Sisu Lab

In the spirit of the season, here's a true gift from Aalto University in Finland in the form of an introduction to a framework called systems intelligence (SI). While the name might feel a even a bit cerebral, this work has deeply changed my personal overlook on life and relationships some ten years ago. It's also the practice to which I root my sisu to raise it from only a quality of surviving hardship to an expression of leadership with a hope of creating something of higher good around us.

SI was originally developed by professor Raimo Hämäläinen and professor emeritus Esa Saarinen at Aalto University. They highlight that SI is a key competence we all possess as humans. It begins with "thinking about our thinking," as Saarinen puts it, to understand what actually drives our habits, patterns and actions. SI is about better thinking - not only about thinking or thinking more (that's why it is an update to systems thinking). Thinking about our thinking takes us to 'the source' of our action to illuminate a path toward better actions and when we place this understanding within a system, it becomes a dynamic inquiry towards excellence with regards to everything we connect with - within and outside.

Below are four points from Hämäläinen ja Saarinen (2007, p. 59-60) that I mention in the episode (I've added a question to each point to use for self-reflection) & further reading.

With this... thank you for your support in 2023 and may we both have a steady, strong year of sisu of the heart and love deep in the bones ahead!

***

1.     Acknowledging that one’s action and behaviour is the result of one’s thinking. (“What constitutes my mental models, beliefs, assumptions, and interpretations?”)

2.     Acknowledging that one’s thinking is likely to be one-sided and a far cry from an accurate grasp of the bigger picture; the holistic system around self is likely to be reflected in one’s thinking only partially and possibly in a distorted form. (“How well do I know what I don’t know?”)

3.     To act more intelligently in systemic environments, one must engage in meta-level thinking regarding their thinking. (“How do I use my thinking?”)

4.     One’s framing of the environment and its interconnected systems is likely to reflect their subjective assumptions. Reflection on how I frame and look at things is an intelligent path to life in systems. (“How do my beliefs guide my thinking?”)

Further material: 

Systems Intelligence Research Group, Aalto University
http://systemsintelligence.aalto.fi/

Systems intelligence: A key competence in human action and organizational life. Hämäläinen, R. P. & Saarinen, E. (2007). https://www.researchgate.net/publication/240789681_Systems_Intelligence_A_Key_Competence_in_Human_Action_and_Organizational_Life

Perceived systems intelligence and performance in organizations, J. Törmänen, R.P. Hämäläinen and E. Saarinen (2021), https://www.emerald.com/insight/content/doi/10.1108/TLO-04-2021-0045/full/html

Being Better Better - Living with Systems Intelligence (2014) https://sal.aalto.fi/publications/pdf-files/being_better_better_living_with_systems_intelligence.pdf

Sisu as Guts, Grace, and Gentleness - A Way of Life, Growth, and Being in Times of Adversity (2022). https://aaltodoc.aalto.fi/items/7f

Sisu is a reserve of inner strength but it's also a way for us to know ourselves and impact the world in a positive way. Cultivating these reserves of inner strength starts with self-care and continues through self-inquiry. its power then extends to the world through our inspired acts of deep courage and compassion.

Thanks for tuning in! You can find out more about sisu, find links to research, and check out Gentle Power: A Revolution in How We Think, Lead, and Succeed Using the Finnish Art of Sisu at www.sisulab.com.

Sisu is great, love is greatness.

By now researchers have made wonderful strides in mapping the mental and physiological side of human capacity. We understand how muscles grow and endure, how fatigue plays into our vitality, and we also have a plethora of concepts (such as resilience, perseverance, mental toughness, grit and so on) to help us describe the curious landscape of what makes humans endure. What we know less about is the life energy behind this enduring and persevering that becomes visible usually only when we are about to run out of it.... join me for an episode of sisu lab in which I share some words and concepts around the elusive topic of human spirit... elan vital, Wille zum Leben, qi, chi and so on...

