Jesus is often seen as a religious figure, but are there lessons we can learn from Him about leadership and management?
International leadership coach Sharon Seivert joins Dan, Suzana, and Flavio for a conversation about Jesus’ leadership style and insights we can gather for our day-to-day lives.
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Transcript
Hello, everyone, and welcome to episode 38 of Spiritist Conversations, where we sit down with friends and have great conversations about everything from a Spiritist perspective. My name is Dan Assisi, and today I am joined here by the Uncomparable Susana Simoes and the ever happy Flavio Zanetti. How are you guys doing?
Suzana Simões:Hey Dan. Hey Dan. Hey Flavio. Good to see you guys.
Flavio Zanetti:Likewise. Likewise. Good to see everyone.
Dan Assisi:Yes, it's really great to see you guys. We're in different parts of the planet today. Flavio is in Italy. Susana is holding the fort in the US for us. I'm in the Bahamas. And we're just stretching our spiritual wings today and, connecting virtually from different places. Very excited to see you guys. It's been a while. It's always reassuring and uplifting for me to have a conversation with you guys. And today I hope we're going to have a great conversation. But before we introduce our guest, I just want to remind folks who might be watching this on different channels on the web that if you make your way to the Spiritist Conversation YouTube or Facebook channels, that's the best way for you to interact with us. Sometimes because we broadcast to different places, we don't get to see all the comments that you might be placing. And so we're really happy to have your interaction, so feel free. to come and interact with us. We love being with you. And if you're here, just drop us a comment. Let us know where you're coming from and pop in your questions and be part of the conversation as well. So Zanna, Flavio, are you guys ready to dive into a interesting and different topic
Flavio Zanetti:today? Absolutely. This is an interesting one. I'm on it. Yes.
Suzana Simões:Yes. Yes. I'm very excited to see what's going to come out of it. And what can we take to our daily lives after this conversation?
Dan Assisi:Great. So let's go ahead and bring Sharon. Sharon, thanks for being with us.
Sharon Seivert:I feel like I've been invited to a party, a Friday night party here.
Flavio Zanetti:Welcome, Sharon. It's good to see you.
Dan Assisi:Yeah, we're what you asked for sharing to be aware what you asked for. That's all I'm gonna say. But Sharon, we're really thrilled to have you here today. Sharon has been who in contact with us for such a long time. Now we've been talking about different ways of collaborating and finding a way to get her voice here in Spiritist conversations too. And I think this is a perfect episode for Sharon to come in and we'll let her talk a little bit about herself. But among other things, she's an international leadership coach people. So to talk about leadership and Jesus, I think that would be great to have such a wonderful feed perspective on this. But Sharon, I won't do you justice. Tell us a little bit about who you are and what you do.
Sharon Seivert:Okay, well, I am a member of the Boston Area Spiritist Center where I see Flavio on many occasions and Daniel and Susanna occasionally when you come to town. It's interesting how things have come full circle because it's my International leadership coaching that brought me to spiritism, which is that I had a just spectacular client by the name of Thais Moriyama from Brazil, who after we completed our work together and she decided where she wanted to go in her career and leadership herself that she sent me as a thank you all these spiritist books. And I Picked up the first one, which was, uh, Renunciation. I chose from the many books she sent me. She and her mother decided, actually, I've worn this as this is a gift from Thais and her mother of the Black Virgin who saved those fishermen in Brazil. And once I started reading Renunciation, I I just started one page after the other and could not stop reading. I read it just cover to cover. And I was, landing, 10 point Olympic, land in spiritism. And I have never looked back. That was about five years ago. So interestingly, we, I've come around, I've come to the circle here where we're talking about what brought me into spiritism in the first place. So I was thinking about that when I was coming in today, you know, this is. This is great how this has come around.
Dan Assisi:That is awesome. That is fantastic. This personal connection is something that I think many of us can attest to. I think many people find spiritism through this personal connection with somebody because let's be honest, spiritism is not as widely well known as different philosophies or bodies of knowledge or even religions out there, right?
Sharon Seivert:Right. Yeah. Yeah. So it has been so that's why it's so exciting for me to be on this conversation today with you. I just you know, I'm so grateful for the thousands of things that Spiritism has given me and the perspectives it has given me. And actually when I was writing this last book Genesis helped me inform it and my studies with the Spiritist group helped me. You know, ask different questions. It's it's very integral to my life and my work. So it seems like you're an author as well? Yeah. Oh, yes. I am an author of a series of books. The most recent one is called The Superpower of Balanced Leadership in Unbalanced. So here we are.
