Every time we judge another,
we exile a part of ourselves.
That’s where real leadership - and real compassion - begin.
The Cruelest Person on Earth. The Child Starving. The Leaf in the Dew.
Can You See Yourself in All of Them?
“Practice until you see yourself in the cruelest person on Earth, in the child starving, in the political prisoner... until you see yourself in a speck of dust in a distant galaxy.”
- Thich Nhat Hanh
This line has been haunting me.
It challenges everything we usually call awareness.
We like to think of awareness as insight, empathy, mindfulness.
But this points to something far more radical -
the end of separation itself.
To truly see yourself in everyone - even those you reject -
means to go beyond the mind’s duality of right and wrong.
It’s realizing that everything you condemn out there
also lives somewhere in here.
The violence.
The greed.
The fear.
The tenderness.
The longing to be free.
All of it belongs.
This doesn’t make cruelty acceptable -
it makes it understandable.
And understanding is the beginning of compassion -
not as sentiment, but as clear seeing.
Cultivating This Kind of Seeing
- Radical Presence - See and listen with your whole being. Drop judgment. Feel life directly, not through the filter of “me” and “you.”
- Contemplation of Inter-Being - Nothing exists independently. The air, the water, the food sustaining you - all are continuations of countless lives.
- Shadow Integration - When confronted with arrogance or cruelty, ask: Under what conditions would I act the same? This question dissolves projection and opens understanding.
- Embodied Practice - Practice isn’t separate from life. It’s in every conversation, decision, or dish you wash. Presence is the path.
Why It Matters for Leadership
Most leadership still operates from separation -
leader vs. team, success vs. failure, us vs. them.
That mindset breeds fear, control, and conformity.
But when leaders awaken to inter-being, everything changes:
- From judgment to understanding
- From ego-driven power to compassionate authority
- From short-term performance to long-term wholeness
- From fear to presence
This is not soft leadership.
It’s fierce in clarity, rooted in care.
It doesn’t avoid confrontation -
it meets it with awareness, not hate.
When we begin to see ourselves in all things -
even in what we fear or reject -
something in us softens.
Separation loses its grip.
And leadership becomes less about control -
and more about presence, compassion, and truth.