Jennifer Cohen: Surviving to Thriving

Jen has steeped herself equally in the practical as well as the esoteric. A devoted student of Vippasana meditation from the Theravada Buddhist tradition as well as a student of psychic practice, Tantric healing, and a mystery school student, Jen has cultivated her heart and spirit as the primary source of her teaching. In her passion for understanding the design of life, she has dedicated herself to understanding systems thinking and theory, has studied the neurophysiology of trauma, as well as communication theory and the architecture of masterful conversations and she has been teaching the Strozzi method of embodied leadership for well over a decade.

She is the author of the chapter “From Surviving to Thriving” in the book Being Human at Work, edited by Richard Strozzi Heckler. She has a master’s degree in Applied Psychology with an emphasis on systems theory from the Antioch New England Graduate School, and she did her undergraduate work in philosophy at Oberlin and Barnard. She is married and has a daughter.

1. What is your passion or purpose you are being called to bring into action right now?

This is a unique and powerful moment in the history of human life. How we choose to live and work right now may, say some scientists and visionary thinkers, impact the course of life on earth for the next 1000 years. I am passionate about providing opportunities for us all to reveal and revel in a movement now afoot to restore, renew and rewire how humanity walks this earth, stewards the land, how we care for one another, and all of life itself.

At Seven Stones Leadership Group, our mission is to bring the promise and practices of exquisite sufficiency – an idea whose time has come – to the world through our coaching, consulting, speaking and learning materials. We believe that the context in which we are embedded could presently be described as a pingpong match between scarcity and abundance. This paradigm has given rise to an economic model that is unjust for the majority of humans and unsustainable for our ecosystems as well as a mental model that causes us to feel a chronic sense of inadequacy, spending billions to medicate our pain either with pills or products and denying our citizenship. If we re-shape the dream for our future and re-shape our consciousness then through the new practices that arise out of that dream, we can re-shape our social systems, our organizations, and our hearts.

2. What were the motivating factors or defining moments that inspired you to get involved and share your passion?

The moment that inspired this most recent expression of my passion was engaging with a group of leaders to investigate this paradigm of exquisite sufficiency, a concept first inserted into the collective consciousness by Buckminster Fuller and later popularized by Lynne Twist in her book The Soul of Money. This group has inspired three global summits exploring the relevance of sufficiency to the sustainability movement, to economics, and to the future of life on earth.

That said, when I look at my life as a whole I can see that what inspired me and motivated me was my personal experience of pain and trauma as a child. I was angry and hurt and looking for answers. And, as I found a way to work skillfully with my own suffering, as I found my own path of transformation I wanted to share it with others.

3. What is your mantra or favorite quote you refer to when you seek inspiration or hope and why?

“The quality of light by which we scrutinize our lives has direct bearing upon the product which we live, and upon the changes we hope to bring out through those lives. As we learn to bear the intimacy of scrutiny and to flourish within it, as we learn to use the products of that scrutiny for power within our living, those fears which rule our lives and form our silences begin to lose their control over us.” Audre Lorde

This quote and just about everything Audre Lorde said reminds me to have courage.

The thoughts becomes the word

The word becomes the deed

Deed becomes habit

Habit hardens into character.

So watch the thought and its way with care

And may it be born out of concern for all beings. —The Buddha

This quote reminds me that I am not my thoughts. I am not my patterns. It reminds me to let go of all unclear seeing of the truth.

3. Tell us about a moment recently when you were standing in your full power and purpose?

A moment: When I invited my parents into family therapy to heal that which seems impossible to heal. A moment; when I spoke at The Interdependence Project in NYC on Truth and trust and stood fully in myself

5. Why is the work you are doing so important for everyday women?

The work we are doing is important for anyone who wishes to stand in and speak truth. It’s time to re-call the radical truth that fear and scarcity obscure from our view: We are enough, we do enough, and we have enough right now, just as we are. We came to this earth already whole, already intact, already complete and full of life’s bounty.

What kind of world could we create if we already knew we were enough?

6. Why is it so important for women to participate in an event like the Passion into Action Conference?

Conferences like this one are a kind of soul food. People leave inspired, connected, networked and having drank from the well of our collective and individual greatness. In this time when people often feel alone or less interwoven than we might like, coming to a conference where women are gathered and clearly weaving connection reminds us of our social fabric. Its an opportunity to re-weave ourselves and go our strengthened into the world to offer our gifts.

7. What are you hoping will be the biggest take-aways for women both at the Passion into Action Conference and your workshop?

You will leave deeply understanding that the context we create and live in sources our thinking, our experience, our social systems, and our organizational models.

You will see clearly the scarcity excess trap we lie in and come into contact to your essence, your power, your own sacred enoughness to source your passion and your action in the world.

Having tapped into it, you will design some next steps to turn your passion into action.

You have everything you need and together we can create just about anything.

8. What is your message to women around the world?

This is our moment. Something profound to shifting and there is a re-ordering of energies happening, a re-ordering of power and of priorities. The world is reaching for your gifts. Be willing to offer yourself fully to the world while you are here, not because anything needs saving, but because everything needs your love and your fullest expression.