Recently Elected? Use ancient knowledge to embody great leadership

In May 2021, nearly 5000 people became local government officials at the elections across the UK, many of them for the first time. Winning the fight can be hard, but making the changes we fought for can be even harder.

To bring their ideas to life, politicians have to work in partnership — with their communities, businesses, the voluntary sector and the civil service. They all bring something important to the table, but they don’t all think the same way. No matter how passionately our newly appointed MPs and councillors believe in peaceful progress for all, the path ahead will be filled with frustrating obstacles. So how best to get round them?

Here’s a way of looking at the problem which I think can really help. The ancients believed our bodies are microcosms of the universe, so the answer lies within. I don’t mean politicians need to spend hours meditating or going all yogic in the pursuit of Zen (though that might well help) — I mean we can foresee the problems and solutions best if we think in terms of human bodies. Here’s how…

1 Bodies are shared experiences

If you want your ideas to survive, you need to find common ground. Bodies are wired to survive, and bodies are guaranteed to be common ground. They are our universal story.

What makes us (and life) interesting is that each of us is unique even though we share a general design. We hold strong views based on very different experiences, each of which is ‘normal’, and we like ‘normality’ because it feels safe and predictable. So the challenge is to see our differences not as a threat, but as normal.

Our bodies show us normal is lots of systems joining up lots of complicated parts. The lesson we’re getting is that difference is ESSENTIAL to survival. To be effective in elected office, or in partnership, you have to embrace diversity. The opportunity is there to create a culture of kinship, shared accountability and commitment. Ideas that feed on the incredible power of collective intelligence will grow strong.

2 Bodies are emotional

Politics is always tied to place, and the biggest mistake to make is to forget that places are full of feelings. Every place I’ve ever been is home to people with plans. In striving to be efficient and effective, we try to be ‘businesslike’ and set feelings aside. The problem is — bodies have nervous systems, and they’re going to work whether you like it or not.

You can have great vision, brilliant strategy and the best implementation plans, but as Peter Block puts it so well in his excellent Flawless Consulting, ‘people commit to decisions based on emotions, feelings, intuitions, trust and hope — logic, information and reason are never enough to win support for change on their own’.

So the challenge is to accept that we need patience to deal with emotions, and to make it feel safe to handle difficult questions in public. By taking emotions seriously, we create opportunities to perform together well through tensions, resistance and doubt. The key to resilient politics and partnerships is care.

3 Bodies need balance

Life is a balancing act full of both good and bad things. It’s messy, complicated and difficult, but we really want things to be clear, simple and easy.

Our bodies help us see compromise isn’t a dirty word, but an essential part of life. We can only function if we stay balanced as we move — something our bodies do reflexively in response to the terrain, the forces in play and the purpose of our movement.

Balance is key in our conscious choices as well — sugary fatty food gives an instant hit of pleasure, but too much and we’ll start to suffer, so we have to manage the conflicts and cravings. It’s the same in partnerships and in politics too. Balance and compromise are critical if you want to stay fit, healthy and strong.

The great challenge is to hold things lightly so we can adapt more readily to change. The good news is cooperation feels great — we get a kick out of teamwork and collaborative achievements make us feel inspired.

So if you use our understanding of what our bodies need and focus on our mutual interests in wellbeing, you’ll be growing trust. Seize opportunities to strengthen trust, and we learn it’s OK to wobble, developing a culture that helps out when we trip or fall. Strong leaders aren’t the ones who fight to the death, they’re the ones who build up our tolerance for upsets and compromise so we can find the balances we need.

4 Bodies shape the places we live

Everywhere we live, we shape the place according to our needs. Those ancient Roman thinkers started setting their ideas about human design in stone, and we’ve been referencing them ever since. The relevant point here is not the way places are built, but the way they host countless lives over a long period of time. Places are where our human stories are played out.

One of the most common frustrations for people in politics and partnerships is our tendency to re-invent the wheel. So whilst ideas from ancient times are still circulating, every generation makes it’s own way. The differences may seem minimal, pointless or foolish to those who went before, but every body needs to learn for itself.

It may be annoying at times, but it’s not just OK, it’s vital to progress. The challenge for politicians, and anyone working in partnership, is to allow for the learning as people come and go — including for ourselves.

We all arrive hoping to make change, and our own experiments may well work. But the greatest opportunity is to keep building on the best of what works. To do this, we need to keep a hold of the thread of learning over time.

So whether newly elected or not — if you’ve battled for an opportunity to make change and you’ve won, I’d urge you to do two things.

1) Give your thinking some body — you want to change lives, so pay close attention to the process of living. It’s helpful, and it matters.

2) Look after the body — organisations and places are bodies of people past, present and future who all want to survive and thrive. Invest in ways of making sense of things together, it’s our best hope for success.

In ancient history, ‘Know thyself’ was a familiar idea — it suggests the more we understand ourselves, the better we do together. I think this is still true today — the greatest leaders are those who can help us embrace all of our diversity, inside and out because they have the extaordinary power of empathy at their command.

In politics it takes courage to admit you’re only human — but we all are. So if you’re really passionate about making change, embrace the story of our bodies.

It’s the story that shows our progress will always be hampered by our complications, emotions, and vulnerabilities, but it’s also the awe inspiring story of humankind.