Dan Assisi:A very appropriate title, a very appropriate title.
Sharon Seivert:In which people say a lot of, Amen, sister. Yes, here we are. Yes.
Dan Assisi:Great. So, the reason why we wanted you here today, Sharon, besides the fact that you're awesome is that, we were really trying to look at this incredible figure, Jesus Christ, which, I personally think is often misunderstood or under understood in many different ways. We've made him to be a religious figure. But in many different ways, there's so many wonderful lessons that we can take from his leadership and how he handled different things and how he saw the world, who he talked to, how he went about things, doing things that sometimes I think that we don't notice because we put him in a small little box, right? And and I thought it'd be great to have a conversation about his leadership style, especially in this difficult times that we live in where we are having a really tough time talking to each other. Being kind to each other, accepting different perspectives and different approaches. I think that if we live out there today in the world, that's all we do. I think we can agree with that piece. And this is a topic that is really cool. About 20 years ago, not that I want to date myself. I came across this interesting book called Jesus CEO by Lauren Beth Cope. That was published in 1996. And I really thought it was like an eye opening piece because it was like, Oh my God, I had never thought about Jesus that way. And so I could not help but think about that today. And so really excited to have you here to talk about that. Excellent. Yeah.
Flavio Zanetti:I think it's totally you, but most people have not thought about Jesus in that way. Right Dan? I mean, it's, uh, it's people usually are, they think about Jesus from a religious connotation and they stop right there and everybody. Juxtapose, right, all his teachings, all his leadership examples in order to really study or look into from that angle. So you're not alone, and I think still most people, when they automatically see or read the word Jesus, they associate that with the religious figure, not so much so with the in the leader that Jesus was or still is for a lot of us, right?
Suzana Simões:Yeah, we tend to, um, to keep Jesus in this very, Narrow perspective and today we're going to talk about leadership, but we could also think of him, his role as educator, his role as a doctor. and physician, right? So there are many ways in which we can go way beyond the religious figure and bring into, other roles that relate to our society and our living and learn from him. So it will be interesting to talk about this today, but certainly there is room for more in the future.
Sharon Seivert:Right, right. When I talk about the superpower balance leadership, I think Jesus is just probably, I'm probably the best image person that you can imagine, because he was so fully human. He was, he, he and he embodied all of our sort of gave examples of all of our best traits. You talk about him as a, as an educator, and as a healer. And all of those are aspects that we have of ourselves. And if you think about him in that particular way, he leads it with all these different dimensions. It's so he's so multidimensional. And one of the things I love that spiritism has brought to me is this total reframing of how who Jesus was, you know, the governor of the planet. He's not this one dimensional kind of person who came to earth. So I love thinking about him in all the ways you're describing.
Dan Assisi:Or an absent leader, right? Because sometimes we think that if we have the perspective that he came once and then we're still waiting for the second coming of Christ, it's almost like, where has he been? Is he an absent leader? How can a good leader be absent? Probably not. Right. So I think he's a lot closer than we imagined. I think maybe it's a way for us to jump in there and say, what do you guys think about Jesus as a leadership model? What is it that jumps out at
Flavio Zanetti:you? I think the very, the big one that comes to me is about server leadership, right? So he was the server leader per excellence. And if you look at a lot of business studies show nowadays that servant leaders are way more effective than leaders that don't play the role of servant leadership. I mean, we have several examples of servant leaders. Obviously, the one that really comes to mind is Abraham Lincoln, right? One of the first ones. We have, for example, Steve Jobs and so many others that really played that role. Obviously, not as good as Jesus, but played the role. Of servant leadership that made it made a change or made an impact into the modern world, so to speak, they can really make some connections with servant leadership. That's the way at least to me. That's what comes to mind right away.
Dan Assisi:Flavio, do you really think Steve Jobs was a servant leader?
Flavio Zanetti:I do believe so. I do believe so. If you read his biography, his autobiography. A lot of the things that he did was towards helping, enabling these people, pushing these people towards success, and maybe not 100% of the time, obviously, right? But the a good chunk of it, I think it was.
Dan Assisi:I'll take your word on that. It's the first time I think of Steve Jobs as a servant leader, but I think you do have a point.
