Leaders bring out the best in others, but successful visionaries go even further: they form lasting emotional bonds. They are the kinds of leaders we hold in our hearts. When people are emotionally bonded to you, they want to have contact with you. They want to be of service and share in your vision. Deep motivation then develops. True, lasting loyalties are formed.
To create such bonds, you must be willing to build real relationships. Share yourself. Take a personal interest in others, and notice their strengths. At the most basic level, you must display healthy emotional energy yourself. Avoid the three toxic A’s: authoritarianism, anger, and aloofness.
In every situation, make it a habit to ask yourself the key questions of emotional intelligence: How do I feel? How do they feel? What are the hidden stumbling blocks between us? A leader who can answer these questions will be in a position to create lasting emotional bonds.
Emotions are the invisible allies of successful visionaries. To carry out your vision, you need to master this next area. When you think of a powerful leader, do you imagine a strong authority figure, a boss who cannot be defied, whose disapproval is to be feared? Traditionally, leaders have sought to exercise authority, control, and power. In the long run this strategy doesn’t succeed; when motivated by fear, people perform either reluctantly or not at all. A leader working with positive emotions, however, is able to unfold the potential of everyone under her. If you are truly the soul of the group, you lead and serve at the same time. When others sense that you are willing to give of yourself, your influence as a leader will expand tremendously.
Successful visionaries in all ages forged emotional bonds, often instinctively and without a conscious agenda. We can tell that a bond exists because of the behavior of those around them:
They want to be in the leader’s presence.
They want to be of service.
They want to perform at their best, which brings them closer to the leader.
They want to share in the leader’s vision.
They want to participate in the leader’s success.
None of this behavior is slavish; it’s how a group functions when it feels inspired. Inspiration begins with emotional commitment. Stop for a moment, and consider a leader who inspires you. If you were offered the opportunity to be close to that person, wouldn’t you want to have personal contact, share in her vision, and be fulfilled by her success? These are qualities of emotional bonding.
Emotional bonding isn’t the same as being touchy-feely, overly personal, or wearing your heart on your sleeve. It’s about working from a high level of emotional intelligence, which has become an aspect of practical psychology. To be more specific, some basic principles grow out of emotional intelligence, allowing you to be emotionally clear and effective. These are skills that any successful visionary must possess.
Emotional Freedom: In order to bond effectively with others, you must be emotionally free. This means, first of all, being free of guilt, resentment, grievances, anger, and aggression. You aren’t required to be perfect, only to be clear about your own underlying feelings. We all have negative emotions, but a leader deals with them effectively, for the good of the group. He doesn’t give mixed signals or indulge in outbursts and moods—and if he does, he quickly makes amends. Only in clarity can you trust yourself emotionally and have others trust you.
To reach a point of clarity, it’s very useful to:
• Stay aware of your body. Sensations of tightness, constriction, stiffness, discomfort, and pain are indications that negative emotions are asking to be acknowledged and released.
• Witness your feelings. Emotions suck us in and inevitably color our judgment. But if you observe your emotions objectively, as passing events whose influence will diminish over time, you can resist being drawn in by them.
• Express your feelings. This means, first and foremost, expressing them to yourself when you know that they are negative and potentially destructive. Learn how to release your negativity in private, and be diligent about it. Don’t let anger and resentment linger just because you have walked away. Unless you actively acknowledge and release them, they will build up and fester.
• Take responsibility for what you feel. When someone else makes a mistake, it is her responsibility to correct it, but it is your responsibility to handle how you feel about it—that emotion doesn’t belong to anyone but you. It often helps to keep a journal of your emotional life, both positive and negative. Give yourself credit when you’ve handled a tough situation without blowing up, blaming, or turning resentful. Take responsibility for the times when your emotions had an adverse effect on your leadership. Journals are good places to be totally honest and admit your flaws, with the aim of improving on them.
• Share your feelings with people you trust. Everyone needs a loved one or close confidant who will listen, understand, and offer a different view.
