{"id":3123,"date":"2017-05-05T12:53:24","date_gmt":"2017-05-05T19:53:24","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/markccrowley.com\/?p=3123"},"modified":"2017-11-16T17:21:33","modified_gmt":"2017-11-17T01:21:33","slug":"ancient-chinese-philosophers-teach-harvard-students-a-modern-way-to-think","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/staging-wmplo.xyz\/mark-c-divi5\/ancient-chinese-philosophers-teach-harvard-students-a-modern-way-to-think\/","title":{"rendered":"Ancient Chinese Philosophers Teach Harvard Students A Modern Way To Think"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a>One of the most popular classes at Harvard University today is a deep dive into the wisdom of the great Chinese philosophers, scholars who lived over 2,000 years ago.<\/p>\n

We all know their names \u2013 Confucius, Mencius, Zhangzi and Lao Tzu \u2013 Eastern sages who devoted their lives to exploring what it takes to flourish in life, and who often landed on counter-intuitive conclusions that stand in stark contrast to traditional Western thinking.<\/p>\n

\u201cYour lives are about to be profoundly changed,\u201d Michael Puett tells his students on the first day of class.\u00a0The professor begins every new semester knowing that the time-tested and spiritually informed ideas of the Chinese scholars will likely fully transform how his students go on to operate in the world.<\/p>\n

After taking Puett\u2019s class as a Ph.D. student, Christine Gross-Loh astutely realized that far more people than Ivy League students needed an introduction to classical Chinese philosophy.\u00a0And she urged Puett to collaborate with her on a book \u2013 and to effectively make his research available to us all.<\/p>\n

Just recently, the pair published, \u201cThe Path: What Chinese Philosophers Can Teach Us About The Good Life,<\/em>\u201c and it\u2019s become a New York Times<\/em> best seller.<\/p>\n

While nowhere is it clear in the title, many of the book\u2019s most provocative ideas also have direct application to workplace leadership.\u00a0After fully digesting The Path<\/em> \u2013 and then spending considerable time discussing it with Gross-Loh, I’ve spotlighted three pieces of ancient wisdom that are not only likely to challenge your personal views on how best to excel in the world, they might just send your own<\/em> life into a positive new trajectory:<\/p>\n

1.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0The World Is A Messy, Fragmented Place Filled With Messy, Fragmented People<\/strong><\/p>\n

Most of us see the world as a harmonious whole \u2013 stable and mostly under our control. But in the view of the ancients, this is pure illusion and entirely wishful thinking.<\/p>\n

Instead of being cohesive and reliable, they saw the cosmos as fragmented, chaotic and very often messy.\u00a0\u201cOur lives are messy, our actions are messy and our personalities are certainly messy,\u201d Gross-Loh told me. \u201cWe tend to behave as if the world is fully coherent and this assumption affects all our decisions. Consequently, we\u2019re often taken by surprise whenever things don\u2019t work out as we expected.\u201d<\/p>\n

Importantly, the Chinese philosophers weren\u2019t offering a doom-and-gloom projection of things; they were simply realists.\u00a0In their view, once we accept that nothing is ever stable, we\u2019re able to live far more expansive lives.<\/p>\n

Ming And The Unpredictability Of Life<\/u><\/p>\n

In the Chinese wisdom tradition, the word \u201cMing\u201d asserts that we live in a capricious universe. Translated into English, the word variously means \u201cfate,\u201d \u201cdestiny\u201d or \u201cheaven\u2019s commands.\u201d<\/p>\n

In one sense, Ming explains the tragedies and setbacks that befall our lives no matter how thorough our plans or preparations.\u00a0Ming reminds us that our best-made decisions are never guaranteed against arbitrary, sometimes calamitous events.<\/p>\n

But while an understanding of Ming teaches us to maturely anticipate that difficulties in life will occur, it also tells us to be open to windfalls \u2013 the unexpected, synchronistic opportunities that occur just as often in life.<\/p>\n

According to the ancients, infinite potential exists in the universe.\u00a0But when we hold too tightly to a plan, or to rigid expectations of outcomes, we unwittingly undermine our faculties for recognizing the unexpected opportunities Ming sends our way.<\/p>\n