Sharon Seivert:When I think about that servant leadership of Jesus, one of the things that I think about is that he had such love, such compassion. He felt people's pain. He went out of his way to help heal them. So he was a, what I call a relational leader. It's one of the six powers that he had. The other thing he did as a servant leader, a relational leader, is he established a community that has lasted millennia. I mean, think of what he does and how he has called us to serve other people. And he's called us to do work for the social good. And that is, of course, one of his major messages. But he is a relational or servant leader par excellence. I try to when I establish groups of leaders, one of the things I try to do is community. And imagine what he did to establish a community that served each other for millennia. I mean, wow.
Dan Assisi:Wow. Well, and I'm gonna piggyback on that one sharing because not only did he create a community, But he went out of his way to get people with different backgrounds in that community, right? His initial team was not homogeneous, right? We had fishermen, we had tax collectors, right? We had all kinds of different groups of people, some of which obviously knew each other. But some of which perhaps were not very welcome at first. So I love that he built that diverse team. We're talking about diversity, equity and inclusion nowadays,
Sharon Seivert:right? He
Dan Assisi:was the OG. He was the OG on that piece, right? He was the D& E
Flavio Zanetti:master. Yeah, the diversity and inclusion and equity master. Yeah, I
Suzana Simões:love
Sharon Seivert:it. Yeah, and went way out of his way and then had his disciples go way and way and way out of their way to reach across the world.
Dan Assisi:Yeah, and to Susana's point about the educational piece, I find it hard to distinguish his leadership without the education piece, right? He empowered others. He has not left us with a single written work. He has not left us with anything other than his words that we actually hear through others. So he really empowered this team of people that then created other teams of people and who have been speaking to us for millennia. I find that incredibly breathtaking in many different ways. But Stu, where do you think you're going to jump in there?
Suzana Simões:No. Yes. When you said in power, I think that's you know, to me, um, when I think about Jesus from this perspective, I think about someone who embrace, heal, dignify, and empower. Those are the four ideas that I actually think about and try to bring to my own day to day life. So when I'm dealing with my team, With my employees is okay. These employees coming to me what is this employee needs at this moment, he needs to be seen, he needs to be acknowledged, he needs to be healed from conflict, from, stress, from whatever, is he ready to be empowered? Right. To feel that he is really valued. So I, to think about when he multiply the bread and the fish, he attends the immediate need of the crowd, but then after that most immediate need is met, he goes on to, to teach and to empower people and to tell about all the talents that you had, you were like, you were the salt and and get them To to fulfill their missions from that point on. So I have those steps within me and it's something that I try, obviously we don't, we're not always far from being like it's a practice, it's a journey, obviously. Uh, but those are references that I, I hold in myself, uh, for the work that I do every day from, you know, from thinking of Jesus as a leader.
Dan Assisi:Yeah, I love that Susana. Yeah, I love that. Go
Flavio Zanetti:ahead. Flutter. No, I love that too. And if I could maybe unpack the idea of Jesus as a servant leader, right? In my head, it all begins with care because servant leaders, they care for their teams. They care for their peeps, right? So to speak. So he cared about not only the 12 disciples, but everybody that he was Really leading, right, towards a new life, towards the right? A new, you know, reality, so to speak. He set the example for everybody to follow, right? Hey, walk on my shoes, right? I'm the path, the way, and the truth. He set the example. He always did the right things. Not only for himself, but for others, right? And he created the right mindset, not only for the disciples, but for everybody that wanted to follow him. The good thing about, the one thing that really catches my attention when I look at Jesus leadership examples... He allowed people to fail. That's a very important one to me, right? If you want, teams to be successful, right? Teams to work hard, to make, a great impact into what they do, they have to fail, right? Failure means, finding different ways to do different things, right? And he allowed folks to fail, which to me was amazing if you think about it, right? And he also empowers
Suzana Simões:Can you, can you, can you bring us an example of that? Maybe for people who are listening to us. It may not be so clear.
Flavio Zanetti:Great, great point, Suzana. So, a lot of times, if you're a new leader, right, the automatic reaction of leading somebody or asking somebody to do something that that person doesn't know 100% how to do it, it's taking too much time. Let me do it myself, right? He never did that. He asked others. He asked disciples. He asked, you know, several instances where he asked folks to go and do things. He never really took the reins of... Doing, but rather he allowed folks to go out, try it out, fail, come back and you give the lesson, you give the teachings, right? And several opportunities he did that. To me, that's a magic leadership example, right?
