Continuing to dig through my journals, today I found an early understanding I came to about personal engagement. Last fall I was brainstorming what would become Heartspace and the Principle of Engagement, when I drew the following graphic.

My life and study have shown me that personal engagement is the great motivator of all other engagement in our lives. When we are strongly and sustainably connected within ourselves we are capable of being strongly and sustainably connected outside of ourselves. There are some people who live this way naturally; many of us do not.

There is no obligation to be engaged outside of ourselves. There is, however, a directly proportionate rate of personal-to-external engagement in our lives. Because of that, in my graphic I wrote, “Personal engagement allows, capacititates, and necessitates all other forms of engagement.” This means that community, cultural, social, spiritual, and educational engagement rely on personal engagement.

Further still, I have learned that personal engagement makes all other forms of engagement richer. We are incapable of becoming as richly engaged in something as we could be without becoming engaged within ourselves.

Personal engagement is a force to be reckoned with! What do you think?