Authenticity/Integrity

“To thine own self be true,” the Master Playwright said. This is the essence of authenticity and integrity, of conscious living. Staying true to yourself, to who you are, and allowing the outer to meet the inner, to be harmonious with one another, places you in a state of integrity and authenticity. When word and deed are one, you are in integrity. Authenticity has an energy all its own, an energy that attracts. Authenticity frees up others to be honest. When they see that you are real, they can be real. When you are authentic, you are one with yourself. Being one with yourself means you are one with the world. Being one with the world brings you peace.

Being of Service/Joy

“This is the true joy in life,” the great playwright George Bernard Shaw said: “the being used by a purpose recognized by yourself as a mighty one.” When you dedicate your life to serving others, you discover that you gain a life worth living. Committed to the spirit of humanity, you are no longer a small self, an ego, confined within your own body and mind. Instead, you belong to the universe, to the collective community, and can serve as a channel for its healing and salvation. Service brings joy.

Communication/Listening

Without communication, nothing works. There is a hidden secret in communication: it lives in the listening, not in the speaking. What gets communicated is what is “listened,” not what is spoken. The next hidden secret is that we usually don’t listen. Instead, we judge, fix, get bored, and leave, focusing on our own agenda or something that has been triggered. None of that is listening. Listening is rare. However, we can learn to listen. When we listen deeply, simply by being fully present with another person, the world opens up. It’s as if a new dawn is born. Our hearts open. When we listen with heart, we heal. By listening with our hearts, we create. Through listening with our hearts, we love. We see each other as God.

Forgiveness/Compassion

“Forgiveness is the key to happiness,” I heard once and found it to be true. It is also the key to restoring trust, the key to freedom, the key to peace. A true letting go of anger, and the desire for revenge, forgiveness frees us up. Forgiveness does not mean condoning, and it has nothing to do with deserving. The Buddha compared the lack of forgiveness to a lump of hot coal you are holding in the palm of your hand, intending to throw at someone. But it’s glued to your hand, and who gets harmed without forgiveness is you. It’s like drinking toxic pain. When you forgive yourself, you are free. When you forgive another, you are free. What grows out of the seeds of forgiveness is the plant of compassion, the beauty of empathy, and even love.

Development/Connection with Source/The Evolution of our Consciousness

Our purpose on this planet is to awaken, to discover the joy of being, to allow spirit to flow through us, and to realize that we are not merely our reactive minds; rather, we can exist in a state of unity and consciousness. Awareness, which enables us to disidentify from our reactive minds, is the key to discovery. Life, our partner in development, offers us the experiences we require and the journeys we need to undertake to support this evolution in our being. Ganesh, the Hindu god, is highly revered in India. Ganesh presents us with the obstacles we need to navigate in order to evolve our consciousness. When we commit ourselves to our development, we also commit ourselves to the wakefulness of the planet as a whole. As our own light shines, we make that light available to others.

Valuing the Uniqueness and Purpose of Each and Every

Each person is unique. “To be born is to be chosen,” says John O’Donohue. There is no other you on this planet. You were born with your own gifts, flaws, karma, destiny, and purpose. Your purpose is often hidden and revealed slowly over time. Our work is to discover that purpose and then live it, express it into the world, in whatever ways are ours to be and do, embrace our uniqueness, giving it as a gift to others.

Community/The Sangha

In Community, we laugh, we cry, we hold, we love. We are bigger than ourselves. The community shapes who and what we can be and are for each other and for the planet. Like a forest whose trees grow deep roots, we touch each other, hold each other, buoy each other up, and sing together as one voice. Separation and Dualism, the mother of all lies, disappear into oneness. In Community, we find the Spirit of Belonging.

Intimacy/Vulnerability

The opposite of arrogance, vulnerability lives at the heart of a great leader. To be vulnerable is to be real, to know that it is not our perfection through which we gain trust and a sense of belonging but our whole selves, including our imperfections, our flaws, and our wounds. They all serve. Like intimacy, vulnerability instills trust. Intimacy, the twin of vulnerability, is where true salvation lies. In intimacy lives honesty, authenticity, the experience of profound connection, of being one with, of knowing that we are interconnected – not only that “your story is my story is our story,” as the Irish say, but that, indeed, we are love.