Dan Assisi:Yeah, and I can jump in there if you're looking for a passage, for instance, I remember in John when Jesus tells Peter, before the crow, right? Sorry, before the rooster crows, you rooster crows disavow me three times, right? Hey, I'm calling you out. You're going to deny me three times. And he was still okay with that. And after that happened and Jesus and Peter came back quite beat up, right? Emotionally and obviously psychologically, Jesus then picks him up again and he asked, I think you might remember this different passage that I don't remember exactly which, um, what are the line, but he's, he tells Peter, Peter, do you love me? And Peter says, yes, of course I do. Then take care of my sheep. And then he asks, Peter, do you love me? And Peter goes. Yes, of course, teacher, I do then take care of my sheep and then he asked for the third time. Do you love me, Peter? And Peter then gets it, right? He disallowed. Disavow Jesus three times and Jesus brought this question three times to say, here's your way back from your own guilt and self consciousness, right? So work hard. So I love that about him. I think they did a lot of that, but I also want to double click on something that Susanna said, which I think was really cool about the communication piece, because what really. inspires me a lot about Jesus among other things. But in this particular area is his ability to what we call in the education field differentiate. He's able to speak to somebody at one level because he knows what that person needs, and he's able to speak to somebody else at a different level because he knows what that person needs. So we have these great speeches of him talking to the crowd. And we have this great dialogues of him talking individually to people in different pieces with exactly what a person needs. And that is just an incredible thing that sometimes nowadays, I think you get lost sometimes in leadership. Because I think people feel like they either have to do this great speeches or write this great memo or do this great thing. But Jesus was able to know how to relate. Depending on the person's need and
Suzana Simões:that was really great. And that is where leadership and education kind of meet. Because another good example is when he talks about the kingdom of heaven. So there are many, many times where he's going to explain about the kingdom of heaven to the people. But he will do it in very different ways depending on who he's talking to. So, for the farmer is the treasure that is hidden under the ground, for the fish, the fisherman is the fish under the water, for, and so forth, is the yeast for the woman who is baking at the house, so it's it's really it's quite significant his capacity to communicate And two, one of the things that I think is it's very, um, important is how, and we're talking about relational leadership. And that calls for horizontality. So it's being horizontal you know, in the relating and meeting people where they are. But when you are a true leader and you are very centered on your role and what you can do for your team, even though you are horizontal in the relating, you never lose. Your proper place, so to speak, in the chain of command. I don't know if I'm being clear because a lot of leaders want to be respected by imposing. And
Sharon Seivert:when
Suzana Simões:you are naturally connected with this role of loving and leading and enabling. You don't have to fight for respect. Respect is just a natural consequence. People want to
Sharon Seivert:look up to you. I'd love that. Yeah, I love that. And I would like to piggyback on that immediately because what I hear from you is the issue of power versus force and Jesus was the ultimate sort of force. self powered leader. He did not have to force. He attracted the people to him who wanted to learn. So the, um, so that's a very, very important thing. So he had this natural power wherever he stood was the hub of his power and people came to him because of that. So there was no force. In him, right? And that allowed him to stand up to the literally the political forces of his day. And the one more thing I'd like to say to piggyback on your teaching thing is I am so impressed as I look at it about how he could teach anyone according to their level of understanding and their desire to learn. And so. We have the parables and then Kardec came along and, gave us more of this whole body of work. But he, people would take what they needed from the parables according to what they understood. So he spoke to us when he was here. In exactly the language that we needed. And that's an extraordinary thing. It's like reading one of those books that's for children, but it's really for adults, you know, we have a lot of examples in that literature. And that's, I think the way he. He taught and he inspired and so you could take every time I read something and Daniel you're such a master of this that you go into a story and you talk about it and I'm going well I didn't see that. I didn't notice that.
Dan Assisi:Oh, please Sharon. Keep going. Keep going. That's good Flattery will get you everywhere, Sharon. Keep going.
Sharon Seivert:Yeah, so that's a, that's a form of genius and of power being able to interpret, to translate, to the level of the person you're speaking with it's the greatest teacher. What can you say?
