Corepower, Leadership from your Core.: A Guide to Power, Love, Wisom and Inspiration

By Baud Vandenbemden and Lien De Coster

COREPOWER – guiding yourself from the core
Knowing what is important to you and living your life according to that vision. Being balanced and regaining balance whenever you lose it. Living deeply connected to yourself and the world around you. Sounds hard? Luckily personal leadership is something you can develop.
The Corepower book helps you strengthen your integrity. Exercises as varied as meditations, martial art techniques and psychological models give you the opportunity to grow in the area you want. The book is divided into different qualities with which you can connect: power, love, wisdom, spirit and earth. Simple skills such as breathing from your belly, opening your heart, and focusing your attention serve as the basis for more complex forms of self-guidance and deep transformation. They bring you more physical, emotional and mental balance and nurture you spiritually. The effects are quickly noticeable in daily life. They come in the following ways: obtaining better resistance to stress, dealing with boundaries in a healthy way, working from your heart, and being more conscious of your purpose on earth. Corepower can also be useful for groups and organizations. The method can unblock group processes, heighten effectiveness and restore the balance between group dynamics and group work. Corepower is mainly inspired by insights from the Chinese philosophy of Taoism and the leadership methods of Teampower.

• Language: English
• Publisher: BookBaby
• Release date: Jan 28, 2014
• ISBN: 9783955777470

Book preview

How to contact me: [e-mail]

I love hearing from you!

Feel free to contact me:

Baud@corepower.

www.corepower.be

Copyright: © Baud Vandenbemden

Copyright cover and artwork: © Baud Vandenbemden

Year of publication 2014

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in or introduced into a retrieval system, or transmitted in any for or by any means (electronic, mechanical, by photocopying, recording or otherwise) without the prior written permission of the author.

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Contents

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

INTRODUCTORY NOTE

PREFACE

INTRODUCTION

1. COREPOWER: POWER

1. INTRODUCTION

2. ADRENALINE: TO SURVIVE

3. TO DEAL WITH AGGRESSION: TO GENERATE LIFE FORCE

4. YIN-YANG: THE DANCE OF LIFE

5. REST/POWER: FEET AND BELLY

6. TO EXPRESS POWER: VOICE AND EYES

7. TO DEAL WITH BOUNDARIES: TO SAY STOP

8. TO DEAL WITH A (THREATENING) GROUP: BODY LANGUAGE AND CHARISMA

9. POWER UPKEEP: TO LIVE DAILY IN YOUR POWER

2. COREPOWER: LOVE

1. INTRODUCTION

2. FROM DICHOTOMY TO POLARITY: FROM TWO TO MANY

3. OPEN HEART: PURE LOVE

4. KI: SOURCE WATER

5. TO TRANSFORM EMOTIONS: ALCHEMY

6. THE SAVER’S TRIANGLE: FROM DESTRUCTIVE TO CONSTRUCTIVE COMMUNICATION

7. ARMOR: FROM SHELL-FISH TO SLUG

8. EMOTIONAL VIRUSES: ATMOSPHERIC CLOUDS

9. PARASITICAL PROGRAMS: EMOSPAM

10. TRANSFERENCE AND COUNTERTRANSFERENCE: FROM OLD TO NEW

11. PROJECTION: FROM YOU TO ME

12. EMOTIONAL HYGIENE

13. ANCHORS: TO MAKE A LINK

14. LOVE UPKEEP: TO LIVE IN YOUR LOVE EVERY DAY

3. COREPOWER: WISDOM

1. INTRODUCTION

2. BRAIN SETTINGS: WAVES IN YOUR HEAD

EXERCISE: TO HOLD AND TO LET GO

3. TO FOCUS AND TO LET GO: TO MASTER YOUR THOUGHTS

4. MIND POWER: TO THINK STRONGLY

5. THE COREPOWER COMPASS: THE MAP OF YOUR INNER BALANCE

6. COKI: COREPOWER ENERGY

7. TO CO-CREATE AND TO THINK POSITIVELY: WHAT CAN GO RIGHT

8. DIRECTION AND GOAL: YOUR MISSION

9. STRATEGIES AND TACTICS: ACTION PLAN

10. WISDOM UPKEEP: TO LIVE IN YOUR WISDOM EVERY DAY

4. COREPOWER: SPIRIT

1. INTRODUCTION

2. SPIRIT(UALITY): TO CONNECT WITH HIGHER HOLONS OR TRANSPERSONAL FIELDS

3. ENERGETIC FIELDS: KI COLLECTIONS

4. LIGHT BEINGS: PARTNERS IN COREPOWER

6. I AM-CONSCIOUSNESS: FROM EGO TO SELF

7. THE COREPOWER FIELD: INTEGRITY AND HEALING

8. COREPOWER SYMBOL: TO ANCHOR COKI

9. SPIRIT UPKEEP: TO DAILY LIVE IN YOUR SPIRIT

5. COREPOWER: EARTH

1. INTRODUCTION

2. LOST ROOTS

3. RADICAL RECONNECTION

4. RITUALS: TO BE INTIMATE WITH THE EARTH

5. EARTH ENERGY: TO HEAL AND TO BE HEALED

6. EARTH ACTIVISM: TO CHANGE FROM THE CORE

7. EARTH UPKEEP: TO LIVE DAILY IN YOUR EARTH

CLOSING WORDS

RESOURCES

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

THANKS TO

My parents who have, consciously or unconsciously, given me exactly those impulses that made me look for my core.

