Pavini Moray: Embracing Authenticity and Play

Culture and Leadership Connections Podcast

The Somatic Leadership Journey
Bio:
Pavini Moray has started, failed, and succeeded in many businesses. A serial entrepreneur, they have built private practices, a worker collective, and a for-profit company. Pavini is a somatic leadership coach, specializing in helping relationships be easy. Moray holds an M.Ed in Montessori curriculum design, as well as a Ph.D. in Somatic Psychology. Pavini has authored, How to Hold Power: A Somatic Approach to Becoming a Leader People Love and Respect.
Links:
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/pavinicoakwellmoray/
Website: https://www.pavinimoray.com/
Episode Highlights:
In this episode, Pavini delves into their experiences of cultural disconnect, sharing personal stories of their childhood and how counterculture and punk music provided a sense of belonging and freedom. They discuss the importance of somatic approaches in leadership and personal growth.
Childhood Incidents:
As a child, Pavini’s mother decided that Pavini should have a cultural education of experiencing the arts. As a single mother, cultural education was a luxury she had to prioritize and save for. Contrastingly, Pavini’s dad had season tickets and a box at the opera. One night, when mother and child were at the opera, they noticed the dad sitting in his box in the theatre which was Pavini’s first awareness of wealth disparity.
In January 1986, Pavini’s friends invited them to a punk party. While there, Pavini felt the difference between the world they lived in and the current world they were experiencing then. This experience set Pavini on a journey to find spaces of belonging.
Cultural Influences:
Pavini’s purpose comes from living a life informed by pleasure, embodiment, and communication, tempered with transparency and kindness.
Leadership Influence:
In 2008, Pavini attended an activist camp and experienced the power of transparency and power sharing along with strong organization. This shaped their foundational beliefs about leadership, elderhood and the importance of structure. To date, Pavini cannot stand being in a poorly organized meeting and strives to incorporate elderhood into leadership since it increases the capacity of an entire community.
Temperaments and Personality:
Pavini believes they came into this world as a dancer, with a sense of awe, magic and connection to nature and spirit. Curiosity is also part of Pavini’s temperament. As a child, and later as an adult Pavini developed both a playful and pragmatic side to their personality.
Cultural Epiphanies:
Pavini lived in Bulgaria in the 90s and experienced the Bulgarians' sense of powerlessness and hopelessness as shocking. Pavini recalls a time they went to the mayor asking for transportation for books that had traveled 10,000 miles around the world, and now required transportation for the last 200 miles to get them to the destination. The mayor said it was impossible, but Pavini was able to show him how doable it was when he opened his mind to possibility.
When Pavini was working with a worker collective, a sense of anger at late meetings arose frequently. One of the people they worked with told Pavini that the time intolerance and anger was white supremacy and not all people understand time the same way.
What Brings out the Best in Pavini?
Pavini enjoys working in environments where they can laugh and be playful.
Soapbox Moment:
Pavini encourages us to be attuned. They recognize how vulnerable it can be when we open ourselves to attune with someone else's needs, feelings, desires, fears, and grief.

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