When people ask about my four months living as a guest student Zen monk, the usual description I give is this: What was it like?
Boring. Wonderful. Strange.
In that order.
You see, there’s a lot of just sitting in the meditation hall, staring into a wall. As many of those Zen masters used to joke, “Zazen (Zen meditation) is good for nothing.”
And yet, there were moments of wonder in looking at the nature of the mind and experience. As one of my favorite teachers said, “Zen is letting the mundane catch fire.”
Strange — have you ever walked single file into a candlelit hall with a bunch of people in black robes at 4:30 a.m. and wondered, “Why am I doing this again?”
Actually, no, you probably have not had that moment! Suffice it to say, the whole thing was a bit odd.
But what the whole thing was really about was affecting change at a more fundamental level than just learning a technical skill set — a change in your way of being: awareness, insight into the nature of experience, compassion, etc.
So, having been through that, I’d like to share with you five lessons for leading others and living a good life. Leader, in this context, doesn’t necessarily mean a general or CEO, but someone who manages themselves and influences others. We are all leaders, and this will help you be more effective and happy along the way…
It is said that, after years of meditative mental training, and then one night of sitting deep in mindful awareness for many hours, the Buddha became enlightened under the Bodhi tree. Bodhidharma, who founded Zen, is said to have walked from India to China and then sat staring into a wall for 9 years to achieve that same enlightenment. For us, we’d wake at 4:15 and do a combination of meditation and service for about 3 hours.
I don’t necessarily recommend any of these strategies for you. But we need to understand why we’re doing it.
I met a guy at the Zen center who was an army veteran and who said that, in a lot of ways, the experience was like basic training. Everything was structured and had routines down to the minute, repeating day after day to train you. But what we were training was the mind. Think about it: if you were to do a crossword puzzle every single day for 2 hours, you’d probably get really, really good at them, right? At the same time, even if you’re not a people person, if you had to give a 10-minute TED Talk every day to start your workday or you would be fired, in a few months you’d be a way better speaker than the average person.
You see, the mind is basically a learning machine that changes based on how it is used. So what we are training is a greater degree of awareness. This means the ability to pay attention, on purpose, nonjudgmentally, in the present moment to both your inner and outer experience.
So, just like you have ultramarathon runners and bodybuilders, we are becoming sort of these Olympic athletes of mindfulness: attentive awareness of direct experience in the present.
Most of us, whether we realize it or not, are training our minds all the time. So why not build the capabilities that are going to lead us to a greater quality of life and a greater ability to work with others? The primary discipline for that is increasing your awareness. That is the foundation for empathy, self-control, and emotional intelligence.
There are many practices you can do, whether it be prayer, journaling, yoga, woodworking, or traditional meditation. The common theme through all of them is that you are bringing your attention to something in the present moment, and every time your mind wanders off, you bring it back again and again and again, thus strengthening your awareness.
I once heard it said that anxiety is in the future and depression is in the past. So, be where your feet are. Another teacher of mine said that Zen is letting go of whatever comes and whatever goes.
Train your mind harder than anything else. Don’t leave the experience of your life to chance. Shape your psychology every single morning. This is how to live with intention.
If you want to be a leader, learn to be where your feet are — train your mind every morning.
A monk had a beautiful, delicate teacup.
His student asked him about the cup. Much to the student’s surprise, he replied that the cup was already broken. “What do you mean?” the student asked.
The monk said, “To me, this cup is already broken.”
“I enjoy it. I drink from it. It holds my water admirably—sometimes even reflecting the sun in beautiful patterns. When I tap it, it has a lovely
ring to it. But when I put it on the shelf and the wind blows it over, or I knock it off the table and it shatters on the ground, then I say, ‘Of course.’
When I understand the glass is already broken, every moment with it is precious.”
This is the essence of a Zen life.
This is the way to view everything in the phenomenal world — our possessions, our loved ones, and, above all, our own lives. This is the difficult art of loving nonattachment. How can we love others and engage in our lives wholeheartedly without clinging and without fear?
By knowing that the cup is already broken… The end is certain. This life of mine is already over. Everyone and everything is here and gone in one breath.
Becoming in tune with this fact helps you appreciate life and let go. What do we mean by appreciate and let go?
You live with intention. You don’t take things for granted. As some Zen teachers put it, you become intimate with your experience of life. But at the same time, you’re not attached. Everything is in a constant state of change and impermanence. The cup is already broken. We have to let go of the desire, the fear, and the need to have everything match our preferences in order to live with peace and ease. In other words, unconditional happiness (or unconditional okay-ness as I sometimes call it) means letting go of the conditions!
