The Zen Leader<\/em>, she has made a major contribution in unpacking the most important insights in Zen and providing a way to practice them in the world. No kidding.<\/p>\nWhitelaw\u2019s dedication page has this nice verse: \u201cto the old man in the woods\/who has nowhere to go\/and to you\/who are going somewhere.\u201d<\/p>\n
That says a lot. If you\u2019re a hermit or attached to nonattachment, this book might not ring true. If you\u2019re involved in leadership in the corporate world especially, but also in nonprofits or even Zen Centers, I wholeheartedly recommend this book and this way of work. I\u2019ve read through once and am now going to go back and work through it all slowly.<\/p>\n
Beware, this isn\u2019t a \u201cjust be mindful, keep a calm mind and follow the precepts\u201d approach. Well, that\u2019s hard enough \u2026 and one reason that the mindful approach is hard is that it\u2019s like pushing down a gourd in the water rather than\u00a0 seeing who it is that\u2019s doing the pushing.<\/p>\n
Each chapter contains a Zen flip that points to how to really practice awakening while in leadership. Here\u2019s a list of the chapter titles:<\/p>\n
1. From Coping to Transforming<\/p>\n
2. From Tension to Extension<\/p>\n
3. From Or <\/em>to And<\/em><\/p>\n4. From \u201cOut There\u201d to \u201cIn Here\u201d<\/p>\n
5. From Playing to Your Strengths to Strengthening Your Play<\/p>\n
6. From Controlling to Connecting<\/p>\n
7. From Driving Results to Attracting the Future<\/p>\n
8. From \u201cIt\u2019s All About Me\u201d to \u201cI\u2019m All About It\u201d<\/p>\n
9. From Local Self to Whole Self<\/p>\n
10. From Delusion to Awakening<\/p>\n
It stuck me while reading the book that this approach is like Samurai Zen \u2013 the effort of the Zen community beginning in the 12th Century to apply Zen, especially Rinzai Zen, to the world at the time \u2013 filled with war and warriors. The effort seems to have been that Zen can help you be the best samurai you can be. And the wisest and most compassionate.<\/p>\n
Dogen and others had a little issue with the ethics of that and it certainly seems to have reached rather bizarre ends with WWII.<\/p>\n
And I suppose the same danger here \u2013 the nondual insight and practice can make you the most effective corporate leader you can be for the good of all \u2026 or not.<\/p>\n
Another niggling issue is whether those who haven\u2019t done lots of sitting and\/or koan training have the foundation to do this practice or if it becomes just another dogma.<\/p>\n
With those concerns in mind, I\u2019m intent on working with this in my work life and making the book the center piece of our fall practice period here at Transforming Through Play \u2013 with Dogen pieces to complement the chapters and maybe a koan or two that seem to be the underlying source points for the chapters.<\/p>\n
So if you\u2019re interested in this, stay tuned. There\u2019s likely to be much more about this here in the coming months.<\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
About a week ago, I had a really rough day at work with three events that left me limping home, thinking, \u201cGawd, I\u2019ve gotta make some kind of inner shift!\u201d As synchronicity would have it, there in the mail box was a new book for review, The Zen Leader: 10 Ways to go From Barely […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":182,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1069","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"yoast_head":"\n
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![\"\"](\"https:\/\/wp-media.patheos.com\/blogs\/sites\/88\/2012\/06\/Zen-Leadership.jpg\" "\\"Zen")
<\/a>About a week ago, I had a really rough day at work with three events that left me limping home, thinking, \u201cGawd, I\u2019ve gotta make some kind of inner shift!\u201d<\/p>\n