• Find additional perspectives. Emotions are closely tied to beliefs, ego, and past conditioning. When you get angry at someone, you are also saying, “I’m right.” Defuse this self-centered tendency by asking for as many viewpoints as possible. Finding out what others think won’t make you wrong; it will broaden your vistas.
Doing these things is not just good for you. When you’re emotionally free, it makes other people comfortable and happy to be around you. It energizes them, and encourages them to be clearer about their own feelings. Brain research shows that mothers and children bond through a primal mechanism known as limbic resonance that entrains two brains: the same emotional centers of the brain, the limbic region, are in sync, which leads to sharing biological rhythms, like heart rate and respiration. If they are truly entrained, mother and child can sense what each other is feeling, and even thinking, without an exchange of words. The same mechanism remains intact as we mature; you can entrain with others at a deep biological level, which includes sharing the openness of emotional freedom. Otherwise, stress and hidden negativity can serve to pull two people apart.
Shared Enthusiasm: Turn “this is great for me” into “this is great for all of us.” Unless your enthusiasm reaches out to touch others, it may even have a negative effect. People aren’t moved to help a leader if they don’t think they are also helping themselves. (You can’t help but wince and laugh at the smarmy manager in the television series The Office when he says, “The bad news is that there are going to be layoffs. The good news is that I’m being promoted.”) Be sincere. Let your success be “our” success if it’s deserved. Otherwise, the best maxim is not to look great but to let others make you great.
Genuine Caring for Others: Offering someone five minutes of praise and nodding “How’s it going?” when you pass in the hall isn’t the same as bonding. You have to care. The same conditions that you care about in your life apply to others. Look the person in the eye, forget everything else, and respond naturally.
Willingness to Build a Relationship: At bottom, all relationships are built on what two people have in common. The strongest adult bonds are between equals. You can’t be part of everyone’s family, but you can make others feel tied to you as a kindred spirit. At the soul level this is the only truth, because all souls are equal. It’s the roles we play that enforce the illusion of inequality. As a leader, it’s your job to play a role, but you must be attentive to stepping out of your role once in a while. Make contact for the sheer pleasure of it, for the fun of spending time together.
Reinforcing the Strengths of Others: Again and again it has been shown that the best leaders focus on the strengths of their followers. They build a team by assessing who does what well. They encourage each person to develop his or her best qualities. But that’s just the beginning. People want to be praised for their strengths, specifically and personally. Walking past a machine operator and saying “Good job” is formulaic. Far better to know what he does well, point it out, and show that the job was worth doing.
Increasing the Self-esteem of Others: Self-esteem consists of three basic elements. People feel good about themselves, first, if they feel that they are doing good work at a job that is worthwhile; second, if they developed a positive self-image while growing up; and third, if they are living up to their core values. Knowing this, do your best to help those around you feel they are appreciated, and that they have every reason to appreciate themselves.
Nonviolent Communication: Removing any sense of threat allows you to manage situations in a way that fulfills people’s needs. If you see stress, distrust, apathy, hidden hostility, or any other sign of resistance in the people you are communicating with, something is working against you on the emotional level. All change threatens the status quo. Inertia fights against vision. You can reduce the level of threat by looking at yourself closely and making sure that the following things are true:
You respect differences of opinion, even those that seem to undermine the success of your vision.
You don’t need others to change in order to be happy.
You are coming from a place of peace.
You genuinely want to understand why others are resisting you, without passing blame or judgment on them.
You want change to benefit everyone, or as many people as possible.
You can walk away from setbacks without being hostile to those who oppose you today—they may become your allies tomorrow.
Conflict Resolution: We are all emotionally involved in our deepest beliefs. When two people cannot agree, the cause is almost always at the feeling level: someone is stuck. Negotiation is the only way to move them. When you can negotiate with your opponents at the emotional level, the passion behind your vision has a chance to speak to their hearts.
Using emotional intelligence as a negotiating tool requires the following:
You respect the opposition, and you see that they feel respected.