Show notes

The Energies of Men William James, The Philosophical Review, Vol. 16, No. 1 (Jan., 1907), pp. 1-20 https://www.jstor.org/stable/2177575

The Energies of Men William James (1914)
https://ia802608.us.archive.org/18/items/energiesofmen00jameiala/energiesofmen00jameiala.pdf

Embodied fortitude: An introduction to the Finnish construct of sisu Authors E E Lahti (2019) https://internationaljournalofwellbeing.org/index.php/ijow/article/view/672

A Wife’s Letter Rabindranath Tagore (1914, Translated from Bengali by Prasenjit Gupta) https://parabaas.com/translation/database/translations/stories/gStreerPatra1.html

Twin Tracks: The Autobiography by Roger Banniste
https://www.amazon.com/Twin-Tracks-Autobiography-Roger-Bannister/dp/184954686X

Työstä ja elinvoima by Prof Eero Riikonen (2013)
http://www.psykologia.fi/arkisto/vanhat-numerot/vanhat-numerot-ghost/283-psykologia-2014-04/kirjat/339-tyosta-elinvoimaa

Sisu is a reserve of inner strength but it's also a way for us to know ourselves and impact the world in a positive way. Cultivating these reserves of inner strength starts with self-care and continues through self-inquiry. its power then extends to the world through our inspired acts of deep courage and compassion.

Thanks for tuning in! You can find out more about sisu, find links to research, and check out Gentle Power: A Revolution in How We Think, Lead, and Succeed Using the Finnish Art of Sisu at www.sisulab.com.

Sisu is great, love is greatness.

Sisu speaks of the extra reserves within individuals everywhere to endure challenges and take action against slim odds. However, while sisu denotes extraordinary power to overcome the extraordinary and do the extraordinary, it can also end up creating extraordinary problems. This would most likely happen with mindless sisu that is out of balance, is done at all cost, and happens usually when we are out of touch with our blind spots.

The possible negative outcomes of unbalanced or hard sisu include harm to our mental wellbeing and physical health, as well as to other people and team success. On today's episode, musings on constructive vs unconstructive sisu and an exercise at the end (for the truly brave) to gain understanding of your own sisu and what's its overall impact to people around you.

Stay strong and love even bigger!

Show notes

World Happiness Report
https://worldhappiness.report/ed/2023/

Tim Lomas and cross-cultural research on the determinants of wellbeing
https://www.drtimlomas.com/blank-s59cw

Amy Edmondson's research and trainings on psychological safety
https://amycedmondson.com/psychological-safety/

Harvard Business Review: What Is Psychological Safety? by Amy Gallo
https://hbr.org/2023/02/what-is-psychological-safety

E. Elisabet Lahti: Embodied Fortitude: An Introduction to the Finnish Construct of Sisu at International Journal of Wellbeing 
https://internationaljournalofwellbeing.org/index.php/ijow/article/view/672

Sisu is a reserve of inner strength but it's also a way for us to know ourselves and impact the world in a positive way. Cultivating these reserves of inner strength starts with self-care and continues through self-inquiry. its power then extends to the world through our inspired acts of deep courage and compassion.

Thanks for tuning in! You can find out more about sisu, find links to research, and check out Gentle Power: A Revolution in How We Think, Lead, and Succeed Using the Finnish Art of Sisu at www.sisulab.com.

Sisu is great, love is greatness.

Welcome to a new episode in which we muse on how to deal with life's headwinds - and how to do it with less damage and more grace. Take aways from ultra running that apply to everyday life (thanks, fellow adventurer & runner Annastiina Hintsa) and a note on deep-seated humility, as well as making our awareness and body our allies in the process.

For this episode, finally after years of procrastination (not as bad as the Ironman which took 16 years to conquer) I learned to do sound editing and created a start tune. Please listen and give feedback on anything - sound levels, user friendliness, and so on, as this is a  "home-baked" passion project. Tune selected out of numerous is licensed from lovely Dutch composer Evert Zeevalkink, aka, The North (on Spotify), and is called Stand my Ground.

Until next time... may we both sisu and smiles galore <3

Show notes:

Resources on sisu at sisulab. Direct link to podcasts and research: https://www.sisulab.com/blog

Harvard Health: Basic intro to understanding stress response: https://www.health.harvard.edu/staying-healthy/understanding-the-stress-response

Sisu is a reserve of inner strength but it's also a way for us to know ourselves and impact the world in a positive way. Cultivating these reserves of inner strength starts with self-care and continues through self-inquiry. its power then extends to the world through our inspired acts of deep courage and compassion.