Letting go is letting go of living all the time as though you have to be doing something, solving something, or moving toward something, and just experiencing being.
If you want to be a leader, learn to love and let go in every moment.
On my third day at the Zen center in the hills, we started work.
I was in maintenance. And I couldn’t believe what I walked into. The bathhouse had a big pipe sticking out of the back. Beside it, someone had taken several big plastic trash cans, punched out the bottoms, and sawed them in half. There was a clog. This was not a clogged toilet. This was a clogged bathhouse. Think a clogged toilet multiplied by eight.
So we needed to open up the outflow pipe and get in there, but to do this, we needed to line up the cans and line them with plastic to create a funnel. Now, I’m no engineer, but I think the proper term for this is a DIY, semi-homemade crap chute.
So we started to make this happen. And I’m thinking to myself, “Go live as a Zen monk,” they said. “It will be peaceful,” they said. “It’ll be profound, easy, and stress-free”— yeah, real profound.
So we got in there hands-on, undid the pipe, and tried to navigate this flow of fluid and debris, and golly. And as we went about it, I remembered a Zen story.
It is said that a samurai asked a Zen master of his time to show him the meaning of Heaven and Hell.
The Zen master declared him and idiot and said he would never know such wisdom. The samauri filled with shame and rage and as he went to cut down the master, the master said “that is hell”.
The samurai was so full of gratitude and insight that the master risked his life to teach this way. He dropped to his knees in serenity and compassion. The master said, “that is heaven.”
These states exist right here. Heaven and Hell exist in your mind and heart. It’s up to you where you go.
So, in that moment, all I could do was let go. That’s what letting go is about. It’s not holding on to preferences or the conditions placed upon your happiness. And as I did this, I remember thinking to myself, “Isn’t this funny?”
I looked at Jeff knowingly and started to crack a smile, then a little laugh, and next thing you know, we were laughing hysterically as we did this. We were like two kids playing in the mud. And that morning wasn’t so bad.
If you want to be a leader, learn to laugh while you deal with life’s sh—.
It is said that a student asked the great Zen teacher Suzuki Roshi about their group. He said, “Each one of you is perfect just as you are, and you could use a little bit of improvement.”
What seems like a paradox perfectly captures what I think is the heart of leadership — again, leadership not exclusively in a corporate setting, but in your relationships and in life. It’s high challenge and high support. It’s not just about being nice. It’s about being compassionate, which can require accountability and helping others get better, both of which are difficult.
It’s really the unconditional love of a parent: “You’re perfect just as you are, but you could use a little bit of improvement.” I support you wholeheartedly, and I want you to be your best.
If you want to be a leader, remember that people are perfect and can use improvement.
There’s a story of the Buddha talking to his first and closest disciple. It goes something like this…
Ānanda — “Venerable sir, this is half of the holy life, that is, good friendship, good companionship, good comradeship.”
Buddha — “Not so, Ānanda! Not so, Ānanda! This is the entire holy life, Ānanda, that is, good friendship, good companionship, good comradeship…”
The symbol of the highest being in Zen is the Bodhisattva. This is essentially someone who has enlightenment. They’ve gone beyond the world of suffering, pain, or misfortune. But out of compassion for everyone else, they return to that realm and vow that they will not leave until they have helped everyone else be free from suffering.
While we think of Zen or monkshood as a lonesome endeavor, I looked back on the memories and things that had the greatest impact during my time at the Zen center, a lot of them had to do with teachers, friends, and social celebrations. And at the same time, the hardest part of my time there was being away from my tribe of friends and family in Western Pennsylvania.
So I believe that we do the “inner” work of Zen — working so hard on our own mind and heart so that we ultimately can engage with others in a way that deepens relationships and connection.
If you want to be a leader, remember that the real measure of wealth is the amount of love you give and receive.
Be where your feet are. Train your mind to live in awareness as that is the foundation for composure, insight, and enjoying the ride.
Contemplate that the cup is already broken — live with intention to appreciate and let go.
Laugh well while you do with life’s crap because heaven (pleasure) and hell (pain) exist largely within you.
And challenge and support people. Because true wealth is love and nothing more.
Remember these five things and you will be a leader in work and in life.
Your happiness nerd,
Jackson