As the administrator for the September 11 Victim\u2019s Fund, attorney Kenneth Fineberg spent nearly two years working with people whose lives were suddenly and irrevocably changed by the World Trade Center and Pentagon tragedies. In a recent PBS interview, he offered this Ming-based insight:<\/p>\n

\u201cYoung people come to me all the time with their resum\u00e9s saying this is what they\u2019re going to do two years from now, four years from now, six years from now.\u00a0I tell them don\u2019t plan so far ahead. Life has a way of changing the best laid plans.\u00a0You may think you know what you\u2019re going to be doing a year from now or two years from now.\u00a0I don\u2019t think I plan more than two or three weeks ahead because everybody gets curveballs one day or another.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n

2.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0We Make Our Best Choices When We Ask Our Hearts To Weigh In<\/strong><\/p>\n

When it comes to making life\u2019s most important decisions, we\u2019re taught in the West to rely solely on our rational minds.<\/p>\n

Aligned to this, businesses have repeatedly chosen the brainiest people for leadership roles \u2013 purely rational thinkers who masterfully marginalize their feelings and emotions, and make their \u201cbest\u201d choices through careful calculation and hypothesis.\u00a0They take comfort in the belief that by reducing experiences to measureable data, they can somehow master chance and defy fate.<\/p>\n

But according to the ancients, especially Mencius, excluding the heart in decision-making is massively misinformed and self-defeating.<\/p>\n

Mencius believed that what truly distinguishes society\u2019s most effective people is their determination to remain closely in touch with their emotional side. Human beings function as logical beings and<\/em> intuitive beings, he asserted \u2013 and only when we use both can we maximize our effectiveness.<\/p>\n

Xin And The Heart-Mind<\/u><\/p>\n

It\u2019s remarkable, really, that the Chinese word for mind and heart is actually one and the same \u2013 \u201cXin.\u201d<\/p>\n

This tells us is that at least two millenniums ago, Chinese wordsmiths captured a societal belief that the human heart and mind (\u201cheart-mind\u201d) must work in partnership to be successful.\u00a0Our wisest choices cannot come from thinking things through rationally alone; they only can come from a complete understanding of what our \u201cheart-mind\u201d knows is the right thing to do.<\/p>\n

Our fear in Western civilization is that our emotions will hijack our choices.\u00a0But the truth is emotions are involved with every decision we make. Consider questions like, \u201cWhere shall I live?\u00a0\u201cWho should I marry?\u201d \u201cWhere would I like to go on vacation?\u201d<\/p>\n

It\u2019s impossible to make purely logical choices.\u00a0\u201cAnd so what the ancients advised,\u201d Gross-Loh told me, \u201cwas for us to train our emotions to guide us and become our ally.\u00a0When your heart-mind is developed, you are guided intuitively \u2013 and you instinctively make sounder, fuller choices.\u201d<\/p>\n

The human heart is a connection to deep insight. So the next time you have a big decision to make, thoroughly weigh your options.\u00a0And right before you make the call, ask your heart how it makes you feel.\u00a0As Mencius said, \u201cAt the center of your being, you\u2019ll have the answer.\u201d<\/p>\n

3.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0Softness, Not Hardness Makes Leaders Infinitely More Influential<\/strong><\/p>\n

Traditional management theory espouses that power over people drives the greatest human performance.\u00a0In many workplaces today, we continue to tightly manage worker activities, and leverage fear and pressure as means to motivating productivity.<\/p>\n

But if the ancients were alive today, they\u2019d be insisting we have it all wrong.<\/p>\n

The concept they all shared was that true strength never relies on domination over others. In their view, leaders who rely on this kind of power build resentment, discontent, and have the inevitable effect of influencing people to work against them.<\/p>\n

In his classic text, the Tao Te Ching<\/em>, Lao Tzu teaches us that there are irrefutable laws of the universe (he calls them \u201cThe Way\u201d), and that oppressing and dishonoring the well-being of human beings inherently violates what nature intended.\u00a0Helping others to thrive, all of the ancients were convinced, is the surest way of earning their support and commitment.<\/p>\n

According to the Chinese philosophers, true leadership strength lies in what we instinctively judge today as being weakness:<\/p>\n