer and reclaiming your own sense of peace. [*For positive news channels, see: Good News Hub; Good News Network; Positive News]
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 ‘There are no permanent friends or enemies in international relations, only permanent interests.’ (Henry Kissinger) The third anniversary of Russia’s attack on Ukraine came and went this week with some hints of progress towards an end to the war. A possible deal or sorts, amidst shifting blame, and against the backdrop of disturbing rumours of hidden geopolitical manoeuvrings behind the scenes. It felt hard not to see Ukraine as trapped in the middle – a David now caught between two Goliaths as one friend put it – seemingly powerless at the hands of bigger, crushing and grabbing forces. In the middle of the mess, we saw the UK straddling two horses – with its Prime Minister in thin disguise asserting himself as the new leader of Europe (another land grab, of sorts, while his German and French counterparts were floundering in political chaos); whilst also sacrificing the poor in the world to the insatiable god of war in a bid to win approval of the world’s new President. I felt sick as I watched the news, seeing a leader sell his nation's soul for political expediency. I wondered what I might do if I were in his position of power and responsibility. I hope better, and I fear worse. I was brought back down to earth on Wednesday evening at a weekly ‘Prayers for Peace’ event in a cold church building in Germany. A group of ten German people – with I as a visiting Engländer – stood in prayerful solidarity with a group of twenty shy-looking Ukrainian women and children. Each held a candle and some cried with tears of pain and hope. I felt like crying too. 
‘When we know people whose lives are being destroyed and there seems to be no way of reaching them; when people are in impossible situations and there are no words to help them…hold them at the centre of prayer, where the divine Christ dwells, and expose them to the rays of his love.’ (Iain Matthew) Friedensgebet (‘prayers for peace’) felt even more earnest this evening than last time I was here. As we entered the church, each person lit a candle and placed it on a silver cross before a figure of the crucified Christ. It felt like holding the suffering of the world before one who knows what it is to endure pain. The candle I lit barely flickered at first, as if struggling to spark itself into even the tiniest glimmer of a flame. Hope, too, can sometimes feel like that. Those present reflected on certain parallels in German society today with those that preceded the rise of the Nazis so many years ago now. That was an unspeakably dark period in German history which, at times like this, still surfaces, smoulders and burns in the people’s collective psyche. I could feel their sense of concern and anguish about the forthcoming general election. Would Germany learn from its history, or would it find itself condemned to repeat it? As we prayed, I recalled Iain Matthew’s soulful spiritual wisdom: ‘Feel the way to the wound that is in us, to the place of our need. Go there, take it, name it; hold it before Christ. Feel our way to the wounds of this world, to those people or situations in dire need of healing. Go there, take them, name them; and hold them before him. Go there, not to dictate to Christ what the answer should be or what he should do about it; but to hold the wound before him.’ Yes.  ‘If you’re not confused, you’re not paying attention.’ (Tom Peters) Leaders who develop strategy collaboratively with diverse key stakeholders often find that inviting others in proves critical to its success. It recognises that no leader, no matter how knowledgeable or experienced, can know everything and it values the contribution that others can bring. That said, leaders can also feel overwhelmed if levels of participation are high and inputs are complex. These tips (below) are, therefore, designed to help leaders sift through and make sense of the reams of hopes, ideas, information, impressions, data etc. that they may surface and receive through strategy research and through inviting input from various people and groups. They are not intended as a prescriptive one-size-fits-all set of rules. Have a glance and see which, if any, work best for you. 1. Don’t panic In the midst of some great information and ideas, you are also likely to receive input that will look unclear, confusing or contradictory. There may be handwriting you can’t read, comments in shorthand that made sense to the person who wrote them but don’t make sense to you etc. You may receive so much input from diverse people and sources that it could feel bewildering. If so...don’t panic! 2. Research questions Go back to your research questions. Use them as a guide to sift through the input you have received. How far does the overall input contribute to answering the questions you set out to address? Has any of it raised wider or deeper questions that need to be acknowledged? Is any of the input interesting but distracting? Avoid the temptation to race down fascinating rabbit holes that take you off track. 3. Test a hypothesis Some leaders suggest formulating a hypothesis – a provisional answer to the questions you set out to answer – before sifting through responses. This provides a focus, a testing stone, and enables you to check each response: ‘Does this support or contradict the hypothesis?’ If it doesn’t relate to the hypothesis, shelve it for now so that you don’t get distracted. You can always circle back to it later. 4. Cluster responses Some leaders prefer to start with a blank sheet, skim through responses and note intuitively what core themes or ideas emerge. You can then place responses under those themes, adding or modifying themes as the sifting process progresses. Don’t worry about identifying the themes perfectly too early. You can always hone them and see what answers they point towards later. 5. Test your biases It can be tricky for leaders to look at responses afresh, especially if we have a strong interest in the work we do currently or strong views about how we should move forward. During the research phase, I refer to these challenges as ‘blind spots’ (assumptions) and ‘hot spots’ (sensitive areas). Invite others to test your assumptions and to point out if you appear to avoid challenges or new ideas. 