Flavio Zanetti:Yeah. I think the great analogy that I've heard one, not on Jesus, but I'd love to connect with him. It's someone that can really speak at the boardroom level. All the way down to the boiler room level, right? Going up and down, depending on what levels he was talking to, right? Being through parables. To me, since Dan mentioned about the communication style, to me, one of the most important traits, or traits, I should say, of a great leader is the ability to ask very good questions. Yes. And to me, Jesus asked... Amazingly good questions, right? That if you don't stop to share, right? If you don't stop, if you don't stop to think about it, it's, uh, some of them get lost. So, for example, if you remember when the blind beggar comes to talk to him, Right? What? What? What's his question? What do you want me to do? Right?
Dan Assisi:He asked that of everybody. What would you have me do? What do you want me to do? Really? He's a natural coach.
Flavio Zanetti:Dude! I'm blind! I'm sick! What else? But really? Is that? Is that what you want me to do for you? Heal you and you go. So I think asking a very good questions to me spoke, I mean, speaks very highly of how Jesus was well connected with needs from everybody that he served, right? He always spoke the truth, no matter what he, who he talked to, right? He always used the truth, not only to hurt or never hurt people, but to really set the tone of a conversation, right? So he always engaged. In the very productive conversation, every opportunity that he had, he let, he left somebody bad when that person, before that person saw him, right? And that should be, as spiritists that we all are, should be all of our major, our math, our most aspiration, right? to leave somebody better than before we encounter an individual of that person. To me,
Dan Assisi:I would say, I would say even not, that's not even a spirit testing, that's a human being thing, right? As human beings, we should just do that leave people better than we found them but Sharon, taking what Flavio said, let's go back to something you said, which I think was really power. You talked about six powers that Jesus had, right? Could you talk to us a little bit about your insights
Sharon Seivert:into that? And you guys have touched on on a bunch of them. And, uh, so the, in the, in the balance leadership program, as we look at Jesus through this lens the image that I like people to have is the center in the four directions, the compass. So think of the compass as as something that we have in our hands. It's our native birthright. This is what we have. Because we're human. And so as human, we have these six powers, which, of course, Jesus exemplified in their highest forms. So the first power is our core at our core. Who are we? And who are we at our best? And what are our gifts that we need to bring to the world? to leave the world a better place, to make the world a better place. And do we own these and bring these out? And this is what I call authentic leadership. And we could talk for hours about the authenticity of Jesus and the values that he instilled in us and then has had us carry on. The second is inspirational leadership. When we talk about the teaching, when we talk about continuing to learn and raising our hope and having to see a different world, envision a different world and let's make it happen. Let's bring us all there. The third is motivational leadership, and that is that's doing it. That's acting. So not only do we have some good ideas, but We have to show up at the center and we have to help out and we have to act a day in a daily basis with the people who just frankly annoy us a lot. And so he's always out there doing these actions that make the world a better place. The fourth is the relational or servant leadership, which we've discussed extensively of which he was obviously a master and, and I, and an idol for us. The fifth is managerial leadership. And I think Jesus did. I mean, he paid attention to details and he took, looked at the comfort of the people around him and he did, those things to take care of our human needs. He didn't dismiss that. I mean, look who he was and yet he didn't make that small, you know, he paid attention to that. And the sixth is, of course, The miracle worker, the systems worker, the context, the bringing of the divine. How are we connected to the divine? How do we make miracles in our own lives by putting all of these things together? So that's the approach that I take. And when we own our powers, when we stand in our power, as opposed to what Susanna was talking about, which is force, when we stand in our power, we will create miracles and that. Lifts everyone up, and I think that's our responsibility as Spiritists. How do we lift everyone? Around us up.
Suzana Simões:Love it. Love it. I love it. I love it. All right.
Dan Assisi:That was a show. Everybody. We love it. See you. See you next week.
Sharon Seivert:And there's so many wonderful examples when we that we can look to about well, how do I do this? How can I be this kind of a great leader in this particular power? Well, let's take it over.
Dan Assisi:Is there one or two that you think are more important than the other ones?
