‘Today’s leaders don’t lack IQ, but wisdom’
Sumana Ramanan
In the city to launch the Indian edition of her news website Huffington Post, which will be the 13th globally, Greek-American author, journalist Arianna Huffington talks about spirituality, crisis in capitalism and the sexual violence against women in India, among other issues.
The willingness of Indians to talk openly about their spiritual practice and sources of strength and wisdom features high on the list of things Arianna Huffington admires about the country.
On the negative side, the widespread sexual violence against women in this country strikes her as among leading issues.
“You don’t even know how much of this is being reported,” she said in her Greek-inflected English. “Getting to a place of zero-tolerance is going to be key here. Also, educating boys in a way that they recognise what they are doing is critical.”
India can use the strength and wisdom in its ancient traditions, which it has exported to the world, to meet this and other huge challenges such as entrenched poverty and endemic corruption, said Huffington, who first visited India when she was 17 to study comparative religion in Shanti Niketan, outside Kolkata and has returned several times afterwards.
This time, she is here to launch the Indian edition of the news website, which will be the 13th globally, and to promote her latest book, Thrive, on this very theme: the need for people to look inwards to find definitions of success that go beyond money and power.
The potential of individuals is what holds the key to address a larger crisis of credibility that plagues institutions around the world: business, the media and politics, said Huffington. “There has been a failure of leadership on many levels...We have a lot of smart leaders in media, business and politics making terrible decisions, not because they don’t have a high IQ but because they lack wisdom.”
Wisdom is among three ‘W’ words Huffington argues must enrich meanings of success: the others being well-being and wonder. Among her own least wise decisions was overworking to a point that she collapsed from exhaustion and sleep deprivation.
“Breaking my cheekbone and getting four stitches on my right eye [as a result] was not wise at all,” said the former compulsive multi-tasker, whose favourite yoga asana was trikonasana because it allowed her to do three things at one time.
Among the wisest things she’s done is to have children. “My first child was stillborn and my daughters were not born until I was 38 and 40. They have been the greatest source of love and fulfillment in my life.”
Huffington’s mission is to help individuals do what is in their control, but what about the larger structural problems, such as the way corporations are structured or a larger crisis in capitalism itself?
“There is obviously a need for institutional changes at the policy level on issues like maternity and paternity leave,” she said. “And capitalism cannot survive disconnected from fundamental moral values...that even its founders, such as Adam Smith, wrote about. But there is also an awful lot that individuals can do to connect with their own inner strength and wisdom and cultivate their own resilience-...What is amazing about human nature is that you can find great leaders who transcend the limiting structures of the time, like Gandhi.”
Among contemporary leaders she admires are Mark Bertolini, the chief executive of the healthcare company Aetna, Padmasree Warrior, the chief technology officer of Cisco. Bertolini discovered the benefits of meditation, yoga and acupuncture after breaking his neck in a terrible ski accident.
He then made these available to his 49,000 employees. Warrior meditates every night and spends her Saturdays doing a digital detox.
She also refutes criticism that her prescriptions are for the really affluent, who have the luxury of doing yoga and meditating.
“They are equally if not more important for those struggling to put food on the table because the truth is that people facing the same challenges respond differently,” she said. “Some are resilient and are able to overcome them and some fall apart. The difference is whether we are able to tap into our own strength and wisdom, and that requires knowing how to renew ourselves.”
In the city to launch the Indian edition of her news website Huffington Post, which will be the 13th globally, Greek-American author, journalist Arianna Huffington talks about spirituality, crisis in capitalism and the sexual violence against women in India, among other issues.
The willingness of Indians to talk openly about their spiritual practice and sources of strength and wisdom features high on the list of things Arianna Huffington admires about the country.
“In the West, people are more reluctant to talk about this. Here you have politicians, actors, journalists talking about it and what de-stresses them,” said the 64-year-old Greek-American author, journalist and cofounder of the news website Huffington Post, in an interview on the sidelines of the Times Litfest in Bandra. “I love the fact that this can be a public conversation.”
On the negative side, the widespread sexual violence against women in this country strikes her as among leading issues.
“You don’t even know how much of this is being reported,” she said in her Greek-inflected English. “Getting to a place of zero-tolerance is going to be key here. Also, educating boys in a way that they recognise what they are doing is critical.”
India can use the strength and wisdom in its ancient traditions, which it has exported to the world, to meet this and other huge challenges such as entrenched poverty and endemic corruption, said Huffington, who first visited India when she was 17 to study comparative religion in Shanti Niketan, outside Kolkata and has returned several times afterwards.
This time, she is here to launch the Indian edition of the news website, which will be the 13th globally, and to promote her latest book, Thrive, on this very theme: the need for people to look inwards to find definitions of success that go beyond money and power.
The potential of individuals is what holds the key to address a larger crisis of credibility that plagues institutions around the world: business, the media and politics, said Huffington. “There has been a failure of leadership on many levels...We have a lot of smart leaders in media, business and politics making terrible decisions, not because they don’t have a high IQ but because they lack wisdom.”
Wisdom is among three ‘W’ words Huffington argues must enrich meanings of success: the others being well-being and wonder. Among her own least wise decisions was overworking to a point that she collapsed from exhaustion and sleep deprivation.
“Breaking my cheekbone and getting four stitches on my right eye [as a result] was not wise at all,” said the former compulsive multi-tasker, whose favourite yoga asana was trikonasana because it allowed her to do three things at one time.
Among the wisest things she’s done is to have children. “My first child was stillborn and my daughters were not born until I was 38 and 40. They have been the greatest source of love and fulfillment in my life.”
Huffington’s mission is to help individuals do what is in their control, but what about the larger structural problems, such as the way corporations are structured or a larger crisis in capitalism itself?
“There is obviously a need for institutional changes at the policy level on issues like maternity and paternity leave,” she said. “And capitalism cannot survive disconnected from fundamental moral values...that even its founders, such as Adam Smith, wrote about. But there is also an awful lot that individuals can do to connect with their own inner strength and wisdom and cultivate their own resilience-...What is amazing about human nature is that you can find great leaders who transcend the limiting structures of the time, like Gandhi.”
Among contemporary leaders she admires are Mark Bertolini, the chief executive of the healthcare company Aetna, Padmasree Warrior, the chief technology officer of Cisco. Bertolini discovered the benefits of meditation, yoga and acupuncture after breaking his neck in a terrible ski accident.
He then made these available to his 49,000 employees. Warrior meditates every night and spends her Saturdays doing a digital detox.
She also refutes criticism that her prescriptions are for the really affluent, who have the luxury of doing yoga and meditating.
“They are equally if not more important for those struggling to put food on the table because the truth is that people facing the same challenges respond differently,” she said. “Some are resilient and are able to overcome them and some fall apart. The difference is whether we are able to tap into our own strength and wisdom, and that requires knowing how to renew ourselves.”