You remain firm but flexible.
You genuinely feel that the other side has a right to their position.
Win-win is your ultimate goal. Everyone should walk away feeling they gained something.
You want the best for your opponents. Don’t aim to get the most from them in terms of concessions.
You remove right and wrong from your vocabulary during the negotiations. Like it or not, everyone around the table feels equally righteous.
You see the other side of the coin, that every party feels equally aggrieved. A feeling of injustice doesn’t exist on your side alone.
You speak personally, from the heart. This requires you to present yourself in a simple, appropriate, and balanced way.
Agree to forgive and to ask for forgiveness. Let the faults of others fade into the past while taking the blame for your own faults here and now.
Never turn the argument to ideology or religion. These are off limits, because no matter how diplomatic you may be, the other party will feel threatened.
Feelings either fulfill a need or they don’t. A leader always keeps that in mind. She isn’t here to encourage any emotion for its own sake. Each of the seven situations presented in the first chapter has an emotional side that is the best clue to the underlying need that must be filled. But you have to recognize it first.
Emotions: Fear, anxiety, uncertainty, feeling threatened
Your strategy: Bring the group’s hidden anxiety out in the open. Provide your people with reasons not to be afraid. Lay out a path that will lead to stability. Ask those who are strongest to share the source of their strength. Promise that everyone will get through the crisis, and keep that promise as quickly as you can. Offer reassurance and help through one-on-one connections.
Emotions: Lack of motivation, apathy, sense of failure and inadequacy
Your strategy: Share your personal enthusiasm with the group. Reinforce their small successes. Make it clear that all victories are “our” victories. Describe the new possibilities that are opening up. Specify how each person can succeed according to his or her strengths. Assign a single task or project that is likely to succeed, making sure it’s a success the person can be proud of.
Emotions: Jealousy, resentment, divisiveness, selfishness
Your strategy: Locate one emotion that everyone can share (pride, self-worth, satisfaction in doing one’s best, mastery of a difficult task) and then ask for agreement on that feeling from everyone. Don’t give up until agreement is reached. Bring up the topic of divisiveness without assigning blame. Point out the reasons why everybody wins if the group acts together. Be patient, but if you have to, weed out chronic complainers and backsliders. Negotiate differences by bringing rivals together in private. Give strong negative feedback to any public display of fractiousness.
Emotions: Loneliness, isolation, feeling misunderstood and unheard
Your strategy: Show that you care about everyone in the group. The whole group is hurt when someone feels left out, but this feeling isn’t something to discuss publicly. Sit down in private with the alienated member and hear what she has to say. Keep this contact going until she rejoins the group. Respect everyone’s right to privacy, but make it clear that participation is mandatory. Show patience. Naturally, not everyone will participate to the same degree. Monitor the wallflowers by asking if they agree, and how they feel. Engage them, but don’t confront them directly (e.g., “Adam, want to join the rest of us?” “It would be great if you had an idea, Alicia.”). Instead, keep it simple and open-ended (“Adam, how does all of this sit with you?” “I’d like to hear what’s on everyone’s mind—Alicia?”).
Emotions: Stagnatation, boredom, stifledness, feeling in a rut
Your strategy: Openly acknowledge to the group that a fresh wind must blow. Set time aside for blue-sky sessions, where everyone can let imagination run free. Make it clear that good new ideas will be rewarded. Never put down any sign of creativity and imagination. Don’t point out obstacles, budgetary limits, or impracticalities. Do surprising things that bring smiles. Say “astonish me” and mean it—you want everyone to stretch and feel safe when they do.
Emotions: Guilt, emptiness, lack of guidance, aimlessness
Your strategy: Speak to the group from the heart. Inspire from the soul. Share personal stories about peak experiences in your life. Ask for the same from others. Don’t step on other people’s moral values or act self-righteous about yours. Focus on the unlimited potential for growth in everyone. Put your highest values—compassion, love, loyalty, honesty, and integrity—into practice by acting as role model. If it seems appropriate, ask for group silence, meditation, or prayer. Don’t be afraid of an uplifting moment. Always be straightforward. Appreciate the innocence hidden in everyone.
