Liminal leadership is the practice of guiding teams through transitional, “in-between” periods where the old way of doing things no longer works, but the future remains unclear.
Liminal means existing at a threshold, the space between what was and what is about to be.
I was recently introduced to this leadership concept and was nudged to consider that maybe that is the real condition of the human mind. Not solid. Not settled. Not nearly as certain as we pretend.
My mind is always between thoughts. Even when the stream feels constant, each thought rises, holds for a moment, and falls away. Then another appears. And another.
We act as though we are our thoughts, when most of the time we are just being dragged from one thought to the next. This is the liminal mind – not the thoughts themselves, the space where one thought dies and the next one has not yet taken control.
Most people never notice that space. They only notice the noise.
In Buddhist thought, there is deep attention given to the gap between thoughts. Not because the gap is exotic. Because it is honest. In that small pause, the ego is not narrating quite so loudly. The craving softens. The fear loosens its grip. For one brief moment, you can see how much of your being is manufactured by your own constant inner commentary.
That should unsettle us.
Because if there is space between thoughts, then every reaction is not inevitable. Every resentment is not sacred. Every anxiety is not truth. Maybe the real issue is not that life is noisy. Maybe the real issue is that we are addicted to internal noise because silence threatens the versions of ourselves we have worked so hard to defend.
And yet, I do not think that space is empty. I think it can become holy.
Not because it belongs to Buddhism. Not because Christians invented stillness. But because any moment that exposes illusion has the potential to become a doorway to God. A threshold. A liminal place. A place where you stop obeying every thought that enters your mind and start asking a harder question:
Who told me I had to believe all of this?
Shift/Insight
The liminal mind is the unnoticed space between thoughts where freedom begins. You are not every thought you think.
You are responsible for what you agree with, what you repeat, and what you let rule you.
Today’s Nudge
Set a timer for three minutes. Sit still. When a thought comes, do not fight it and do not follow it. Just notice the space before the next one arrives.
Faith Connection
“Be still, and know that I am God.” Psalm 46:10
Stillness is not passivity. It is resistance against the tyranny of unexamined thought. Pause long enough to catch one thought before it owns you.