{"id":1704,"date":"2020-04-11T11:00:49","date_gmt":"2020-04-11T11:00:49","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/idronline.org\/2020\/12\/23\/self-inquiry-for-social-change-leaders\/"},"modified":"2025-11-10T16:53:19","modified_gmt":"2025-11-10T11:23:19","slug":"self-inquiry-for-social-change-leaders","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/idronline.org\/kn-in\/self-inquiry-for-social-change-leaders\/","title":{"rendered":"Self-inquiry for social change leaders"},"content":{"rendered":"

“I felt trapped, and I was angry a lot of the time. I worked from early morning until midnight, with no outlets for my emotional and intellectual needs other than my employees and the local women we served. Over time, I felt the need for more nourishing interactions, and I also felt guilty about wanting something more. It was very unhealthy.”—Bedriye Hü<\/em>lya<\/em>, founder of b-fit.<\/em><\/p>

We’ve heard some version of this sentiment in many of our conversations with social entrepreneurs. “I was riding on adrenaline for the first five years,” said Mike Sani, founder of the UK-based civic engagement enterprise Bite the Ballot<\/a>. “People only see the glamorous parts, but no one knows the depths of the lows. I blamed myself for not achieving our mission faster. I suffered from imposter syndrome. None of my family members understood what I did. I felt incredibly lonely.”<\/p>

This is an excerpt from the article<\/em> Self-Inquiry for Social Change Leaders<\/strong><\/a> by Katherine Milligan and Jeffrey C. Walker.<\/em><\/p>

\"What<\/a><\/div>

This article is a part of a special series on the connection between inner well-being and social change, in partnership with The Wellbeing Project<\/a>, Stanford Social Innovation Review<\/a>, Schwab Foundation<\/a> at the World Economic Forum<\/a>, and Skoll Foundation<\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n