Bibi for the trust and support.

Wannes and Elias for teaching me what is truly valuable.

All of my teachers who inspired me to walk my own path: Mia, Diana, Freerk, Dirk, Bea, Marleen, Ivo, Guy, Gisèle, Yvonne …

Q.Y. for the beautiful cooperation and support.

Mike for everything you have done for us.

Baud

Mum, for putting me on the path towards my Corepower

Juan, for reminding me of myself when I forget

Marit, for feeding and challenging me

Karin en Rasmus, for all the beautiful solo spots

Katrien, for the inspiration and sharing

La Gomera, for the soft beating of the waves in the background while revising this book

Sweden, for the sound of the heaven harp

Lien

SPECIAL THANKS TO

Olga Putilina, for editing the translation

John, Jacqueline and Doris for proofreading

INTRODUCTORY NOTE

By Looby Macnamara

In this planetary time of change and challenges the world needs people who are willing and able to step up and speak out. Unfortunately though, there are many ways in which we play small in our lives. We have learnt this at school, in our homes, out on the city streets. We hide our light, we try and fade into the background, we shy away from new experiences, we are overly modest about our strengths. But does this really serve us, and does it serve the world? We are at a time in the Earth’s lifespan when the choices we make as humanity will make a significant difference. And the choices we make as individuals become part of these greater tides of change. We can choose to be part of the problem or we can choose to be part of the solution.

These ways we play small are learnt behaviours, we learn them implicitly or explicitly from those around us, the cultures we inhabit, and as defence mechanisms. But now is the time for us all to relearn to be our full selves, to wake up to our power and our wisdom, and have the courage to share our strengths with the world.

What Baud and Lien have gifted us with here is a myriad of exercises to help us get in touch with more of ourselves and to connect with something much larger. This is a treasure trove of exercises that enable us to connect with our inner resources and build our stamina as well as accessing the support of the cosmos.

One of the most important lessons I have learnt in my journey with People and Permaculture is that we need to attend to both our own self-care and our contributions to positive change in the world. We need two wings to fly - inner sustenance and outer work in the world. I have learnt that if we want to walk our talk in the world we need to resource ourselves as fully as we can. Our own personal well-being influences and is influenced by the well-being of those around us, and the health of the Earth. What is offered here is a way of balancing our own needs and supporting ourselves by accessing more of the energy inherently available to us. We are encouraged and guided through activities that remove blocks to our flows of power, love and wisdom. Corepower is packed full of goodness – a superfood for our consciousness, providing us with nutrients to feed us on our all levels from the cellular to the energetic and emotional.

My own goal in life is to use and develop my skills to support the growth of the permaculture ethics of earthcare, people care and fair shares in the world. My experiences have shown me that inspiration, transformation and empowerment come most when I can let go of playing small and be myself; when I trust the magic comes. When I appreciate myself my energy can flow more freely and I am able to connect with others more.

Through Corepower we can gain familiarity with our inner landscape that enables us to flourish and be resilient. The invitation here is to find ways in which we can dream big, act effectively, focus our attentions, and to come from a place of loving kindness, where we are grounded and connected to the Earth and to our innate wisdom. We can be the best for ourselves and the world.

Looby Macnamara, permaculture teacher and author of 'People and Permaculture'

www.loobymacnamara.com

PREFACE

About Baud, Lien and Corepower

Personal leadership has been the main recurring theme in my life for the past ten years. When I was working as a youth worker on the streets, trying to build up and restore social bonds, I found myself in extreme situations on a daily basis. I had a strong need for something that would strengthen my level of leadership, because even though I did not have any formal power over the people I worked with, I stood in front of them in a certain position of authority. This meant that I had to stand very strong. To achieve this I had to further develop the ability to guide myself. By being in balance with myself and working from a place of integrity, I had a much bigger impact on the street. In my private life, also, I noticed that working on living from my core sparked positive changes.