Thanks for tuning in! You can find out more about sisu, find links to research, and check out Gentle Power: A Revolution in How We Think, Lead, and Succeed Using the Finnish Art of Sisu at www.sisulab.com.

Sisu is great, love is greatness.

Dear sisu pilgrim, I hope you are well and held by all the courage ands compassion that makes up your unique you. This episode is a slowing down to feel into...grief; a recognition of that something gentle and sometimes heavy within us, buried deep into the cellular wombs of our experiences and too often bypassed by constant doing and going. I share some of my favourite poems and introduce the concept of "edge emotions" by Drs. Kaisu Mälkki and Larry Green.

For those in the woods right now: love is the medicine and sisu is your companion. Keep on going.

“…let happy memories sustain you if your strength fails you, they are always there, and their current does not run backwards, even across foggy country it floats toward the future.” Selected Letters of Rainer Maria Rilke

Notes:

C. S. Lewis: A Grief Observed
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Grief_Observed

Joseph Campbell and the Power of Myth | Ep. 1: 'The Hero’s Adventure' (a highest recommendation for the entire interview series)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pE8ciMkayVM

Jean-Luc Marion: Being Given - Toward a Phenomenology of Givenness
https://www.sup.org/books/title/?id=907

The Impact of Grief on Humans at Work with George Kohlrieser on Human Leaders Podcast with Alexis and Sally
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8VTojuSV5eg

... and one of my personal go-to videos that in times of sadness and depression has allowed me to gently shift my perspective toward an orientation of light. Thus, open to the miracle of life in the moment:

The Most Astounding Fact by Neil deGrasse Tyson
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9D05ej8u-gU

With sisu and love, E. E.

Sisu is a reserve of inner strength but it's also a way for us to know ourselves and impact the world in a positive way. Cultivating these reserves of inner strength starts with self-care and continues through self-inquiry. its power then extends to the world through our inspired acts of deep courage and compassion.

Thanks for tuning in! You can find out more about sisu, find links to research, and check out Gentle Power: A Revolution in How We Think, Lead, and Succeed Using the Finnish Art of Sisu at www.sisulab.com.

Sisu is great, love is greatness.

This is a 23 minute calm and guided meditation to help you relax and calm your nervous system, connect to your breath, and set an intention. There is no background music or sounds and there is an additional 45 seconds for silence after the session ends, so that you can integrate back slowly. No intro or outdo in this episode for that reason either to not startle your nervous system when it is relaxed.

In tough times, your parasympathetic nervous system is an ally you want to turn to. Meditation and awareness of breath are some tools to activate it. They have helped me immensely on my own journey, when I needed to connect to my sisu and inner fortitude.

Please give some stars to help others find the show if you liked it. Also, feel free to give feedback on this meditation as it was the first I recorded. What worked, what didn't, and if you would like maybe a shorter version or something else. You can reach me via sisulab.com, Instagram or at facebook.com/inspiresisu

With sisu... and smiles!

Sisu is a reserve of inner strength but it's also a way for us to know ourselves and impact the world in a positive way. Cultivating these reserves of inner strength starts with self-care and continues through self-inquiry. its power then extends to the world through our inspired acts of deep courage and compassion.

Thanks for tuning in! You can find out more about sisu, find links to research, and check out Gentle Power: A Revolution in How We Think, Lead, and Succeed Using the Finnish Art of Sisu at www.sisulab.com.

Sisu is great, love is greatness.

Sisu is an interconnected matter. Rarely is your sisu only your sisu or my sisu solely my sisu. One of the main findings of the ultra run field work portion of my PhD on sisu is the idea of sisu that exists, and is born from, the space in-between you and I. This episode is about how we inspire strength and fortitude in each other. Furthermore, our own sisu can be inspired by the strength we see and witness in others and their actions, and this impact  can extend to drawing strength from even those dear to us who are long gone. I speak of Viktor Frankl, present Angela Duckworth and James Gross´ concept of superordinate life-goals and propose some journaling work.

Enjoy, brave ones!

