The Three Jewels of Leadership

Approximately 2500 years ago, Lao Tzu wrote the Tao Te Ching - which translates to modern English as “The Way”. While not the oldest spiritual/religious text, it is one of the first to define a specific pathway way for living. Its concepts can be found in Judaism, Christianity, Buddhism,  and Islam - as well as philosophies like Stoicism and Platonism.

One of the concepts is called, depending on translation, “The Three Treasures” or “The Crown Jewels”. According to Lao Tzu, these were the most essential of human traits. They are:

• Compassion
• Humility
• Moderation

These three traits show up repeatedly in history across all cultures, forms of government, world events. As mentioned, they are common themes in the world’s religions - but they are also common themes with other spiritual/mystical writers that are not part of any particular religion. A summary conclusion: there appears to be a timeless universality to these ideals. 

In the last 500 years, these traits were admired but were often considered to be non-essential - or “soft” leadership skills. Of more value and importance were charisma, vision, decisiveness, boldness - big personalities with big ideas. Yet, it’s those leaders with these treasures that often had the most impact - where their actual contribution was bigger than their reputation. Two particular 20th-century leaders that embodied these treasures were Dwight Eisenhower and Martin Luther King, Jr. 

In studying the frequent appearance of these three ideas, I noticed a specific pattern: they most often resurfaced during times of deep crisis or transitional periods. Eisenhower rose from an obscure staff officer to being America’s first President as a superpower. Although a superior orator, it was King’s application of these traits that propelled civil rights forward. 

As noted in my article “The Great Unsettling”, we are in another one of these evolutionary stages between the old and the new. So once again, these jewels have become essential leadership traits. Let’s break them down as contemporary leadership principles:

• Compassion - In modern leadership parlance, we call this Emotional Intelligence or empathy. Both are important, but compassion goes much deeper. Compassion is a genuine love for humanity - and for individual humans. Compassion keeps the people a leader is leading from becoming abstracts. Compassion reminds leaders that humans are not capital. With compassion, a leader is able to make decisions that make people the highest priority. In addition, compassion allows leaders to further tear down the wall between business and society. Compassion creates principled brands that attract principled people.
• Humility - In contemporary terms, this is frequently referred to as Servant Leadership. While a helpful model for understanding hierarchical leadership, humility goes deeper. Humility inspires leaders to surround themselves by people smarter and wiser. Humility reminds a leader that they might be wrong. Humility teaches a leader that planning is a fragile endeavor. Humility isn’t about thinking small. You still need to think big. It’s reminding yourself of your own smallness. It is the counterweight to arrogance.
• Moderation - This is one of those words that now means something different than it used to. Today, moderation is often seen as moderate; a kind of temperance to not over-indulge or swing too far one way or another. The traditional definition of moderation is more musical. It’s about finding harmony between competing dichotomies or paradoxes. It’s about blending. By this definition, moderation is an absolute leadership essential because it reduces binary thinking. It encourages leaders to find a third way. And matters of innovation and humanity are almost always found in a third way. 

For me, these three jewels are my measuring stick for leadership. I want to grow them in me (none of them come naturally for me). I want to be friends with people that embody them. If someone doesn’t have them, I won’t vote for them, support them, apologize for them. Not coincidentally, leaders that don’t demonstrate these traits are often defenders of institutions and systems.

The good news is that we all have these treasures inside of us. Sometimes they’re buried deep beneath the surface of the ego-mind, suffering, life struggles and more. But they are still in there. And the world needs as many of us as possible leading this way. So how do you get to them? I can only speak for my own experience …

Compassion comes from opening my heart to what another is feeling - especially if they are in pain. It comes from a deep, abiding self-love - and a fierce belief that the natural state of the universe is towards restoration.

Humility comes from practicing healthy skepticism with my own thoughts, feelings, impulses. It comes from touching truth and reality and understanding how little I actually have control over. My mantra for this: hold your plans in humble hands.

Moderation comes from curiosity; from seeing problems as puzzles or riddles. It comes from questioning formulas. In my inner world, it comes from making music with all my various dichotomies - especially between instinct and intuition, productivity and peace, planning and acceptance.

As I said, everyone’s journey to find these jewels is different - but all have the same starting point: if you want to find these crown jewels in your being, you have to go inward. They aren’t “out there.”