We Have a Job to Do

Editor’s note: The opening speech by Karen and Henry Kimsey-House at the Co-active Summit centered around the statement that ‘we have a job to do.’ Below are back and forth “riffs”—as Henry calls them—that formed the core of Karen and Henry’s call-to-action to the Co-active community.

Photo by Okokon Udo.

We have a job to do:

HKH
…and it’s about transformation. We can no longer stand by and hope that people become more conscious and evolve. We have to evoke transformation. We have to see the butterfly in every caterpillar. The nature of life is to transform and evolve and this is a messy, chaotic and often confusing process.

KKH
…and it’s about believing. Believing in the capacity of the human spirit to transcend the mess and navigate through the chaos into the next transformation.

HKH
…and it’s about evolving human consciousness. We humans are in the midst of an evolutionary leap and the foot is coming down on the other side of that leap and we have a job to do and it’s to be ready for what’s next. We need to be ready in ourselves and we need to be ready as coaches and leaders to guide, cajole, teach, coach, lead, and point the way to our fellow humans who are landing on the other side with us. We have to be flexible and clear as we step into this mystery, this new paradigm of existence. We need to be ready to both open up our own consciousness and to work with others to open up theirs.

KKH
…and it’s about participation, about helping people understand that the unfolding story of our world is co-created and we each have a part to play. We matter. We don’t need to have the answers. We need to know that together, we can find the way and together we can create possibilities that are not available when we stand alone. Our job is to engage fully 100%, to nourish and affirm life in each and every moment. We have to dance with our whole hearts in THIS moment and the next and the next.

Photo by Okokon Udo.

We have a job to do:

HKH
It is right behind the eyes of the person sitting next to you or the checker at the grocery store or the waitress at your table or the CEO of the company next door and that’s to make sure the lights are on and somebody is home. We have to find the dimmer switches in our fellow humans and support them in turning their lights on. We need to find the sparkle of aliveness in all of the eyes around us and use the gifts that we have developed in ourselves to brightening the consciousness of all of our species.

KKH
It’s about supporting people in breaking free from convention, from business as usual, from The Way It Is. We must help people find the courage and heart to stand firmly for what is real and true and be bold enough to live from the inside out rather than the outside in. Work is sacred. Work has to become a place where we come together to create something meaningful rather than a place where we put our authentic self in the closet just to survive. Our work places must become opportunities to engage, to fully express and share our creativity and our talents. We must work to help businesses understand that people truly are their greatest resource and that whatever we do, we do in relationship with each other.

HKH
It’s about passion, purpose and paradox. We have to courageously insist on people leading passion filled lives on purpose—while at the same time allowing people to find their own way to these lives. We have to live in the paradox of push and pull, stay and go, be and do, co and active. We have stand firmly for life affirming purpose and action and not allow ourselves to be stopped or stalled by life-diminishing beliefs or attitudes.

KKH
It is about preparing the ground for our future. We must teach others how to listen deeply, not to the words but to the message, the cry, the yearning, underneath. We need to ensure that education means more than memorization, We need to ensure that success is measured by what one has contributed to the world rather than by what one has taken away. And we need to ensure that dialog and disagreement are INVITED, CELEBRATED, EMBRACED in a way that brings us together as opposed to dividing us.

Photo by Okokon Udo.

HKH
We have a job to do in spreading the wonderful paradox of the Co-Active way. The way of “Co”, relationship, connection, intimacy, love, and the divine feminine expressed in its fullness and totality while at the same time expressing “Active” which is all about strength, power, action, making things real and the divine masculine. We can’t pick sides. We have a job to do to heal the “Co” and the “Active” in each and every one of us and to find the love and power in all of us and to be able to express and operate from both at 100% simultaneously.

KKH
We have a job to do and it’s about creating a world that works for everyone. We belong to each other and we live together in this home we call Earth. We must learn to honor our individuality and celebrate our shared human experience while at the same time affirming in each moment that we are one with all of life.