I’m inspired by my recent conversations with Anthony Quintero to add my “Zen leader” voice to these virtual pages. By “leadership,” I’m not referring to a position on an organizational chart, but rather, adopting Kevin Cashman’s inside-out definition\[1\]: authentic self expression that creates value for others. Not only is the training and development of leaders the calling of our profession, but as trainers and developers—through the value we create for others—we, ourselves, are leaders. And what does it mean to be a Zen leader? Again, I’m not referring to a fixed formula for leadership that’s “out there,” but rather to realizing our own true leadership capacity, that is, our authentic self expression that is at once individual and universal and comes out clean—not in service of our own ego. When we get out of our own way, we realize the Zen leader in us. 

Zen supports training, development, and leadership in two critical ways. First, Zen meditation is an excellent developmental practice. It is able to accelerate progress through the stages of human development as expressed in models such as Spiral Dynamics and brilliantly integrated by Ken Wilber’s Integral Theory. Wilber cites research that only about 2 percent of the world’s adult population is at a developmental stage that’s capable of a truly global mindset, while among those who have been meditating for 4 years or more, 38 percent are at or above this stage\[2\]. Further evidence for causality in this connection comes from brain scan research that has shown meditation causes physical changes in the brain. For example, Davidson et al.\[3\] finds meditators show stronger connectivity between the parts of the brain associated with self control, self regulation, positive emotions, and empathy—every aspect of what we’ve come to call emotional intelligence (EQ). It’s hard to imagine any trainer, coach, or consultant being successful without a hefty dose of EQ. And when it comes to the organizational leaders we serve, more than 15 years of research has shown that more developed leaders run better performing companies\[4\].

But it’s the second contribution Zen makes to development and leadership that matters even more. For Zen does more than evolve the ego—including its tendency to feel good about itself for being at some evolved stage of development. Nonsense. Zen crushes the ego, or at least, destroys its grip on being our sole sense of identity. For Zen creates the conditions in which samadhi—boundaryless connectedness—can arise, before the thinker has a chance to separate out thoughts. From this condition, our sense of self is eventually flipped inside out.  Yes we are an ego playing the game of life, and yes we are absolute emptiness in its non-dualistic, inconceivable entirety, expressed in this tiny dot. How does that enormity manifest through the way we teach, coach, or lead? To the extent that it does, that’s the Zen leader in us. 

To the extent that it doesn’t, that’s what we mean by getting in our own way. So while we need an ego to play the game of life—as Wilber observes, we’d be psychotic without one—the ego’s prime impetus is its own survival. As Maslow expressed simply in his hierarchy of needs (see Figure 1), the ego’s needs go beyond physical survival or security to include such things as affiliation, power/self-esteem, and self- actualization/achievement. The good news is that the motivation to meet those needs causes much to be done in the world. Organizations ride on the drive of people having high needs for achievement. The bad news is that those same needs come with the fear that they won’t be met enough. We don’t go through our days consciously thinking, “I need to meet my need for self-actualization” or “I need self-esteem today.” Indeed, we may not be conscious of these fears at all, which is exactly why they can do so much damage. Fears do their dirtiest work when we unconsciously push them away and instead blame conditions “out there” for our negative reactions. We can be angry, for example, with the colleague who doesn’t agree with us without realizing that it triggered our fear that we’re not powerful enough. Or we can be endlessly busy without noticing that we only feel good about ourselves when we’re performing, so we keep putting ourselves in the center of things (even to the detriment of good coaching or consulting). We can be critical of the success of others without recognizing that it triggers our own fear of being worthless. Indeed, every time we see something negative in what is happening “out there” it maps to some need “in here” that it worries won’t be met.

Don’t take my word for it. You might download this fear-flipping exercise from The Zen Leader and try it out on one of your own negative reactions, or use this with clients. This flip from “out there” to “in here” is pivotal to moving beyond fears and finding one’s power to act. It involves seeing how one is playing into the situation, finding the root fear that is operating, and moving so close to that fear, indeed becoming the fear, that it loses its leverage over us.  

Here’s an example. Say that as a trainer or consultant, I find myself frustrated when speaking to a group of leaders who are peppering me with questions. At the surface, I may think, “I don’t like this group; they’re trying to find fault with everything I’m saying.” But if I’m willing to look inside, I’ll find insight into the fears being triggered in me: what am I not enough? I get to the root of my fears by probing beneath surface answers and asking: what will that lead to?

I’m afraid that I’m not up to their challenge, that I’m not good enough.

What will that lead to? That they won’t respect me if my answers aren’t good enough.

And what will that lead to? I’ll make a fool of myself and not be hired back.

And what will that lead to? That I can’t make it in this business, that I have no job security, that I’m a failure…

And what will that lead to? Failure, depression…Isn’t that bad enough? Life would be awful, I’d rather be dead.

We know we’ve found the root of our fears when we hit the fears associated with basic Maslow-like needs or death itself, which is the root of all fears. While this may seem like a depressing line of inquiry, by making it conscious, we see the fears operating in us. As we move into them, becoming the space the fear would otherwise occupy, we can claim our power to act—which is our power to add our best energy to the situation—regardless of what comes back. To complete the above example, moving into our fear and claiming our power might look like this:

I can’t control if they respect me, but I will add as much value as I can to each person’s life. They may never hire me back, but in this moment, I will do whatever I can to help them learn and come out of this meeting stronger.

As our focus flips from self-protection to service, we operate with natural strength, rather than tense defensiveness.  There are still no guarantees for how things will turn out. But when we’re willing to face our fears squarely and add our best value anyway, we’re able to work with whatever life throws at us, even death. Like all of the flips in The Zen Leader, this flip, repeatedly practiced, increases our agility and expands our sense of self. It takes us along a path from barely managing to leading fearlessly, and not for our sake alone. For what Zen ultimately brings to training, development, and leadership is the fearlessness that comes with being a part of, not apart from, with nowhere to be lost to. If you truly realized that fears have no more substance than a mirage, don’t you think you just might be able to take some of the fear and anxiety out of this world?

\[1\] Cashman, Kevin, Leadership from the Inside Out (Provo, UT, Executive Excellence Publishing, 2000).

\[2\] Wilber, Ken, _A Theory of Everything (_Boston: Shambhala, 2000), dialogue with Ram Dass on Integral Naked.

\[3\] Davidson, R. (with Begley, S.), The Emotional Life of Your Brain (New York: Hudson Street Press, 2012).

\[4\] see, for example, Jim Collins discussion of Level V leaders in Good to Great (New York: HarperCollins, 2001)  or Rooke, D. and Torbert, Organizational transformation as a function of CEO's developmental stage, W. Org Dev Jrnl: 16 (1), 1998.