In this thought-provoking and imaginative allegory, join a fictional hero for an all-too-real journey through the shadow side of leadership and its many challenges. Our hero faces the distortions and personal dilemmas that accompany his leadership role, seeing five ways that leaders fail and two ways they abuse their power. In the process, he learns seven lessons that will make him a great and principled leader for these very challenging times. The world is evolving and the values and capabilities of leaders must keep pace with and even help shape that evolution. While the virtues of good leaders may be similar through the ages, the consequences of abuse and misuse are amplified in our highly networked, complex, and uncertain times. What does it mean to be a leader with formal power today? The age of command-and-control authoritarianism is fast slipping away, but our need for competent, courageous, and principled leadership is, if anything, even more critical. Jim Kouzes, coauthor of the bestselling The Leadership Challenge and Executive Fellow of Leadership at the Leavey School of Leadership, Santa Clara University, asserts, "The Shadow Side of Power is just plain great storytelling-the kind that draws you in, stirs your passions, sustains your interest, teaches meaningful lessons, and leaves you both gratified and wanting more.... Before you embark on your next leadership adventure, take a guided tour through the allegorical world of the Leadership Inferno. You'll be better prepared for your other challenges once you have." This book is for you if you: * Are or want to be in a formal leadership role - whether of a small team or a large organization or nation. * Want to be a good - even a great -- leader who is respected by those you lead: leveraging for impact, learning, and leaving a legacy. * Are willing to face into the shadow side of power - the temptations and misperceptions that inevitably attach to authority roles and that may expose both your strengths and your least desirable qualities. * Are a coach or educator who develops people for formal leadership roles As a reader, you will be energized to meet the challenges of leadership as a choice and a responsibility-more than simply a title or an opportunity to make more money. For four decades, Pat McLagan has worked with business and government sectors to develop leaders and to transform leadership systems. In The Shadow Side of Power, Pat draws on in-depth experience as well as ongoing research into institutional, leadership, and personal transformation and effectiveness. She knows firsthand the immense energy and promise that come along with formal power, for she has seen leaders face, struggle with, succumb to, be corrupted by, and grow from the dilemmas and opportunities of their roles.

The author offers exploration of self and practical guidance dealing with the dark side of personality based on Jung's concept of "shadow," or the forbidden and unacceptable feelings and behaviors each of us experience.

In this groundbreaking exploration, three New York Times bestselling authors—Debbie Ford (The Dark Side of the Light Chasers, Why Good People Do Bad Things), Marianne Williamson (The Age of Miracles, A Return to Love), and Deepak Chopra (Jesus: A Story of Enlightenment)—deliver a comprehensive and practical guide to harnessing the power of our dark side.

The bestselling, beloved classic on how to go into the dark side of yourself to bring out the light -- now with new material. Debbie Ford believes that we each hold within us a trace of every human characteristic that exists, the capacity for every human emotion. We are born with the ability to express this entire spectrum of characteristics. But, Ford points out, our families and our society send us strong messages about which ones are good and bad. So when certain impulses arise, we deny them instead of confronting them, giving them a healthy voice, then letting them go. It is to these feelings that Ford turns our attention, these parts of our selves that don't fit the personae we have created for the rest of the world. She shows us the effects of living in the dark, of keeping all our supposedly unsavory impulses under wraps. We find ourselves disproportionately frustrated and angry at the selfishness of friends, the laziness of colleagues, the arrogance of siblings. When we are unable to reconcile similar impulses in ourselves, Ford explains, we waste our own energy judging others instead of empathizing. But most important, we deny ourselves the power and freedom of living authentically. Through the stories and exercises in The Dark Side of the Light Chasers, Debbie Ford shows us not only how to recognize our hidden emotions, but also how to find the gifts they offer us. This is for fans of Marianne Williamson, Neale Donald Walsch, and Deepak Chopra. The very impulses we most fear may be the key to what is lacking in our lives.

Understand the dark side of your psyche—a Jungian approach to transformative self-acceptance. We all have shadows—the unlit part of our ego that is hidden and never goes away, but merely—and often painfully—turns up in unexpected places. This powerful work from the acclaimed Jungian analyst and bestselling author of Inner Work and We explores our need to “own” our own shadow: learn what it is, how it originates, and how it impacts our daily lives. It is only when we accept and honor the shadow within us that we can channel its energy in a positive way and find balance.

What story would Eve have told about picking the apple? Why is Pandora blamed for opening the box? And what about the fate of Cassandra who was blessed with knowing the future but cursed so that no one believed her? What if women had been the storytellers? Elizabeth Lesser believes that if women’s voices had been equally heard and respected throughout history, humankind would have followed different hero myths and guiding stories—stories that value caretaking, champion compassion, and elevate communication over vengeance and violence. Cassandra Speaks is about the stories we tell and how those stories become the culture. It’s about the stories we still blindly cling to, and the ones that cling to us: the origin tales, the guiding myths, the religious parables, the literature and films and fairy tales passed down through the centuries about women and men, power and war, sex and love, and the values we live by. Stories written mostly by men with lessons and laws for all of humanity. We have outgrown so many of them, and still they endure. This book is about what happens when women are the storytellers too—when we speak from our authentic voices, when we flex our values, when we become protagonists in the tales we tell about what it means to be human. Lesser has walked two main paths in her life—the spiritual path and the feminist one—paths that sometimes cross but sometimes feel at cross-purposes. Cassandra Speaks is her extraordinary merging of the two. The bestselling author of Broken Open and Marrow, Lesser is a beloved spiritual writer, as well as a leading feminist thinker. In this book she gives equal voice to the cool water of her meditative self and the fire of her feminist self. With her trademark gifts of both humor and insight, she offers a vision that transcends the either/or ideologies on both sides of the gender debate. Brilliantly structured into three distinct parts, Part One explores how history is carried forward through the stories a culture tells and values, and what we can do to balance the scales. Part Two looks at women and power and expands what it means to be courageous, daring, and strong. And Part Three offers “A Toolbox for Inner Strength.” Lesser argues that change in the culture starts with inner change, and that no one—woman or man—is immune to the corrupting influence of power. She provides inner tools to help us be both strong-willed and kind-hearted. Cassandra Speaks is a beautifully balanced synthesis of storytelling, memoir, and cultural observation. Women, men and all people will find themselves in the pages of this book, and will come away strengthened, opened, and ready to work together to create a better world for all people.

Beneath the social mask we wear every day, we have a hidden shadow side: an impulsive, wounded, sad, or isolated part that we generally try to ignore, but which can erupt in hurtful ways. As therapists Connie Zweig and Steve Wolf show in this landmark book, the shadow can actually be a source of emotional richness and vitality, and acknowledging it can be a pathway to healing and an authentic life. "Romancing the shadow"--meeting your dark side, beginning to understand its unconscious messages, and learning to use its powerful energies in productive ways--is the challenging and exciting soul work that Zweig and Wolf offer in this practical, rewarding guide. Drawing on the timeless teachings of Carl Jung and compelling stories from their clinical practices, Zweig and Wolf reveal how the shadow guides your choices in love, sex, marriage, friendship, work, and family life. With their innovative method, you can uncover the unique patterns and purpose of your shadow and learn to defuse negative emotions; reclaim forbidden or lost feelings; achieve greater self-acceptance; heal betrayal; reimagine and re-create relationships; cultivate compassion for others; renew creative expressions; and find purpose in your suffering. The shadow knows why good people sometimes do bad things. Romancing the shadow and learning to read the messages it encodes in daily life can deepen your consciousness, imagination, and soul.