Sharon Seivert:The one that's most important for you to develop is the one where you sort of have a uh, you're not paying attention. So, for example, if I'll give myself, I am the poster child for one of these. And one of the reasons I wrote this book is so I could get better in these things. And so I'm one of those writers that says, I'm not doing this very well. I have to figure this out. And so then I write to try and figure it out. So for example, the power that is the weakest for me is the managerial leadership or the structure element. I always have to work extra hard at that. But when I do, when I assume my And I have, when I accept responsibility for that, and I do all those structural things, which is taking care of the finances and making sure the legal documents are in order and and doing, and going into the HTML and making sure the online reports are working, when I do those things, which is like chewing nails for me, okay? I. I have pumped up that tire that was not working so well, and my car is rolling along. So, each one of those, we were given this sense of what it is to be human, and we need all of these things. So, knowing that has made me a way better leader, because I'm paying attention to all of them. And if you can think about it like a car on the road, and all the tires have to be pumped up sufficiently. Just enough so you can go. You will have your preferences. But I think if we look at Jesus he did them all. He was a really full leader, a full human being, and he showed us it was possible. He showed us this ideal that we can move to. Okay.
Dan Assisi:Yeah. Yeah. And that's what I think is so unique about him in many different ways, right? It's the fact that he was so well rounded and so great in many different ways. Obviously I think we all heard of that passage of the woman who's going to get stoned for being adulterous, right? And then he turns around and he does things on the, on the ground and eventually everybody leaves and he turns to her and says, This woman who has condemned you? No one. She says then you're free. But then he tells her, and, but go and sin no more. So he's saying, Hey, we understand you. We're being empathetic. Everybody has made a mistake before. It's okay. You are off the hook today, so to speak. But, but don't do it again. Yeah. So there's also this powerful mixture of tenderness. Right. Thank you. and force, right? Or, or, or whatever you want to call that, right? Of, of rightfulness, uh, righteousness, I should say. That I think is really touching. It's like there is the feminine and the masculine. There is the, a well rounded approach that I think is so rare for us to find nowadays.
Sharon Seivert:That's the balanced aspect of it is that he didn't leave as it were any stone unturned. If we're going to continue with this particular story, he you know, he did both of these things and I love your comparison of the male and the female, because here's another example where I feel he had extraordinary balance. And if you look at the symbol that I use, which is the center in the four directions, that actually is encoded. both male and female leadership at a in a balance. So I think he exemplified that in the tenderness, you said, and in the strength of no nonsense kind of strength.
Dan Assisi:Yeah. And by male and female, we want to be clear, right? These are by no way gender specific traits. We were just talking about traditious animus and anima that young brought forth. Y different ways. Yin yang and like this different opposites. But I think that this balance is a really powerful thing in general for us. And what else jumps out at you guys that Jesus did so well that stuck with you when it comes to dealing with people and leading with people? If you don't, if you don't speak, I will, but you know, I'm trying to be polite here, people.
Sharon Seivert:I, I, I, there must be something wrong with Flavio. You're trying to be a good leader, huh? Yeah, I try Flavio's audio because he's in power right now.
Dan Assisi:You know, we got to say this, Flavio, if you're watching this, you'll notice that Flavio has a little bit of a darker background. Flavio is doing some really great stuff here today. He's in Italy. There is a blackout where he is. He's running on battery on borrowed time. So thank you, Flavio. For for making it happen. If I were to disappear,
Flavio Zanetti:I wouldn't have lost this for anything. I wouldn't have missed this for anything. It's already sadly my time here. So it's 12 38 a. m. Oh, oh my gosh. He's back. The life is back. The miracle. You just, you just, you just mentioned this and everything's back. Look at
Dan Assisi:this. The light is back. You're flying there. Look at that. But there goes our excuse, but there goes the excuse of just being able to kick Flavio out if we don't like what he says and pretend it was a blackout.