6. Trust the process We may have invited and received input from a diverse range of people and groups. Whilst no strategy research will ever be 100% exhaustive and conclusive, the insights that we draw through a collaborative strategy venture will in most cases be good enough – that is, good and enough as a signpost to the future. Pray, be confident in what you know and excited by what you discover!  ‘Tomorrow is the first blank page of a 365-page book. Write a good one.’ (Brad Paisley) It was my first time at a Greenbelt Festival in the UK and I remember wearing simple sandals made from recycled car tyres and a leather headband to keep my hair out of my face. I painted a cross on my forehead, carried a bamboo flute (which I couldn’t play) and walked with friends amidst the crowds towards the centre stage. Radical social activist, Jim Wallis, was the keynote and he spoke passionately about a place in the Bible where Jesus reveals who and what matters to him in this world. I felt spellbound. It resonated deeply with my own spiritual convictions – nothing to do with religious moralising and everything to do with a vision, an ethic, a possibility, a relationship. ‘I was hungry and you gave me something to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink, I was a stranger and you invited me in, I needed clothes and you clothed me, I was sick and you looked after me, I was in prison and you came to visit me.’ In this narrative, those to whom Jesus is speaking were puzzled and asked when they had done this. ‘Whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers and sisters of mine, you did for me.’ Jesus was sharing with astonishing clarity the lens through which he views our priorities and relationships. The way we treat others in need – the poor, the outsider, the sick, the oppressed – is the way that Jesus considers we reflect and treat him. Please God, as we enter this new year: shine your light of love, truth and hope through my life with ever-increasing brightness.  ‘Learn from history, maintain your mystery, take your victory.’ (Amit Kalantri) Sometimes, we need to look back to look forward and the New Year can present us with a special opportunity to do just that. We could think of this as analogous to an annual performance review, where we pause for a moment and take stock of progress and learning so far before moving on. At a personal level, I’ve been thinking and writing quite a lot recently about Kairos moments in my own life that have, in retrospect, often proved pivotal. These experiences carry a spiritual quality and significance for me that both transcend the temporal and reveal a deeper sense of meaning. An instance comes to mind when, 3 days into a leadership role in a new organisation (to me), my line-manager called me into his office to confess, in deep disappointment, that funding for (a) a new leadership coaching programme and (b) a new management development programme, both of which were to lay in my area of responsibility, had been slashed as part of broader financial cuts. He apologised that, as a consequence, these flagship initiatives could no longer go ahead. I could see a look of anxiety on his face wondering, I imagine, how I might react to this bombshell news. I prayed silently then responded in a spirit of curiosity that, if these initiatives were priority, I’d just need to find a different way to achieve them. I thanked him for being open, prayed, then placed an invitation on LinkedIn, asking if anyone would like to offer pro bono coaching support for leaders in a national UK charity. Within 10 days, 180+ people had responded to offer their services. I also prayed and asked around if anyone would be willing to run a pro bono management development programme. A prestigious agency responded and ran an annual programme for us for 4 years running. I’m reflecting on why this experience came to mind for me now. It happened 10 years ago yet still feels so profoundly resonant as we approach the New Year. The first lesson for me is that it’s not all about me. God is capable of doing far more than I can ask or imagine. The second is the rich relational resourcefulness of networks, the kindness of so many people who are willing to offer themselves in heartfelt service when offered meaningful opportunities to do so. The third is the power of invitation, not expectation, that draws people freely into co-creative partnership to do something amazing.  ‘The international arms trade is in direct opposition to efforts to protect and pursue the health of our world and its inhabitants.’ (MedAct) When Jesus Christ was born, if he had been given the projected world armaments spend for this year alone – I have to sit down as I write this: he could have spent US$ 2,708,578 every… single… day... from then until now. And, whilst on the topic of Jesus, a good friend has a satirical sticker across the rear windscreen of her campervan that reads, ‘Who would Jesus bomb?’ The simple answer is, ‘Nobody’. He was far too concerned with bringing good news to the poor, vulnerable and oppressed. Bottom line: weapons didn’t feature on his bottom line. Yet here today we see world leaders striding confidently onto stages, adorned with flags and symbols, making elegant speeches and pointing accusing fingers at one another across starkly-divided world maps. Everyone is firmly committed to the, ‘I’m OK, You’re Not OK’ creed and absolutely convinced by the rightness of their own cause. The platform rhetoric is powerful, existential, and ramps up the ante. It’s a dangerous zero-sum, do-or-die game in which we could all – quite literally – obliterate the world in a quest to, allegedly, save the world. Meanwhile, I see children in the Philippines this week who live in dire poverty, sleeping in rags on hard ground. There are countless millions across the world living like this, with barely enough to survive let alone thrive. Scraps of food and no access to safe water, sanitation, healthcare or education. US$ 2,708,578. So, Jesus again – ‘Reach out to your enemies.’ We could try this: ‘We’ve all made a real mess of this. We’re partly to blame and we’re sorry for the part we played in how we got here. We want to work with you to co-create a very different future.' Everything is at stake.  ‘There’s nothing more dangerous than a resourceful idiot.’ (Scott Adams) 15 minutes before I was due to lead an online change leadership workshop in Germany, I stepped outside briefly for a breath of fresh air. I wanted to clear my head, focus and pray. Then…oh no, I heard a gentle click behind me and discovered, to my alarm, that I couldn’t open the door without a key. It hung tantalisingly on the inside and I could see my mobile phone staring at me blankly from the table. Aha, I thought. I will ask my hosts to let me in. Oh, they were out. Mild feelings of panic rising, I rushed to a neighbour. Thank God they were in, could understand my Englisch-Deutsch, had the hosts’ number and could call. Now, with just 2 minutes to go, my host appeared and saved the day. It was a timely reminder that sudden change can come from anywhere, unexpectedly and often from left field. It was also a helpful reminder that leadership, resilience and agency aren’t simply inward, intra-personal qualities or strengths. Our ability to handle the impacts of changes and transitions often emerges from an outward-facing resourcefulness, looking outside of ourselves openly (and, for me, prayerfully) for people and-or other resources who can co-create and co-enable a solution with us…or – if no solution is possible – sit with us in the midst of discomfort, disappointment or pain.  I spent 5 years learning French, 4 years learning German, 3 years learning Greek, 2 months learning to teach English and 1 year learning Hebrew. I've also learned a smattering of words and phrases in languages as diverse as Japanese, Arabic, Spanish, Filipino and BSL. Whereas traditional language-learning often focuses primarily on vocabulary, grammar and pronunciation, I find myself especially interested in social-psychological dimensions such as confidence, context and culture. Manoeuvring between languages often calls for a nuanced interpretation rather than simple translation, paying attention to, say, intention, meaning and relationship before mechanics like spelling or word order. I find there are similar dynamics at play in other (and equally-complex) human-relational arenas such as leadership, teamwork, coaching and facilitation. Psychoanalyst Carl Jung commented astutely: ‘Learn your theories as well as you can, but put them aside when you touch the miracle of the living soul.’ Textbook techniques will take us so far, yet real transformation often emerges through the sensitive manifestation of human-spiritual qualities in our relationships and practice including: presence, contact and trust. This calls us continually to explore questions such as, ‘What does this person (or group) need in this situation at this time?’ This is very different to a simple, ‘If X, do Y.’ As we enter the New Year, I’m aware of so many complex challenges that are impacting dramatically on people, communities, organisations, nations and the entire natural-environmental ecosystem. In such circumstances, it can be tempting to grasp hold of simplistic, mechanistic solutions that, we hope, will help us to feel less anxious, less vulnerable and less out-of-control. We may risk closing in on ourselves to defend and protect those beliefs, behaviours and interests that provide us with a sense of reassurance, safety and security. In 2023, I hope and pray, with open mind and heart, that I will stay close to the call-principles that guide my practice: prayer, presence, participation. How about you? Happy New Year! Light shines in darkness. We can be hope.  ‘If you want to know what your true values are, have a look at your diary and your bank statement.’ (Selwyn Hughes) Take any example of an important-to-you decision that you have taken during this past week. Consciously or subconsciously, directly or indirectly, it will have reflected something of your underlying beliefs and values. At one level, every decision we take with awareness represents the outcome of a choice point, analogous to a choice of a direction at an intersection in a road. Guiding principles are a way of choosing to align our decisions and behaviour with our beliefs, ethics and values. I worked with a group recently where, during feedback, participants commented on how they felt impacted by what they saw and experienced as my ‘distinctive’ style and approach and, in particular, the power of my 'presence'. They were curious and asked me what, if anything, lay behind this – that which they had experienced – for me. What is it that makes the difference? I held up a small, yellow, post-it note to the screen. On it are written 3 words in my own scrawled handwriting: Prayer, Presence, Participation. These are, if you like, the guiding principles that underpin me personally and all of my work professionally. I carry them with me and have them stuck on my desk, beside the monitor. I pause and focus on them consciously and deliberately before, say, writing a message, joining a conversation or running a workshop. They really do matter to me. Prayer is inviting and opening myself to God’s insight, wisdom and power. He is able to reveal, do and achieve things that are truly impossible for me alone. Presence is ensuring quality of attention and contact with each person or group that I will meet. It’s viewing and approaching each person, each moment, as a sacred encounter. Participation is an invitational spirit that calls for humility and courage. It means engaging with people, not simply technology or any materials that we may use. At the end of the conversation, I invited each person in the group to reflect for a moment – for as long as they needed – and to write down 3 words that, perhaps, they would choose to underpin their own practice. They did this thoughtfully, alone, then each shared with others in the group what they had written. This felt so much deeper and more meaningful than simple words on paper could capture or convey. It was about integrity, authenticity and congruence: choosing to take a stance. What core principles guide the focus and parameters of your decisions and behaviour? What stance are you willing to take? |
Nick WrightI'm a psychological coach, trainer and OD consultant. Curious to discover how can I help you? Get in touch! 
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