After a couple of years, the huge impact of personal leadership from the core was evident. I, therefore, no longer only used it for myself but started to develop it as a method to be used by other people and groups. Since then, I have used the Corepower method in innumerable situations: doing aggression trainings with nurses, with (international) youth workers, with volunteers from the European Voluntary Service program, with groups of managers, trainers, coaches, seniors, adults, children and adolescents with aggression or defensiveness problems, in bullying classes, as team-building for new teachers, etc, … Thanks to my experience with Corepower in such a wide array of contexts I have been able to refine the method further and further.

Corepower as it is presented in this book, is ideal for every individual who wants to work with groups. It can be particularly beneficial for people, such as managers or aid workers, who work in difficult contexts.

Baud

Ever since I was in primary school I wanted to become a journalist. I loved to write and I wanted to make the world more just. When I finally started working as a professional journalist, it did not take long before I realized I was missing something. I found it hard to always have to take an analytical view of the world. I longed for a deeper connection with the people I wrote about. Apart from that, more and more, I found it harder to send negative stories out into the world. Instead of stimulating change in people, I saw a lot of readers sucked into feelings of powerlessness and indifference.

In the mean time, I also started doing yoga. I started to live less and less in my head and more and more in my body. I felt more balanced as a human being. Then Corepower came into my life. It developed into a story that wasn’t written from the rational mind, but from a deeply personal process. By doing the Corepower exercises with Baud and by putting them on paper I grew closer to myself. The writing of each chapter equated to holding a big mirror in front of my face.

Prior to Corepower, I viewed the world with an arrogant attitude: I saw what was wrong with it, and I was working on changing it through journalism and activism. This time I went deep inside myself, confronted my own blockages, and discovered a completely different world. My attitude to life now springs much more from love and connection. This frees a lot of positive energy to start fundamental change.

To work with Corepower and to share the method with others feels like one of the most useful things I have done up to this point. To really have an impact on the world is to act from integrity, a necessity. Let this book be an inspiration for individuals, groups and organizations to make this come true, at home, at work, and in the world.

Lien

INTRODUCTION

Rocean

A day on the rocks at the oceanside/the soles of my feet warm up together with the black stone surface/the sea salt leaves white traces behind in the miniature canyons between the rocks and on my body/hair that sticks together flaps in the wind on which seagulls surf/I smell all fish in the sea briny ocean and sitting on rock I smell like briny ocean and sitting rock/I am hewed out of cliff/the cliff covered by human/light dances in front of my eyes/the sun wildly makes love to my skin/water sheets waves left behind reflect at the wall/I taste the sweet water from to the source on its way to the big salty water/I rest between two clouds between two breaths here a shell turns into sand here some wave becomes bath/the big shadow caresses the valley with unhasty fingers/I sit still move/the earths spins/there is sun sea level/ocean licks rock/rock stays/rock breaks waves/ocean keeps on going/there is no rock/no ocean/rocean. (Lien)

The world

As a human you are a very special creature. You possess a deep primal power, an endless capacity to love and to develop wisdom. You live on a wonderful planet called Earth. At the same time, you are capable of experiencing a bigger cosmic consciousness. Maybe you forgot where you came from. That special place where everything is whole, where no judgment exists and there are no musts. Luckily there is a memory that is stronger than you, that knows why you are here, that remembers the liberation of living as a complete creature, from your core.

Our western world often gives you a hard time perceiving yourself this way. On a lot of levels there is separation. We learn to view the world through analytical and dualistic glasses, which become cemented to our faces before we know it. We give first priority to the recognition of the rational and the material. Because of this, out of necessity, we deny what is going on at energy level.

You see this happening, for example, in science and medicine. Our contemporary science is still mainly built on empirical perceptions. Whatever has to do with consciousness is not taken seriously. In medicine, healing through energetic methods, such as homeopathy, is generally dismissed as quackery. Healing is believed to be, incontestably, about taking a tangible pill or repairing a broken piece of our body’s machinery.

A lot of us don’t know our own bodies. We mainly see them as a device which we have to fix when it somehow fails. Or we put to work on our condition on our to-do list. Seldom do we have a sensual relationship with our body. We don’t give it much attention in the form of, for example, a massage or sauna. We aren’t really occupied with preventing the loss of balance or the thought that every relationship also means spending time together and enjoying one another. If we don’t give our body its due attention, we lose the skill of listening to its signals and knowing what it needs.

Our emotions generally only get attention in the same circumstance; when something goes wrong. Psychiatrists and happy pills are part of daily life for a lot of us. We collectively have a series of anxieties which we often incite in each other. We experience the time we live in as an uncertain one, something we can’t simply respond to by cultivating trust. Even though spirituality can help feed this trust, it seldom has an important place in our lives.

In the same way that we are often not really connected to ourselves, we are often not connected to others. The lifestyle that is encouraged is unsustainable and individualistic. The separation from our core and from each other brings a lot of us a burn out or a mid-life crisis.

Although we tend to perceive these expressions of our unbalance as individual problems, they are actually manifestations of our collective illness. In traditional societies health is always defined in relation to the natural environment. Our industrial urban society is lacking this natural interaction.

