Invisible Leadership

An exploration of leading from behind, or from within, or as the Tao…

“In the age when life on earth was full, no one paid any special attention to worthy men, nor did they single out the man of ability. Rulers were simply the highest branches on the tree, and the people were like deer in the woods. They were honest and righteous without realizing that they were “doing their duty.” They loved each other and did not know that this was “love of neighbor.” They deceived no one yet they did not know that they were “men to be trusted.” They were reliable and did not know that this was “good faith.” They lived freely together giving and taking, and did not know that they were generous. For this reason their deeds have not been narrated. They made no history.”

― Zhuangzi, Thomas Merton (translator), The Way of Chuang Tzu

This has been a memorable quote for me now for some decades. I have contemplated this often while reflecting on the otherwise predominant “go fast” urgency of modern progress narrative culture.

Can we speak freely and openly about the decline of virtue in the world today? Are we strong enough to hold that frailty within ourselves without succumbing totally to it? I’ve been enjoying the book lately, Turning Confusion into Clarity, by Yongey Mingyur Rinpoche, and in a recent chapter he recounted receiving a teaching from his father on this subject.

The aspiration of life is to realize the full flourishing, the diamond nature of our transcendent, and even divine, majesty; this is the fiery edge of evolution’s blade. The paradox in this is to recognize the messy path that we all have taken for eons beyond lifetimes in the journey of a vast, terrible, and profound kosmic perfection.

This is a journey from perfection to perfection. Yet here we are at the bottom, if we are lucky, bumping along the ugly tarnish of environmental devastation, invasive colonization, harsh divisions from one another, from even ourselves, and the bloodthirsty imprisonment of so much otherwise magnificent wildness.

Can we speak freely and openly, can we look directly at our own frailties of honesty, integrity, humility, courage, generosity, respect, service, and others? Can we acknowledge the harms we harbor and that we do to ourselves, each other, and this wonderful world?

There is, in this, good news if we can. The Rinpoche’s father above pointed out that when we do look directly at these qualities of failure, we can begin to tease them apart, to clear away their obscuring condition and thus allow that “greater” nature to shine forth more clearly.

Leadership has this quality as well.

A revered teacher of mine once described “a leader” as, “anyone who leads a life.” In this regard, leadership is everywhere, it is like the water we swim in. It can be said, in this sense, that leadership by its nature is invisible.

Each of us, in our way, in every moment, is cutting through confusion, forging a path through towards the greatest flourishing we can envision given the complexities of our present experience and conditions. We are, every one of us, following a sacred path of luminous thread through time. In one instant, the thread may appear dim and hard to find in a vast and boundless mystery of being, at other times it may be a fiery sun illuminating every detail in perfect clarity.

This thread is our awareness, it’s luminance a pervasive embrace realizing the fullness of our being.

All that arises in life, time, space, self, one another, challenge, opportunity, vice, and virtue, appears as it were, in front of our, or perhaps better said, within this boundless awareness. Habitually we tend to place all of this “in front” of ourselves, arising as it were out of the emerging future into the present moment and organizing itself as it flows over us into our past.

My friend Richard uses the term “Culture of Separation,” or “Everything Industrial Complex” to describe our current evolving catastrophe, and undoubtedly this condition is the result of leadership; in particular, the leadership of many centuries (perhaps many millennia) of humanity’s activity in the world, our activity, our leadership.

To be sure, we are, in our collective condition, in a threshold moment, a time of crossing over. In the roots of the verb “to lead,” lay descriptions of crossing over, thresholds, dying. We are in a time of leadership.

We have followed a certain kind of leadership, dare we say a pendulum swing in this regard far into a territory often referred to as “patriarchy.” We have been following this kind of leadership for quite some time. This quality of leadership tends to accentuate front, first, forward, progress, and security held close to exclusive definitions of goodness, truth, and value. This leadership, like the tip of the arrow, is narrow focused. It is linear. It is, in very concerning terms, profoundly blind.

This world today is fraught with this kind of leadership. It is overt in our systems of democratic representation, it is overt in our systems of totalitarianism and oligarchy. It is implicit in our culture of separation, each one of us alone and in our narrow communities of interest, against the world, seeking to cut through all that is wrong, offensive, and against us, like an arrow towards the goal of realizing a distant salvation.

Leadership also is, and can be, from perfection to perfection.

What does that even mean?

Let us return for a moment to our friend Zhuangzi.

“The Kingly Man

My master said:
That which acts on all and meddles in none - is heaven . . .
The Kingly Man realizes this, hides it in his heart,
Grows boundless, wide-minded, draws all to himself.
And so he lets the gold lie hidden in the mountain,
Leaves the pearl lying in the deep.

Goods and possessions are no gain in his eyes,
He stays far from wealth and honour.
Long life is no ground for joy, nor early death for sorrow
Success is not for him to be proud of, failure is no shame.

