1. Awakened Leadership: A Mindful Roadmap for Perpetual Design Thinking

In this chapter, we present awakened leaders as future-focused individuals who lead from the heart, and with great consideration for the well-being of as many stakeholders as possible. Awakened leaders have experienced their share of mistakes in life but learned from them. They developed a solid value system based on their reflections. They are corporate, community, and household leaders who refuse to put on different hats when it comes to their personality. Awakened leaders practice a holistic and authentic approach in every environment and at every time. While it becomes easier with time to practice awakened leadership, there are easy and difficult sides to this style. Some of the easy elements are authenticity, real freedom, yielding, values, and focus. Some of the difficult issues surrounding awakened leadership are pressure and politics, uncooperativeness and standards, ego management, remaining authentic, and inner-connection. In spite of the challenges, awakened leaders can be found in every segment of society and in every circumstance. Leaders who choose to become awakened will find themselves more in balance with everything around them. They learn to turn inward for solutions, because they know that this is where the answers lie.