To lose touch with oneself in this environment is not such an aberration. On top of this, we live in a time that brings uncertainty. The fundamentals on which our system is built are crumbling. Crises on the economic, ecological, political, social and ethical levels are converging, causing worldwide unrest. But in situations where you can feel fear you can also feel trust. To live in a time as exciting as ours is like an invitation to become acquainted with yourself again. We have to let go of what is not working within our society by the same token as letting go of what is not working for us on a personal level. By living through your vulnerability you can get in touch with your highest capacities. There is no experience that gives you more recognition, confirmation and trust than to (re)discover your own core.

The book

This is the Corepower book. You can use it as a paper guide for connection and integration, on your path from separation to connection. It lets you take yourself by the hand on the path to your core, and brings you into deeper contact with yourself and your environment.

The book can provide insight as to what you need to live in balance. In order to achieve this you can start to work with the exercises and techniques. The exercises are steps towards the actual techniques of self-guidance. They all boil down to the transformation of negative and destructive patterns to an attitude that serves you and your environment, and gives you the opportunity to grow. Concretely, it can bring changes such as more inner peace, stress tolerance, emotional stability, and dealing with boundaries in a healthy way, focus and singleness of purpose, and a heightened consciousness about your goals on earth.

The book contains five chapters. You can run through them the way they are in the book or you can immediately start with a specific chapter that appeals to you. They all work with consciousness, at different levels.

The chapter POWER takes you into your bodily world, LOVE into your emotional world, WISDOM into your mind’s world, SPIRIT into your spiritual world, and EARTH into the world of your planet. When you run through the whole book, you center at different levels and you go through a cycle of deep transformation. You encounter blockages, which you release. This stimulates a free flow of energy. In this sense you can think of the book as an invitation to walk the road of your kundalini, the central energy channel running through your body.

Know that this book is not for reading but for living. When you read it solely from your rational mind it will only bring you limited results. You might understand the chapter about power, but the effect is much stronger when you also experience it physically. For an optimal effect you should reserve a couple of weeks for each chapter, to experience it and to integrate the exercises into your daily life. To live in balance, you have to do so in relationship to others. In the chapter POWER you will find a lot of exercises for two people. It is handy to have somebody you trust to do them with. Give extra focus to the levels you know least and the ones you are addicted to. If you are, for example, a hyper-rational person who seldom undertakes any physical action, then give extra attention to the chapters on power and wisdom.

In the book the gender neutral personal and possessive pronouns they, them and theirs are used instead of he/she, him/her, his/hers. There are two reasons for this: On the one hand, this choice is made out of disagreement with the use of male pronouns general references, which render women invisible. For example, when referred to man, as in a human being, he is the standard. On the other hand, gender neutral pronouns are a better reflection of the polar world we live in. By using he and she the world is rigidly split in two. On the cosmic level this kind of dual division is absent. Everything is constantly moving and changing. The rock and the ocean together form the rocean. In that sense no one thing can ever be either the one or the other. The same goes for identities, which are always in process. You can read more about this in the power chapter under yin and yang.

If you want to go on working with leading yourself and others from the core, as an individual or as an organization, check out http://www.corepower.be/index.php for programs led by a recognized Corepower master teacher.

Have a beautiful life. Live it from your power, with an open heart and an open mind. Be home wherever you are, on earth and in the universe. Have a lot of fun living and reading.

Baud & Lien

In the book the gender neutral personal and possessive pronouns ‘they’, ‘them’ and ‘theirs’ are used instead of ‘he’/’she’, ‘him’/’her’ , ‘his’/’hers’

Inspiration

The most important sources of inspiration for Corepower is the Taoist way of living and the leadership model of Theme Centered Interaction (TCI). What follows is a brief explanation about the basic principles of each.

TCI

Theme Centered Interaction is a leadership model that is also known as Living Learning. It was developed by the Jewish therapist Ruth Cohn, based on her traumatic experiences during the Second World War and her work as a therapist.

In TCI, as in Corepower, your personality is your most important tool. Concretely, with TCI, you work through a specific theme with a group, which initiates a learning process.

Figure 1: the conceptual model of TCI

As will be made clear in the conceptual model (figure 1), a lot of attention goes to the I, WE, IT, GLOBE, and the interaction between them. In other words, the individual, the group and the context are equally important.

Philosophically, TCI is supported by three axioms or postulates about reality.

• The human being is

Reviews for Corepower, Leadership from your Core.

[Bibivoort · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

This book changed my life! Easy and powerfull exercises. Step by step I build my inner strength.
My relationship with my family is easier: I am better in putting boundaries and I am better at loving the ones who are important for me.
I especially liked the way Lien and Baud put their personal experience as an example. I felt I got to know them trough the book.

Bibi