Whole Human Leadership: The Guide

Whole Human Leadership: A Layered Toolkit for Leaders

Build your foundation. Name your layers. Light the candle of your purpose.

So many leaders have been trained to lead from the neck up. Over time, we lose touch with our bodies, our values, our purpose, and the things that used to make us feel alive. Most leadership development responds with depersonalized strategy. This toolkit takes a different path: an embodied, holistic approach that starts with you.

The Whole Human Leadership framework is built like a layered cake. You start with a whole-brain foundation. Then you add your identities, your core values, and the practices that fill your cup. And then comes the icing: play, creativity, storytelling, mindfulness, and nature, the ingredients that make it all stick. Finally, you light the candle of your purpose. By the end, you’ll have a living leadership philosophy and a cake that’s all your own, name included.

Inside the 29-page PDF:

• Eight chapters, step by step. Each one has a short teaching, a somatic practice to try, and a worksheet.
• Practices for your body as well as your mind. Simple ways to ground yourself and notice what’s happening in your body, plus a note on going at the pace of your nervous system.
• The Whole Human Leadership Wheel, for seeing where you feel full and where you feel depleted.
• A Leadership Philosophy section, for writing your own philosophy as a living recipe that’s always in the process of becoming.
• A Recipe Card with your cake’s name, your philosophy in six words, and three concrete next steps.
• A 90-minute team session guide for exploring the cake with your team.
• A further reading list of diverse voices on the body, identity, power, rest, and becoming.

Use it your way. Type right into the fillable pages, or print them and write by hand. Work through it on your own (about 30–45 minutes per chapter), bring your pages to a coach, or use it with your team.

Who it’s for: Leaders who are tired of burnout being the price of leadership, and who want to lead from alignment instead of depletion. Guide can be purchased for individuals, teams (up to 5), departments (up to 20), and for your entire company (reach out to discuss options).

About the author: Dr. Laura Colket is a somatic leadership coach, educator, and Fulbright Specialist with nearly three decades of leadership experience across higher education, nonprofits, and government. She holds a doctorate in Educational Leadership from the University of Pennsylvania. For more information, head to her website www.healplaylead.com or @healplaylead on instagram or Whole Human Leadership, LLC on LinkedIn.