Bodhisattva Leadership:
Inspiring and guiding others toward awakeningOur work practice includes strategically and sustainably governing, managing and administering the functions of the temple according to Buddha’s ten qualities of a good ruler and Dogen’s instructions for temple administrators. It also includes developing practice leadership in the lay and ordained sangha.
Being a steward of the sangha in any capacity is part of our work practice. This kind of service is not simply volunteer work at or for the temple. It’s a practice of investigating interconnectedness by becoming intimate with the life of the community. Thus it’s an opportunity to develop our own practice while offering our insights and expertise to the sangha, and also a chance to study bodhisattva leadership, which we can take out of the temple and into the other leadership roles we assume in our lives.
What is bodhisattva leadership?
Whether you serve on a dharma center board or you're a practice leader, you're working with questions like these: What can I do with my own karmic body, speech and mind to create a sustainable situation here that keeps the practice of buddhas and ancestors alive in the world? How do I help make sure their practice is still going on a hundred years from now (because a hundred years from now is now)? What is leadership in the context of Zen practice? Leadership is usually associated with power, the ability--or the right--to control people or resources, or produce a certain effect. All kinds of other ideas can get mixed into leadership: authority, influence, energy, force, efficacy. Bodhisattva leadership is the kind of leadership that each and every practitioner exercises by simply embodying the practice and demonstrating living by vow. It’s what allows us to make good decisions, moment by moment, for ourselves and others, on a micro and a macro scale. There is no bodhisattva who is not a leader Bodhisattva and leadership can’t be separated One important aspect of leadership is helping to create wholesome conditions for awakening. That can mean ringing bells, cooking meals and giving dharma talks, and it can mean being an ambassador for the temple, a steward of resources, helping to set policies and manage staff and volunteers – in other words, a board member. One of the themes of our sangha life here at Sanshin is that we aspire to understand our practice and to practice our understanding. That means that it's not enough just to read a lot of books about how to run a successful nonprofit or how to be a good leader. We need to demonstrate our understanding of sangha through practice. For the bodhisattva, the aspiration to lead comes from the aspiration to serve. If as leaders we simply want the power, or we want to be seen as insiders, that's about greed, anger and ignorance. Bodhisattvas serve because they want to make it possible for people to practice now and in the future. We are bodhisattvas enabling the cultivation of bodhisattvas. Leaders need followers in order to lead. The sangha is free to choose who to listen to and who to take direction from, and folks are free to leave the community at any time. As leaders, we take the needs and input of the sangha, combine them with our own karmic circumstances, and do real-life concrete things. These things demonstrate our values, our judgment and our competence. Bodhisattva leaders hold wisdom and compassion in balance, and here's why that's a challenge. As a result of practice, they arouse great compassion for all beings. They know about the origin of suffering and they hear the cries of beings who are in the grip of the three poisons. They can see that this is a characteristic of this karmic human form, and liberation is not easy, so they feel great compassion for everyone. At the same time, they know because of their profound wisdom that the five skandhas are empty. There are no beings and no one to save, and no one for whom they need to feel compassion, and as that wisdom arises, the compassion starts to decrease. Then immediately, they're again aware of the cries of the world, and compassion comes back up. This is how bodhisattva leaders move through the world. When running a nonprofit within the samsaric world, we see this sort of thing all the time. We have to balance emotional needs with rational needs. We want everyone to feel heard, but not everyone can get the outcome they want. In a religious community, we also balance personal growth with organizational growth. In other words, sometimes we do the less efficient thing because it allows people to deepen their practice (but we do that with intention, not because we're disorganized). In a dharma center, somebody has to step up and take the leadership necessary to keep the place functioning and the practice available to the sangha. Although that's part of our work practice, it's not just volunteer work. It is a practice in itself, with opportunities to actively engage with the community in this time and place while ensuring the future of the temple and of Soto Zen itself. |
How can we help?Sanshin offers support to the small sanghas in our region that would like assistance with organization development. For example, several of our directors recently formed a support squad to help a dharma center board regroup after the teacher died. Visit this page to learn more about our resources for small groups.
Hoko's four corners of sangha practice
Zen Learners Association: resources for sangha dynamics, board service and misconduct |
Carrying the vision
Part of the wisdom/compassion balance of board members and practice leaders is developing and carrying the vision for the organization, but that doesn't mean that the vision only belongs to you. You're in the best position with the most information to make decisions about direction, and that's what the community has asked you to take on, but until the vision is shared, the sangha doesn't have a common identity and it can't come together and go in a single direction.
There are two reasons the shared vision is important. One is that it indicates where the practice is going -- what we do here as a sangha. It says to people, If this is the practice you want to do, join us and let's practice together. If we can't articulate that, then sangha members don't know what to expect and they will start asking for things we can't do. The other reason that the shared vision is important is that it makes it possible for people to work together toward the same organizational goals. That includes board, staff and sangha, and we need all three of these groups working together if we're going to do anything meaningful and significant. If sangha members don't really know what the leadership is working on, they don't have any stake in that and they don't know how to offer resources -- and they don't know how to get out of the way. So: nothing much happens in a sangha if the leadership doesn't have some kind of compelling, inspiring vision that makes folks aspire to see that thing realized. Vision gives us a purpose and makes us vital parts of the sangha rather than just butts on cushions.
Part of the wisdom/compassion balance of board members and practice leaders is developing and carrying the vision for the organization, but that doesn't mean that the vision only belongs to you. You're in the best position with the most information to make decisions about direction, and that's what the community has asked you to take on, but until the vision is shared, the sangha doesn't have a common identity and it can't come together and go in a single direction.
There are two reasons the shared vision is important. One is that it indicates where the practice is going -- what we do here as a sangha. It says to people, If this is the practice you want to do, join us and let's practice together. If we can't articulate that, then sangha members don't know what to expect and they will start asking for things we can't do. The other reason that the shared vision is important is that it makes it possible for people to work together toward the same organizational goals. That includes board, staff and sangha, and we need all three of these groups working together if we're going to do anything meaningful and significant. If sangha members don't really know what the leadership is working on, they don't have any stake in that and they don't know how to offer resources -- and they don't know how to get out of the way. So: nothing much happens in a sangha if the leadership doesn't have some kind of compelling, inspiring vision that makes folks aspire to see that thing realized. Vision gives us a purpose and makes us vital parts of the sangha rather than just butts on cushions.