Show notes and links

 Viktor Frankl: Man´ s Search for Meaning: https://www.amazon.com/Mans-Search-Meaning-Viktor-Frankl/dp/1416524282

Bushkin H, van Niekerk R, Stroud L. Searching for Meaning in Chaos: Viktor Frankl's Story. Eur J Psychol. 2021 Aug 31;17(3):233-242. https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/35136443/

Duckworth,  A.  L., Peterson, C., Matthews, M. D., & Kelly, D. R. (2007). Grit: Perseverance and passion for long-term goals. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 92(6), 1087–1101. https://www.researchgate.net/publication/6290064_Grit_Perseverance_and_Passion_for_Long-Term_Goals (open access)

Duckworth, A., & Gross, J. J. (2014). Self-control and grit: Related but separable determinants of success. Current Directions in Psychological Science, 23(5), 319–325. https://www.researchgate.net/publication/280771582_Self-Control_and_Grit_Related_but_Separable_Determinants_of_Success

and to hear more about sisu and gentle power and find the books as audio as well as hard cover and kindle: https://resources.soundstrue.com/podcast/emilia-elisabet-lahti-sisu-embodying-gentle-power/

Sisu is a reserve of inner strength but it's also a way for us to know ourselves and impact the world in a positive way. Cultivating these reserves of inner strength starts with self-care and continues through self-inquiry. its power then extends to the world through our inspired acts of deep courage and compassion.

Thanks for tuning in! You can find out more about sisu, find links to research, and check out Gentle Power: A Revolution in How We Think, Lead, and Succeed Using the Finnish Art of Sisu at www.sisulab.com.

Sisu is great, love is greatness.

The sphere of life force is what I call the space within which we operate before hitting the sisu threshold; our outer boundary of inner strength. Ideally, you want this area to be as wide as possible. This episode describes how to expand it through everyday life and how I use it in daily life and to prepare for challenges during extra long ultra runs.

Show notes:

"if you know the way broadly you will see it in all things" - Miyamoto Musashi (Japanese samurai,  1584-1645). Book recommendation: The Book of Five Rings -> https://www.holybooks.com/wp-content/uploads/The-Book-of-Five-Rings-by-Musashi-Miyamoto.pdf

"Get constructively uncomfortable." - Dr. Rhadi Ferguson, Judo Olympian, BJJ black belt. https://www.drrhadiferguson.com/coffee-with-rhadi/coffee-with-rhadi-something-i-went-through-how-i-recovered

What we talk about when we talk about the Default Mode Network (of the brain):
Frontiers in psychology: https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fnhum.2014.00619/full

Killingsworth M. A., Gilbert D. T.: A wandering mind is an unhappy mind. Science. 2010 Nov 12;330(6006):932.
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/21071660/

Konjedi S, Maleeh R. A closer look at the relationship between the default network, mind wandering, negative mood, and depression. Cogn Affect Behav Neurosci. 2017 Aug;17(4):697-711.
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/28390029/

Sisu is a reserve of inner strength but it's also a way for us to know ourselves and impact the world in a positive way. Cultivating these reserves of inner strength starts with self-care and continues through self-inquiry. its power then extends to the world through our inspired acts of deep courage and compassion.

Thanks for tuning in! You can find out more about sisu, find links to research, and check out Gentle Power: A Revolution in How We Think, Lead, and Succeed Using the Finnish Art of Sisu at www.sisulab.com.

Sisu is great, love is greatness.

"The important thing is not your process. The important thing is your process for improving your process." (Ryan Todd). In this episode we start to dig into our stories of sisu (a practice introduced in the previous episode) to build our personal manual for navigating tough times. The key is to not continue to rely on sisu to appear randomly (which happens too because it is life force whose job is to keep you alive) or in ways that leave unnecessary damage its wake due to unwise over-extension or lack of self-care during the process. Some healthy steps toward constructive sisu include:  1) intentionally preparing for times that demand sisu and 2) cultivating patterns and habits that promote healthy sisu. I recommend using and crafting a diary specifically dedicated for understanding your patterns and habits around sisu. A book that over time gets filled with your most valued insights and tips from both life and research regarding the many pathways to fortitude. Thus, it can become the basis  for your personal user manual for enduring hardship and expressing courage in the face of nonexistent odds. The problem isn't so much that we don't have strength. We simply get caught in dysfunctional patterns (negative thinking, projections, and nervous system that is off whack) and forget the levers we can and must pull to access sisu. Hope you enjoy the episode!