Emotions: Yearning, seeking, the desire for more from life
Your strategy: The word strategy isn’t really appropriate in this case. You are here to spread the light, and you do that by being in the light. You understand and accept all people. You feel compassion in all situations. Now you can spread your influence simply by being. If you have found your soul, your source in pure consciousness, people will sense your state of bliss and unity, lifting their spirits without effort on your part. Through you, they will sense that inner peace and complete safety are possible.
Let me tell you a story about how I saw for myself the power of emotional bonds. When I was a boy growing up in India, my father was an army doctor stationed in Jabalpur, a large town close to the center of the country. On one particular day the whole of Jabalpur was aroused to a fever pitch by news of an impending visit by India’s prime minister, Jawaharlal Nehru. India had been born as a country in 1947, just a few months after I was born, and as its first elected leader, Nehru was somewhere between a father and a saint to the Indian people.
As Nehru’s motorcade approached on the appointed day, a ripple of awe and excitement ran through the streets as if Gandhi himself were coming, and indeed Nehru had inherited Gandhi’s mantle. I remember our neighbors climbing lampposts just to catch a glimpse of Nehru’s car; treetops along the street sagged under the weight of little boys hanging from their branches. My mother had dressed in her best sari, and it didn’t matter whom she had turned to—a maid, a best friend, or the wife of the head of hospital where my father worked—nobody could talk about anything but Nehru.
When the motorcade finally wound its way through the streets, it passed directly in front of our house. Then something remarkable happened. My mother had found a place in the front of the crowd. Earlier she had confided to us that she was certain Nehru would notice her among the tens of thousands thronging his route, and although we had teased her, her confidence remained unshaken. And when the moment came, she actually did catch Nehru’s eye! He paused for a second, and then reached for the single red rose he always wore in his lapel. He tossed it to her. Even in all the tumult my mother caught it, and when the parade was over, she took it inside and carefully placed it in her best vase.
All that afternoon our house was filled with people coming over to marvel at the rose, the kind you could buy in the market stalls for a few rupees. But because Nehru had thrown it with his own hands, it had taken on his mystical status. And because my mother had caught it, so had she. People who saw her every day now lowered their voices to a whisper in her presence and looked on her with reverence. And when I looked at my mother, I saw that her brush with greatness seemed to have given her a new sense of herself, too. At the day’s end Nehru’s rose was saved for posterity, carefully pressed between the pages of a book like a sacred relic.
Imagine yourself inspiring that kind of love and loyalty. It’s what every successful visionary does.
Political greatness comes to only a few, but most of us will find some leadership opportunities at our place of work, where it’s not unusual to find a vacuum of emotional intelligence. In an extensive study of worker satisfaction, the Gallup research organization found that the workplace remains very impersonal. According to Gallup, just 17 percent of employees report that their manager “has made an investment in our relationship.” You don’t have to be the leader of a nation to heal this situation!
With the last two needs—for higher guidance and for spiritual fulfillment—we move beyond emotional intelligence. At this deeper level we are working in the realm of spiritual intelligence, which gets us in touch with love, compassion, joy, and inner peace. These values are transpersonal. They belong to humanity as a whole. Spiritual intelligence doesn’t address one specific situation. It’s about finding the sacred in everyday life. You come from a place of love, joy, and equanimity because you are in touch with your own soul.
Spiritual intelligence is a matter not of learning skills but of finding who you are at the soul level. We are all conscious; we all know what it’s like to have inner peace, silence, trust, and joy. Where do these experiences come from? If they come from the very core of our being, from the soul, then it’s only natural to want to go there and experience ourselves.