Self-Care/Well-Being

While many people think of self-care as selfish, it is actually quite the opposite. It is a gift we give to ourselves and to others. A commitment to self-care demonstrates deep respect and honor for oneself, an inner “knowing” that unless we pay attention to our inner life, our soulful life, we cannot be truly responsible for our outer one. Self-care can arise from a wide range of practices and actions. From nature walks and rests or Sabbaths during the day to releasing “chi” energy through Qi Gong or other exercises, as well as eating food like medicine, engaging in singing or dancing, and maintaining a daily morning practice. From reading books that awaken the mind and heart to taking classes that uplift our spirit and expand our consciousness. Self-care can also involve journaling, sitting in stillness until the Muse arrives, allowing the Inner Guide to speak and show us the way. Self-care enables us to share our light and gifts with others and helps us attune and listen to our own Wisdom. From this place, we can engage with the world with centeredness, spirit, joy, and a clear, awakened heart.

The nature of my work

I love working with people, in profound interactions, breathing life into their making a connection with their own wisdom, power, and beauty.

I “found that calling,” and my passion, many years ago. For over forty years, I have been a teacher, coach, guide, and poet, for people and businesses. The kind of coaching I do is transformational. I do not give tips or techniques. Rather, I work with people in behalf of their stepping into new territory in communication and accomplishment, forwarding them in connecting deeply with their own wisdom, beauty, creativity, power, sense of belonging, and ability to lead, serve, and contribute to others. Primarily through interactive coaching conversations, in courses and in one-on-one coaching sessions, I open territory for people to live an alive, awakened, conscious, loving, mindful, fulfilled life.

As a devoted adventurer of both inner and outer travels, a pioneer and pilgrim dedicated to personal development, to making a difference in the lives of human beings, I am committed to stepping ever more powerfully beyond what is familiar and safe, and have been a dedicated student of personal and professional development since the early 1970’s. Working with leaders of organizations, entrepreneurs, managers, and people in and out of organizations who are committed to their own growth and development, I have been designing and leading deep dives into authenticity, courage, integrity, forgiveness, committing, communication, collaboration, accomplishment, and community since that time.

My educational background

After receiving my BA from the University of California at Berkeley as a Phi Beta Kappa, majoring in English, minoring in Music, I earned my Secondary Teaching Credential and my Master’s Degree in Music Education. In 1968, I began my career teaching high school English, and, stepping forward “outside the box,” I received an Award for innovative development from the California Teachers Association, and later completed a short and potent Mastery of Management Program at Darden College.

In my late twenties, I began a serious entrance into the world of transformational, personal and professional development, engaging in teachings through many transformational paths throughout the years. My primary expertise and training lies in Communication, and, particularly, Listening, and Listening through the heart, as a source of power and workability for transforming lives of individuals and organizations.

Business and personal history

As the founder of Gale Leadership Development LLC, and prior to that, Gale Consulting Group, I am profoundly devoted to the awakening of awareness, consciousness, spirit, joy, and passion in human beings. Through the work that I offer, people, and their businesses and organizations, create cultures based in partnership, mutuality, workability, and in communication that works, and within which people flourish.

I am dedicated to opening a space for people to take a powerful inward journey, touching into their authentic selves, coming into their Awareness, Wakefulness, Joy, and Aliveness. As they grow and touch ever more deeply the depths of their own Being, connect with the principles and power of communication, particularly listening, generate their connectedness with others, they open new territory for collaborative accomplishment. From individual transformation, the culture of the organization shifts to being one in which people are nourished and breakthrough accomplishments flourish.

I have been writing poetry throughout my life, and weave many of the themes of my poetry and the poetry itself through my interactive transformational work with people. I am thrilled that I have recently published my first gold award-winning book, a book of poetry, photography, and teaching/reflective questions, called Crossing Thresholds, Island Reflections. Crossing Thresholds empowers readers to make their own transformational journey through awakening their inner guide, immersing themselves in reflective journaling, getting deeply in touch with nature, connecting with their spirit, experiencing the grief of loss, accepting impermanence, embracing endings, starting new beginnings, and being a perceiver of wonder. 

I live on beautiful Bainbridge Island, in the Pacific Northwest, an island across from Seattle. We built our own home on land near the water, and I feel like I live in a national park!  As I am passionate about connecting with the natural world, the move here with my husband in 1990 from California has been a fulfillment of a deep longing.  I live with my husband, Don, who plays banjo and pedal steel guitar and is a consummate musician and singer/songwriter. Our daughter, who is a brilliant artist and passionate about life, lives in Kirkland, Washington.

When I am not designing work, writing poetry, or leading work, diving into developmental courses myself, you can find me joyfully watching Mariner’s baseball with my husband, hanging out with my daughter, or traveling around the world.

Creativity envelops us, nature surrounds us, joy comes from within us.

In behalf of your connecting with my work,
I am including two interviews.