We won't get through this if we keep resisting the 'inner-led' change
I was in my early 30s. For all kinds of reasons, my marriage was falling apart. I had no idea what to do next in a complex crisis at work where I was the person in charge and therefore, I needed solutions!
I remember feeling like I was trying to walk up a very steep hill backwards all of the time.
A wise mentor, for whom I will always be grateful suggested I adopt a simple practice. Each morning when I got to work, I would light a candle (no one else was there + please do not tell the fire safety people!), take a notepad and write down all the things that were bothering me that I had no idea what to do about. Morning Pages if you will.
When I was done and there were no more words of frustration or confusion, I would take a deep breath. Close my eyes and notice, that I still had my breath, I still had my life force and, whilst I perhaps still had no idea what was next, I could do this.
Then I would blow out the candle and get on with my day!
That simple ritual I created proved to me that I could do difficult things. That I could find resilience and strength within me, no matter what the world threw at me.
Sometimes, in the process of writing I would think of a new solution or idea, but often the simple practice of getting what I was thinking ‘out of me’ on the page, shifted something.
I kept to it in that format for some months. And though the daily practice has long faded now, I still have it in my toolkit for the difficult days. I still know I can get it out when everything feels too much.
It was in that period, which was one of the hardest period of my life, that I think I really learnt that change is possible. Not the kind of change we write about in donor proposals with sweeping claims of widespread transformation. But the incremental kind. that makes all the difference.
Because through that simple practice of writing each morning, my frustration became hope and the belief that things could be different. And that affected how I showed up to other conversations, to my relationship and to my work.
And things are different in my life now. Very different.
These are difficult times for many in the sectors I work in. It's not just Trump's executive orders slashing funding. But all the dilemmas and crises that they are being lain on top of.
Our neat projects promising radical change in 36 months do not equip us, in anyway, for these times.
Healing Solidarity as an idea, is both about challenging us to transform ‘International Development’ and about how we support and equip ourselves the be part of that change.
Part of that for me was been a commitment to talk about the crucial role of inner work and culture change in shifting the way we do our work. The way in which this can support the ‘outer-work’ is described by Starter Culture well in this report in to ‘inner-led’ change that combines the inner work with all the other ‘outer’ things we are more used to doing.
As they say,
‘We framed the term inner-led change as a long-overdue reuniting of ‘outer’ change work (which recognises and challenges harmful societal structures and tries to create alternatives) with ‘inner’ change work (which supports us; to explore our own entanglement in a culture that perpetuates these harmful societal structures; to cultivate healthier relationships with ourselves, each other and other-than-humans; and to co-create the healthy, relational and just cultures our hearts long for - and which our current social and ecological collapse demands). Crucially, inner-led change goes well beyond personal wellbeing and western psychology to include dimensions that are richly relational, interpersonal, fractal, social, cultural, mythic, political, spiritual, soulful and other-than-human.’
By and large I have found that people listen a bit to these ideas, maybe get a bit interested and then, often, go back to doing things in the same old ways!
I get it. It feels like everything is on fire. And, in many ways and from many perspectives, it is.
And the way we do things is hard to change. Culture eats strategy for breakfast, as they say. And reflecting on questions like how we participate in harmful systems and how we show up in relationships is challenging.
It can be more comfortable, I think, to launch another strategic planning process, than to do the work of changing a way you behave or a thing that you do, whether individually or collectively.
And even the simple practice of writing and breathing - that took effort - precisely because it was different the previous habit I had of arriving at work and launching in to my tasks for the day.
Like any habit, I had to re train myself, forgot sometimes in the process and I had to learn to keep going imperfectly.
I think at least one reason inner work doesn't feel like it is embraced in workplaces in our current work cultures is that for most people I think it doesn’t really feel like 'work'.
Work is what we do when we write a plan or a strategy, when we lead a meeting, when we make a decision. It is, in our minds, action orientated.
Moving through our own resistance and building our own resilience through doing the often uncomfortable work of reflection - that is something we will do one day when we have finished our never ending to do list! A good idea but no time for it now.
And the day with time for it, often never comes.
But when things are hard, when it feels impossible, that’s exactly when taking the time and space to reflect, to shift your own practices, to dream together how things can be different can not just really help, but may even be the most effective thing you can contribute right now to more widespread transformation.
We have to hold the paradox that sometimes, changing things seems insurmountable and impossible. And, at the same time, we can all change how we play our small part.
One way to create a commitment to more time and space for reflection is to join an Action Learning set with me, as these former members explain.
I have an Action Learning set for a group of people leading change in INGOs, meeting virtually that starts February 20th.
If you want to find out more or sign up you can contact me via maryann@maryannclements.com.
When everything feels overwhelming, we often look outward for solutions - new strategies, plans, actions. But real, lasting change often starts within.
This piece by Mary Ann is a reflection that highlights the power of small, intentional practices to build resilience and shift perspectives. Inner work is not a distraction from transformation; it’s a foundation for it. Yet, in fast-paced work cultures, reflection is often sidelined as non-essential.
But what if taking that time is the most impactful thing we can do? True change happens not just through external actions but through rethinking how we show up, engage, and create space for new ways of working. What small shift might we make today?