Sports as Leadership Theater and Recognizing Near Enemies
episode
The Curiosity Shop with Brené Brown and Adam Grant
38 min
2 speakers
8 chapters
transcribed 2 months ago
Transcript
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What is the main topic discussed in this episode?
Hey everyone, it's Adam Grant. While The Curiosity Shop is on summer hiatus, we're revisiting a few conversations that Brene and I really love, and we think you're going to enjoy them too. On today's episode, we're sharing a conversation we originally recorded during Brene's Dare to Lead series on Strong Ground. We explore the idea of far and near enemies, why sports can be one of our greatest leadership classrooms, and what both can teach us about leading with courage and clarity. Thanks for listening, and don't forget, new episodes of The Curiosity Shop return on July 30th.
Welcome to The Curiosity Shop.
A show from the Vox Media Podcast Network.
Hi, everyone. I'm Brene Brown, and this is Dare to Lead. I am back for my second episode with the one and only Adam Grant, and we are digging into Strong Ground, my new book on leadership, and I'm excited to be here, and I'm always nervous to see what Adam's going to ask me today. How are you, Adam?
Nervous.
How do near enemies affect our values?
Yeah, I get kind of nervous.
I dared to read, so... I have so many new questions for you. I felt a tension in the early parts of the book. And then I realized, oh, this is one of the paradoxes you're writing about that I'm supposed to get better at accepting and living with as opposed to wanting to solve. But I feel there's a tension between adopting a set of routines to make sure that you have your strong ground and also being willing to break your routines. so that you don't get trapped in the past. And I just wondered, I wondered as I was reading early on, how do you think about navigating that paradox?
I think, are you familiar with the Buddhist concept of near enemy?
I've heard you talk about it, but I don't think I understand it well enough. They're near and far enemies. I know that.
Right. So you would say that, like, if compassion is the virtue, the far enemy is indifference. But the near enemy, the thing that kind of masquerades around like compassion, but is actually dangerous, would be pity. Right? So...
Oh, that's good.
Right.
And so I would think that... That's very good.
Yeah. So pity, and I think the same could be true. The virtue might be empathy. The far enemy is not caring about someone at all, but the near enemy to empathy is sympathy. Not feeling with someone, but feeling sorry for them because that puts you in a place of superiority, right?
Yeah.
When you talk about this paradox that you're talking about, sometimes the near enemy, the Buddhist frame of near enemy really helps me because I think the near enemy of discipline is rigidity.
Yes. Yes. Nailed it.
I think rigidity masquerades as discipline. But what you would find in the near enemy column is kind of ego protection stuff. And discomfort protection.
What is the significance of paradoxical thinking in leadership?
So I think discipline... When discipline fails to deliver agility... and the capacity to reflect and change, it's no longer discipline.
Oh, I love this. Okay, so this is making sense out of... I have a colleague who's a very serious athlete. And I was... I don't know if I was appalled or... just shell-shocked to find out that he had a rule that there was no noise allowed at his house after 8 p.m. That's how you think you have to be in order to be an elite athlete? No. And he thought he was being disciplined. I think you've just reframed that as rigidity.
Yeah. I think that's rigidity. And I think that's I don't think that's discipline. Because I think discipline would mean, especially if you've got kids in the house, I think discipline would be, I need to develop a practice that increases my focus or increases whatever I'm trying to do after eight o'clock that allows the human beings around me to be human beings. That's discipline. Yeah. When you start to control the environment... in order to protect yourself, that becomes rigidity.
So well put.
I don't think we should underestimate the helpfulness of the near enemy, far enemy Buddhist concept when we think about our values. So like, what are the values that we really hold the most dearest? We're always clear on the opposite of those values. the far enemy of those values that we hold most dear, but those near enemies, the ones that dress up and masquerade as the value, but also at the same time protect our ego and our kind of armor, those are the ones I think to really watch.
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Chapters
8 chapters
1
What is the main topic discussed in this episode?
0:00–1:05
2
How do near enemies affect our values?
1:05–3:43
3
What is the significance of paradoxical thinking in leadership?
3:43–5:55
4
How can rigidity masquerade as discipline?
5:55–8:33
5
In what ways do sports serve as leadership theater?
8:33–10:29
6
How does the concept of future time impact our decision-making?
10:29–12:48
7
What is hyperbolic discounting and how does it affect our perspective?
12:48–17:21
8
What are the practical implications of the discussed concepts for leaders?
17:21–38:23
Speakers
2 identifiedMore from The Curiosity Shop with Brené Brown and Adam Grant
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What Chimpanzees Reveal About How We Connect and Divide with Aaron Sandel
Building Integrity in the Age of Normalized Cheating
Brené Brown on Protecting our Attention, Time, and Humanity in a World that Won’t Slow Down
Can We Build an “Us” Without a “Them”? with John Green