\"donate<\/a><\/div>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

“I felt trapped, and I was angry a lot of the time. I worked from early morning until midnight, with no outlets for my emotional and intellectual needs other than…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":8,"featured_media":1705,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"inline_featured_image":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[582,14,35],"tags":[141,496],"series":[],"meta-filter":[],"schema-filter":[743],"no-display":[],"class_list":["post-1704","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-instagram","category-leadership-talent","category-centred-self-the-wellbeing-series","tag-mental-health","tag-well-being","contributor-stanford-social-innovation-review","states-india","schema-filter-article"],"yoast_head":"\nSelf-inquiry for social change leaders - India Development Review<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"How the internal work of self-inquiry can meaningfully shift our perceptions and behaviors in ways that positively impact the outer world, and how leaders of social change are incorporating the practice into their work and lives.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/idronline.org\/self-inquiry-for-social-change-leaders\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"kn_IN\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Self-inquiry for social change leaders\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"How the internal work of self-inquiry can meaningfully shift our perceptions and behaviors in ways that positively impact the outer world, and how leaders of social change are incorporating the practice into their work and lives.\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/idronline.org\/self-inquiry-for-social-change-leaders\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"India Development Review\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2020-04-11T11:00:49+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2025-11-10T11:23:19+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/idronline.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/12\/ssir-welbeing-illustration_Helena-Pallares.jpg\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"592\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"333\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/jpeg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Devanshi Vaid\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO Premium plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"Self-inquiry for social change leaders - India Development Review","description":"How the internal work of self-inquiry can meaningfully shift our perceptions and behaviors in ways that positively impact the outer world, and how leaders of social change are incorporating the practice into their work and lives.","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/idronline.org\/self-inquiry-for-social-change-leaders\/","og_locale":"kn_IN","og_type":"article","og_title":"Self-inquiry for social change leaders","og_description":"How the internal work of self-inquiry can meaningfully shift our perceptions and behaviors in ways that positively impact the outer world, and how leaders of social change are incorporating the practice into their work and lives.","og_url":"https:\/\/idronline.org\/self-inquiry-for-social-change-leaders\/","og_site_name":"India Development Review","article_published_time":"2020-04-11T11:00:49+00:00","article_modified_time":"2025-11-10T11:23:19+00:00","og_image":[{"width":592,"height":333,"url":"https:\/\/idronline.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/12\/ssir-welbeing-illustration_Helena-Pallares.jpg","type":"image\/jpeg"}],"author":"Devanshi Vaid","twitter_card":"summary_large_image","schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"Article","@id":"https:\/\/idronline.org\/self-inquiry-for-social-change-leaders\/#article","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/idronline.org\/self-inquiry-for-social-change-leaders\/"},"author":{"name":"Devanshi Vaid","@id":"https:\/\/idronline.org\/#\/schema\/person\/5440619b9bec1184c5774c076c0ca71c"},"headline":"Self-inquiry for social change leaders","datePublished":"2020-04-11T11:00:49+00:00","dateModified":"2025-11-10T11:23:19+00:00","mainEntityOfPage":{"@id":"https:\/\/idronline.org\/self-inquiry-for-social-change-leaders\/"},"wordCount":218,"commentCount":0,"publisher":{"@id":"https:\/\/idronline.org\/#organization"},"image":{"@id":"https:\/\/idronline.org\/self-inquiry-for-social-change-leaders\/#primaryimage"},"thumbnailUrl":"https:\/\/idronline.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/12\/ssir-welbeing-illustration_Helena-Pallares.jpg","keywords":["mental health","well-being"],"articleSection":["Instagram","Leadership & Talent","The Well-being Series"],"inLanguage":"kn-IN","potentialAction":[{"@type":"CommentAction","name":"Comment","target":["https:\/\/idronline.org\/self-inquiry-for-social-change-leaders\/#respond"]}]},{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/idronline.org\/self-inquiry-for-social-change-leaders\/","url":"https:\/\/idronline.org\/self-inquiry-for-social-change-leaders\/","name":"Self-inquiry for social change leaders - India Development Review","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/idronline.org\/#website"},"primaryImageOfPage":{"@id":"https:\/\/idronline.org\/self-inquiry-for-social-change-leaders\/#primaryimage"},"image":{"@id":"https:\/\/idronline.org\/self-inquiry-for-social-change-leaders\/#primaryimage"},"thumbnailUrl":"https:\/\/idronline.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/12\/ssir-welbeing-illustration_Helena-Pallares.jpg","datePublished":"2020-04-11T11:00:49+00:00","dateModified":"2025-11-10T11:23:19+00:00","description":"How the internal work of self-inquiry can meaningfully shift our perceptions and behaviors in ways that positively impact the outer world, and how leaders of social change are incorporating the practice into their work and lives.","inLanguage":"kn-IN","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/idronline.org\/self-inquiry-for-social-change-leaders\/"]}]},{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"kn-IN","@id":"https:\/\/idronline.org\/self-inquiry-for-social-change-leaders\/#primaryimage","url":"https:\/\/idronline.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/12\/ssir-welbeing-illustration_Helena-Pallares.jpg","contentUrl":"https:\/\/idronline.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/12\/ssir-welbeing-illustration_Helena-Pallares.jpg","width":592,"height":333,"caption":"ssir welbeing illustration_Helena Pallares"},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https:\/\/idronline.org\/#website","url":"https:\/\/idronline.org\/","name":"India Development Review","description":"India's first and largest online journal for leaders in the development community","publisher":{"@id":"https:\/\/idronline.org\/#organization"},"potentialAction":[{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https:\/\/idronline.org\/?s={search_term_string}"},"query-input":{"@type":"PropertyValueSpecification","valueRequired":true,"valueName":"search_term_string"}}],"inLanguage":"kn-IN"},{"@type":"Organization","@id":"https:\/\/idronline.org\/#organization","name":"India Development Review","url":"https:\/\/idronline.org\/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"kn-IN","@id":"https:\/\/idronline.org\/#\/schema\/logo\/image\/","url":"https:\/\/idronline.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/01\/idr-logo-without-tagline-sm.webp","contentUrl":"https:\/\/idronline.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/01\/idr-logo-without-tagline-sm.webp","width":1,"height":1,"caption":"India Development Review"},"image":{"@id":"https:\/\/idronline.org\/#\/schema\/logo\/image\/"}},{"@type":"Person","@id":"https:\/\/idronline.org\/#\/schema\/person\/5440619b9bec1184c5774c076c0ca71c","name":"Devanshi Vaid","image":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"kn-IN","@id":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/2ff7c808d3539c16c67949df0296e034b2baeb599fa173f683398d23fe4e3690?s=96&d=mm&r=g","url":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/2ff7c808d3539c16c67949df0296e034b2baeb599fa173f683398d23fe4e3690?s=96&d=mm&r=g","contentUrl":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/2ff7c808d3539c16c67949df0296e034b2baeb599fa173f683398d23fe4e3690?s=96&d=mm&r=g","caption":"Devanshi Vaid"},"url":"https:\/\/idronline.org\/kn-in\/author\/dvaid\/"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/idronline.org\/kn-in\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1704","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/idronline.org\/kn-in\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/idronline.org\/kn-in\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/idronline.org\/kn-in\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/8"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/idronline.org\/kn-in\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1704"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/idronline.org\/kn-in\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1704\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":8697,"href":"https:\/\/idronline.org\/kn-in\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1704\/revisions\/8697"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/idronline.org\/kn-in\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1705"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/idronline.org\/kn-in\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1704"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/idronline.org\/kn-in\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1704"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/idronline.org\/kn-in\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1704"},{"taxonomy":"series","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/idronline.org\/kn-in\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/series?post=1704"},{"taxonomy":"meta-filter","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/idronline.org\/kn-in\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/meta-filter?post=1704"},{"taxonomy":"schema-filter","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/idronline.org\/kn-in\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/schema-filter?post=1704"},{"taxonomy":"no-display","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/idronline.org\/kn-in\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/no-display?post=1704"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}