I cannot express how grateful I am to Sr. Dorota Maria and her Leadership Team who gave me this opportunity to take the eighteen-month Collaborative Leadership Development Program.

I started the Program in May 2023 and finished in November 2024. During very first meeting one of the facilitators raised a question “What are the three qualities I would like to embody in my life and my leadership style?” Each participant gave their answer. Mine was very simple: Honesty, Deep listening and Confidentiality. The content of each Module offered much to reflect upon. I took from it especially the challenge of deep listening, the practice of communication skills, and the search for wisdom in my decision making, and I am sure this kind of reflection will help each participant, advancing each person’s leadership style.

Today, I particularly want to express appreciation to my mentor Sr. Alexis and my coach Sr. Sandy Prucha, Sister of Mercy. The consistency of the meetings and their availability to listen to me has been a great support both spiritually and emotionally. Having a coach and a mentor was a wonderful growth opportunity for me and I am very grateful. I have learned and I am still learning a lot about the leadership journey and how to take care of myself in order to lead others in the ministry and in the Community.

We were divided into small groups for each session. In our small group meeting, we collaborated and shared experiences of attracting and nurturing Charism and Mission through the introductory lens of Formation processes. In one session we talked about how we demonstrated the self-awareness and self-care that is of primary importance in developing the necessary self-empathy to prevent burnout as we compassionately minister to the needs of others. This resonates with me because sometimes my mind runs ahead and I don’t see why it would take the person I am listening to all that time to say something. But I am learning that each person always wants to be heard.

The individual reflections and group sharing have enriched me, and I have learned different technical terms in this course. This has been an amazing opportunity to learn and to grow my missionary abilities, to have more confidence in my ministry skills and experience in a faith-based approach. Thank you for the seven Sisters whom I asked to be my evaluators for my Leadership Profile. An unexpected learning that I realized from reviewing the results of the Circle of Leadership Profile has been that I tend to have the perspective of the “glass half full” for others and “half empty” for myself. The interpretation of my Leadership Profile results was intuitively profound. The honesty of the evaluations from the Sisters are awakening as I discern, through prayer and reflection, what it feels like to be an authentic being living as a member of an intercultural and intergenerational Religious community of truly authentic life.

Let me end my reflection with a question: What has been an especially important learning so far for me in the CLDP program? I am learning to lean into the growing edges and make small changes in my daily interactions with people in the ministry and in the Community.