Exploring who you are at a deeper level than your everyday thoughts is the true definition of meditation. At the beginning it’s enough to practice a simple meditation like the one that follows:
Set aside twenty minutes in the morning and the evening when you can sit alone in a quiet place without being interrupted or disturbed. Turn off your phone and your beeper. Close your eyes and do nothing for five minutes, letting your breathing rate settle naturally. Observe your mind chattering away, but don’t interact with it. Let your thoughts and feelings simply be what they are.
Now place your attention gently in the middle of your chest. As you do, follow your breath as it goes in and out. Feel each exhalation as if it were releasing the breath from your whole body; feel each inhalation as if it were spreading your in-breath to every part of your body. Don’t impose a tempo on your breathing, fast or slow. Don’t try for deep or shallow breaths, but have the intention that over time your breathing will become subtler and more refined. Continue this meditation for fifteen minutes. It’s okay to fall asleep: this just means you have to catch up on your rest before you can meditate. At the end of the session, take a minute to come out of the meditative state; don’t jump immediately into action.
Getting comfortable with this simple practice is taking the first big step toward spiritual intelligence. By meditating every day, you will allow the soul to infuse daily life. As this happens, you will see a host of changes in yourself, such as:
Unexpected moments of joy
A sense of peace in the midst of activity
The ability to see yourself clearly
More reasons to appreciate others, and fewer reasons to criticize
Less need to control
Greater trust that the right answers will appear
A willingness to go with the flow
A deep sense of belonging
Once you begin to have such experiences, you will effortlessly and naturally extend them outside yourself. It will become clear to you that whatever is inside you must be inside everyone. At the level of the soul, everyone possesses the same qualities. The spiritually intelligent leader acts on these qualities even when they may not be much in evidence. She gives each person space to change. One might call this attitude “nurturing in silence.” At this point a leader has gone beyond the immediate situation; she is accepting fully the one role that matters most, to be the soul of the group.
When emotional intelligence merges with spiritual intelligence, human nature is transformed. Such a leader embodies what every wisdom tradition calls “the light.” The light gives rise to love and compassion, even when the person shows no outward signs of acting from the soul. Rather, the invisible powers of Being—the pure consciousness at the base of all existence—begin to show that they are real. Struggle gives way to ease, and conflict yields to complete trust that the best outcome will manifest. Your slightest desire is supported by the universe and made manifest. Every action is part of the flow of life. The first day you meditate, you open a doorway to the light. You ask your soul for more awareness, and your wish is granted. The soul is nothing but light, yet that is a metaphor—the real substance of the soul is awareness.
Awareness is unlimited. The emotional bonds that link you to another person are bonds of light. At the soul level you are already united. Your role as a leader is to help others see that this is so.
Emotional intelligence grows through perception. Look around at your present situation (at work, in the family, with close friends) and observe it from the level of feeling. Your heart will tell you when other people are emotionally distant from you. The signs are hidden or obvious tension; the other people don’t seem relaxed; they don’t laugh with you, or look you in the eye. They don’t seem to want to be around you or share in your success. How can you turn this distance into a bond?
Today your assignment is to take on the task of changing the emotional tone in your life wherever it isn’t working. Look at the behaviors listed below. Pick one to apply today, and over the course of the next month choose each of the ten behaviors at least once.
As you apply these behaviors on a daily basis, turning emotional distance into a bond, be easy with yourself and with the other person. Be sincere; don’t overdo it. Above all, don’t do it because you want to be right or to prove that you can make someone like you; your aim is more objective than that. You aim to develop the emotional intelligence necessary to go beyond your old unhealthy patterns. To value emotional bonding is to bring yourself and someone you care about in from the cold, even if it doesn’t directly benefit you.
Emotionally speaking, you have only three kinds of situations with people: those you can fix, those you put up with, and those you must walk away from. As a leader, it’s your duty to find as many ways to fix a situation as you can. Most people put up with too much, and when they reach a point of unbearable frustration, they walk out. By contrast, you can fix a situation through emotional intelligence and skillful coping with emotions. By closing the gap that isolates people from one another, you are proving that the emotional side of life can be fruitful. Overcoming our fear and inner resistance leads to shared joy.