Had he all the world's power he would not hold it as his own,
If he conquered everything he would not take it to himself.
His glory is in knowing that all things come together in One
And life and death are equal.”

― Zhuangzi, Thomas Merton (translator), The Way of Chuang Tzu

Realizing there is nothing to be done, the wise act without hesitation. Realizing action in nonaction, there is nothing to be done.

So what is this “Invisible Leadership?”

How do we cross thresholds, how do we die invisibly, and what in this is useful and good?

These questions are on my mind not simply as philosophical cloud gazing, but emerge from actual living tensions as I seek to navigate well this world and this life.

Let me share a few more quotes…

“For those who believe in God, most of the big questions are answered. But for those of us who can't readily accept the God formula, the big answers don't remain stone-written. We adjust to new conditions and discoveries. We are pliable. Love need not be a command nor faith a dictum. I am my own god. We are here to unlearn the teachings of the church, state, and our educational system. We are here to drink beer. We are here to kill war. We are here to laugh at the odds and live our lives so well that Death will tremble to take us.”

― Charles Bukowski

Inside this clay jug there are canyons and pine mountains,
And the maker of canyons and mountains!  
All seven oceans are inside, and hundreds of millions of stars.  
The acid that tests gold is there, and the one who judges jewels.  
And the music from the strings no one touches, and the source of all water. 
If you want the truth, I will tell you the truth:  
Friend, listen: The God whom I love is inside.

-- the poet Kabir (1398 - 1518)

I have already described, above, the way that I lead my life; it is the very same way that each and every one of us leads a life. We arrive, moment to moment and we proceed as we best see fit. There is grace in this, and surrender. There is also opportunity, opportunity to notice those aforementioned’s failures of virtue.

This is an opportunity to look with ever finer grain of detail to discover those places in ourselves where the mote still covers the diamond, where some confusion has persisted or crept in afresh and we, with the light of our awareness can see beyond its powers of occlusion and realize it’s diamond perfection even as it passes away.

But what of our collective nature? How does this apply to leading one another? Leadership is, of course, of profound necessity today, it is not just the water in which we breathe, but it is also the torch to light our paths through this awful moment in time.

One of the defining features of our time, in the place of a largely Western Empire led field of agency and “progress,” is the necessity for each individual, by conformity or innovation to demonstrate in clear and practical terms their “usefulness” to society at large. In essence, the care and upkeep of the individual member of the community is no longer considered integral to the well-being of the collective.

We are no longer tribes who are only as well as the wellbeing of the least among us, with 8 billion and counting, we have weighed the value of a life and found it, on balance, disposable.

After all, that is our modern economy, a balance sheet of abstract black and red and as long as we see black in the ledgers of those who hold power, the economy is assumed to be just and good, and so the story goes…

It is incumbent upon each and every one of us to find our way to that declaration of power; by conformity or innovation we demonstrate our usefulness to that narrow band of intelligence and so are sustained. Such as we are. Falling outside these conventions of value metric, we, our carriers, concerns, communities, initiatives, and search for righteousness, are only so much fodder for the system as it is.

We are no more free to lead our own lives in disregard of the values of this larger system, then we are to lead our lives in disregard of gravity, and yet these are very distinct thresholds of condition. The latter describes a law of material perception, while the former lies more supposedly in the realm of cultural construction and negotiation between peers.

To make the point more finally, while we are part of a global economic system that demands allegiance and captures and controls enormous swaths of actual value in abstract ledgers of account held with iron pursestrings against the vast majority of life, we must participate in steering towards an apparent abyss, or risk becoming just so much noise in a quieting din.

In a way, our leadership is invisible.

The leadership of billions is invisible, and we are led by the blind.

And that is not the end of the story…

It strikes me, that if I am successful with the poetry of these words, the reader may best be left without a sense that they have been benefited, or led in any way by this offering.

What does it mean to offer the care of leadership, to offer one’s self in going beyond, crossing over, dying from one condition that something new may be born in the next? What does it mean to offer this care in a way aligned in fidelity with this underlying quality of invisibility?

What does it mean to see past the mote, to see through the dazzling lights of that radiant illusion to the unbroken perfection shining brightly in every moment?

What does it mean when we see, and not just see, but act with and upon ourselves, one another, and the world with love and in a way that draws out that diamond luminosity in service to the flourishing of life, and our seeing and our action is like breeze on the water, evoking the dazzling display of light while not obscuring it or demanding anything in return in any way?

"Even
After
All this time
The sun never says to the earth,

"You owe
Me."

Look
What happens
With a love like that,
It lights the
Whole
Sky."

— by  Hafiz  (Author), Daniel Ladinsky  (Translator)

What does it mean to practice invisible leadership; and how do we care for such a phenomenon that is so essential to the flourishing of all?