It’s our first post from our intrepid ‘on-the-ground-citizen-journalist’ Amy Leighton.  Amy is attending the Association of Change Management Professionals (ACMP) regional conference and reporting back on sessions that she found valuable. This one is the Seven Lessons from Yoga in Managing Change with Rosalind Tyburski. 

Amy shares…

I admit I am a novice yogi; I’ve only taken a few classes over the years to pursue some added zen. In today’s session – the question was posed: What does yoga have to do with Change management?

As it turns out, there is quite a synergy! In yoga, like managing change, resistance is often the biggest obstacle to overcome. The roots of resistance come from those patterns of behaviour that people discover about themselves when they gain self-awareness. When we can help people become more conscious, perhaps we can help them navigate change for themselves! 

There are seven areas where we can find excellent learning through yoga; here’s a summary of where change practitioners can take a yogi approach to guide the right mindset:

1. Embrace the beauty of impermanence. With change comes growth.

2. Sitting with uncertainty; help people find a place to relax. It may not always seem obvious, but it’s there!

3. Access intuition; after all, no one argues with their data. Ask them what they believe are their losses and gains.

4. Reframe the change; instead of focusing on a negative instead, ask them to define what the path to growth looks like for them. 

5. Setting intentions is powerful – by setting an intention, you give your brain permission for it to happen.

6. Steadiness and ease: exploring opposites can bring us into balance. We can do the complex and challenging if we know there will be a celebration after settling in.

7. There is freedom in letting go; when we let go of expectations, judgement, attachment to outcome and what we know, we open ourselves up to new opportunities.

The final thought and my favourite of this session is to focus on actions instead of outcomes; It is very much our agile mindset coming into play!