Sisu is a reserve of inner strength but it's also a way for us to know ourselves and impact the world in a positive way. Cultivating these reserves of inner strength starts with self-care and continues through self-inquiry. its power then extends to the world through our inspired acts of deep courage and compassion.

Thanks for tuning in! You can find out more about sisu, find links to research, and check out Gentle Power: A Revolution in How We Think, Lead, and Succeed Using the Finnish Art of Sisu at www.sisulab.com.

Sisu is great, love is greatness.

In this episode I share some of the background to the very early days of researching sisu, what the word means, and I present the idea of using the upcoming podcast series as a journey into your own sisu.

If you wish, prepare by getting a special notebook (for ease of access and retrieval of the tools) dedicated to collecting material, stories, best practices and other notes relevant to you to get intimate with your own sisu: what it means, where have you displayed it, what stands in its way, what has helped you in tough times in the past, and getting started with cultivating a daily practice for sisu. Learning to recognise sisu will offer a foundation for our ongoing (go at your own pace) inquiry that you're welcomed to join.

The 1st practice: Stories of sisu
Sisu is extraordinary determination in the face of adversity. Take a peaceful moment to look back at your life and note down deeply transformational, challenging moments you've encountered and overcome. Life events where you tapped into your ability to exceed your previously assumed capacities, found the courage to take action against extremely slim odds, or experienced almost a kind of "intestinal fortitude" that seems to be like "magic" (as some respondents my research described sisu) in that helped you "do the impossible."

The human brain is evolutionarily wired for survival and notice what doesn't work and where we feel we have failed (this is called the negativity bias and its function is to provide us with information that can help us stay alive. However, it does this at the expense of the positive cues and what has gone well). Rick Hanson, PhD,describes that the effects of negativity bias may include a growing sensitivity to stress, upset, and other negative experiences; a tendency toward pessimism, regret, and resentment; and a long shadows cast by old pain.

This assignment invites you to notice the moments in your past and present when you have found the strength to go on and have tapped into what the Finns call sisu. Every individual has sisu. The challenge is that we may we prone to fail at noticing these moments and our view of ourselves may be skewed to lack of sisu, instead of welcoming a full picture of ourselves.

Links to topics in the show:

First research paper on sisu: mapping its essences and cultural representations.Lahti, E. (2019). Embodied fortitude: An introduction to the Finnish construct of sisu.International Journal of Wellbeing, 9(1), 61-82.

Microbiome and behaviour.Researchers have been able to influence the brain chemistry of mice by changing the balance between beneficial and disease-causing bacteria in their gut, thereby leading it to become bolder (Bercik et al., 2011) and less anxious (Bravo et al., 2011). When Bercik and his research team (Bercik et al., 2011) transplanted gut microbiota between different strains of mice, they discovered that behavioural traits would transmit along with the microbiota. The recipient animals would take on traits of the donor's personality and relatively timid mice would become more exp

Sisu is a reserve of inner strength but it's also a way for us to know ourselves and impact the world in a positive way. Cultivating these reserves of inner strength starts with self-care and continues through self-inquiry. its power then extends to the world through our inspired acts of deep courage and compassion.

Thanks for tuning in! You can find out more about sisu, find links to research, and check out Gentle Power: A Revolution in How We Think, Lead, and Succeed Using the Finnish Art of Sisu at www.sisulab.com.

Sisu is great, love is greatness.

In this introductory episode of Sisu Lab, I briefly describe the Finnish construct sisu and invite you to take a walk with me to its higher expression as graceful strength that allows you to endure, excel, and even elevate through tough times. At the end I read a short excerpt from my upcoming book.

Thanks for listening and stay tuned for a ride into the formidable fibres of human fortitude!

Sisu is a reserve of inner strength but it's also a way for us to know ourselves and impact the world in a positive way. Cultivating these reserves of inner strength starts with self-care and continues through self-inquiry. its power then extends to the world through our inspired acts of deep courage and compassion.

Thanks for tuning in! You can find out more about sisu, find links to research, and check out Gentle Power: A Revolution in How We Think, Lead, and Succeed Using the Finnish Art of Sisu at www.sisulab.com.

Sisu is great, love is greatness.