I shared my brief review on Extraordinary Leadership a few days ago and I wanted to highlight what I appreciated the most about the book.
In a section of the book dedicated to high-level leadership, the author makes some connections true of all high level relationships.
She identified 3 essential ingredients to high-level relationships: Openness, Separateness, and Equality.
Openness is reflected in the quality of communication, which also at times may involve quantity of communication as well. Many people use a lot of words, but don’t communicate. Gilbert strongly asserts that communication that is not authentic, that does not foster a bond that is based on honesty, self-disclosure, and mutual inquiry is simply not the kind of communication true of high level relationships.
People who lack openness hold back their true feelings and thoughts from others and even loved ones because of fear, shame, or guilt. They may find it easier and tempting to be “open” to third parties about a relationship rather than engage in true direct, honest, and open relationships. Gilbert emphasizes that true communication takes place in the person-to-person context and round-a-bout communication works to erode the potential bond and health of a relationship.
Separateness refers to a distinction of identity and emotional security. People often tend to “overfunction” or “underfunction” in relationships. This means that to varying degrees people allow their identity or personhood to get wrapped up in that of another person. This goes beyond healthy attachments and connections, this means that one at times cannot consciously or subconsciously find the dividing line between self and other. In families this is most evident. Often parents are tempted to overfunction and their identities or self-worth becomes wrapped up in their children. Parents or people who are not separate often take another person’s setting limits very personally and struggle to feel secure in and of themselves. Sometimes they cannot hear another’s “no” or struggle to respect such a limit without feelings of resentment.
Separateness is important because without a proper measure of emotional or psychological separateness, people are prone to non-reflective reactions. In other words, they react uncritically and lack the ability to think constructively and maintain a balanced perspective on a given situation or relationship. Being emotionally separate from others allows for greater objectivity in decision making. People who are not separate often make emotional or reactive decisions that further cause chaos or greater dysfunction.
Equality refers to people’s capacity to engage in adult dynamics. People who “overfunction” often struggle to allow others to assume a peer level in their relationships. People who “underfunction” struggle to ever assume a peer level who those that usually have the greater power in the relationship. Leaders and also parents often consciously and subconsciously keep others in a dynamic of unequal power out of motives for control or significant personal insecurity or a variety of other reasons.
Gilbert emphasizes that high-level relationships move towards equality where there is a mutual respect, trust, and power. Leaders who lack the capacity to move towards relationships of equality maintain hierarchies and can fall into power games where they even subconsciously can rely on manipulative or passive aggressive strategies to preserve their sense of control. Many a parent and many a leader falls into this category.
Conclusion – What I found fascinating was Gilbert’s insights into all these areas. She made some connections as to how these three areas are all interrelated in various ways. A lack of equality automatically hinders the degree of openness that is allowed or possible in a relationship for example. This is so true. It’s been very interesting to thing about how these three things influence relationships and leadership together.
On a different note – these three categories overlap with some of the categories in Cloud & Townsend’s books (http://cloudtownsend.com). These are bonding (openness), boundaries (separateness), adulthood (equality), and integrating good and bad. Integrating good and bad isn’t specifically categorized in Gilbert’s book or theory, but the general developmental need is spoken to continually through her emphasis on not reacting, but maintaining reflective and objective thought. She obviously does not have a “grace” and “truth” paradigm so there are some limitations in where she can go with that.
After thinking about this – do you have any observations about how equality, openness, & separateness work together to build high-level relationships and leadership?
