The privilege of a lifetime is to become who you truly are.
C. G. Jung
Normally, I blaze right through these new section introductions. I don’t find them unimportant per se, but I thought the quotes I had for each would speak to why I named them as such.
Let’s take Live, for example. Mitchell Tenpenny is one of my favorite musical artists, and his line, “Who needs a plan when the sun is shining?” inspired me: The times I feel most alive – vibrant with life, shall we say – are the times I’ve set out to face the rising sun, a smile plastered on my face with not a care in the world, and returned home hours later, skies backlit in a golden light, probably with an ice cream cone in hand.
This quote by C. G. Jung hits a little differently, though.
As of late, I have been thinking quite a bit about my voice. No, not my voice voice, though I happen to think I sing well enough, but my voice in a meta sense, as in, I am an autonomous being.
I wrote a (actually, many) paper for my leadership class last semester. The assignment was to pick a leadership practice, examine the literature, provide a critique, and write about how we intended to use the practice in our everyday lives. My paper was on authentic leadership (I may be wrong, but I believe I mentioned this paper last week!). For me, being an authentic leader means being in tune with this inner voice, your inner you – my actual Jade. I write in my paper that Douglas Conant, in Steve Barry Kaufman’s podcast, talks about authentic leadership, specifically, that it is a practice informed by who he is, where he comes from, and what he aspires to do. I write:
Authentic leadership does make sense because it is informed by one’s inner self.
I started a book by Simon Sinek (literally last night). It’s called Start with Why: How Great Leaders Inspire Everyone to Take Action. On the very first page – before you even get to the actual book – he writes
There are leaders and there are those who lead.
Leaders hold a position of power or influence.
Those who lead inspire us.
As of late, I have been working on a fairly independent interview study. Essentially, I interview key individuals associated with farm to school in the state of Georgia. The other day, I interviewed a woman who spoke about the power of our voices.
Language, awareness, and politics are changing quite dramatically these days. To speak about voice, power, individuality – these are subjects that seem to have become unnecessarily charged. I have to ask – why?
Our voices do have power. Our thoughts, words, actions, behaviors – they all have an unruly, awe-inspiring, and simultaneous incidental amount of power.
But I think the other, more real, question(s) here, is (are),
To what degree are we formulating these words into directives of power?
To what degree are we framing these thoughts into bouts of wisdom and epiphanies for others?
To what degree are we – consciously or unconsciously – inspiring others?
But most importantly, to what degree are we framing our words, as a result of our lives, to shape our own voice? To find our own voice?
Yes, I certainly think it is a privilege to express our voice, as it is – and we should strive for it to be – a direct and authentic representation of ourselves. People can, but shouldn’t, have their voice taken away.
What are you doing to lead, to inspire, to cultivate, to hide, to grow, and to express the voice uniquely informed by the way you get to live?
ON HAPPINESS 
💛🦋
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