Flavio Zanetti:So cannot kick me out, no, no. What I wanted to say is, I wanted to go back to what you mentioned, right, that Jesus is the ideal model for not only a leader, but the ideal model for humankind overall. If you look at, for example what called you Gus, you know, idea of ideal humankind, you guys mentioned this, right? At the same time, Jesus had the initiative, the courage, the objectivity, right, as well as the intuition, the capacity of love or the spiritual wisdom. That's really demonstrated in a lot of examples when he, for example, expelled the merchants. that were turning the synagogues into a market, right? Very energetic, very, you know, gregarious in a way that, no, get out of here, this is not your place to be. He was very you know, emphatic and really putting those people out. At the same time, when he invites the children to talk to me, right? As the children come to me, he shows his other side. And on his, again, leadership, principles, he was able to understand. The intrinsic needs for everyone that he was leading and he was really talking to, to tap or to really uh, achieve what those people needed at that time, right? I think that to me is a, it's a magnanimous faculty that leaders, we as leaders have to understand people come to us for different reasons. And if we're able to really move away from the surface, right, the tip of the iceberg, what's really driving that person's behavior, right? Or that person's interest and all that. I think to me, there was nobody else that did as Matt, nobody mastered this. The way Jesus did. So to me, it's just phenomenal,
Dan Assisi:right? I love that, Flavio, and I love that you said the courage that he had, too, right? Because I think that he does something that is really hard for us to do nowadays, which is have difficult conversations, right? We all struggle with having difficult, crucial conversations, so to speak, where the stakes are high, things are important, and he did it in a way that it was not aggressive, right? He was able to speak truth and speak to the Spirit. It wasn't speaking to the physical, he was speaking to the spiritual, and that obviously he had credibility, he had authenticity, he lived it, and he did that, and he was very courageous in that sense, because he had his eyes on what was best. For everybody, not only for him, right? And I think it's really, that's really a powerful thing because sometimes we get trapped on what is it that I need right now? What's my angle? What do I need to get out of this? As opposed to what's best for everybody. He was able to convey that message to such an extent that one of the things that I admire the most about Jesus that I only learned later as I started to study a little bit more. It's his ability to cross lines, right? And break taboos at the time. So, for instance, things that we take for granted, but he went out and spoke to women when they were by themselves. That's something that did not take place at that time and place. Like a man would not just simply go out to a woman and start speaking with her. If she were by herself he also spoke to different people who were considered perhaps not as good or not as friendly the Samaritans that there were like the Jews and Samaritans didn't really see eye to eye and Samaritans were considered to be perhaps in less than but he made a point of sharing many different stories about how there's a good Samaritan. That's even a parable like the good Samaritan for us is just a term But back in the time, a good Samaritan would be even more impactful as a message because many people would be, will be thinking that there is no good Samaritan. It's impossible to have a good Samaritan, right? Which is not different than the way I think our world is crumbling, the cookie is crumbling today, right? Where we think that because somebody's part of a political party or a nation or a preference, Whatever it is, we think that they cannot be good. And so this ability to walk and across borders, across groups and talk to people about the spirit, about their needs, it's so inspiring. Because sometimes I struggle with those difficult conversations, right? And sometimes I ask myself, Ooh, Am I being the right amount of courageous in this conversation? I don't want to come again, come as charged and I don't want to wimp out from actually saying this is important to me. And I think he did that so well in many different ways, right? That I think still sticks as a, as an example for me, 2000 years later, it's amazing.
Suzana Simões:Yeah. It's funny. Um, where you guys are saying really resonates with me. And when you ask what you guys have more to say, and we were like quiet for a second I was kind of, you know, after Sharon spoke about the six powers, I felt like I needed a minute to digest it. And where I was is like, Oh, let me think about those things. And then when you ask about, what You know, of those six, it stands out most to you, and I'm not sure if I understood correctly, but when you spoke about the core, because I wrote everything down the core of who we are, our best, our gifts, and authentic leadership and values, I think that's one of the things that I struggle at work. I think that leaders were expected to be in a certain way, behave in a certain way. And in every moment and time in my life, my, my work is to be myself, my authentic self. I want to be able to speak honestly and freely about my feelings, my emotions. Without judgment, without shame, and I think that's that there is a place for that in leadership as well. And, you know, going back to Dan and Flavio, I think that Jesus portrayed that. He was himself at all times. He didn't change. And, we, in leadership, and depending on the size of the institution that you work there are a lot of politics and a lot of things to be considered. So, navigating that can be challenging, right? But I, I still try as much as possible to be, you know, as authentic and transparent. With my thinking, but also with my feelings,
Sharon Seivert:I would love to give you some feedback. Susanna, because I have attended your lectures and your authenticity ripples out from your core. You are so there where you are. And what happens when someone does that as a leader or in your case, a speaker, but you're leading us with your speaking is that it allows us to be Like, Ourselves in that moment we can settle into it and there's places where we as human beings overlap Where I have this in common with you and you have just resonated it or vibrated It with me. Does that make sense? Yes That's what I that's what I feel. So the effort that you put into being authentic Ripples out to everyone you speak with and everyone you touch. It is a major blessing When we do this as leaders or as human beings when we are our authentic selves.
Dan Assisi:Yeah, plus one on that.
Flavio Zanetti:Yeah, plus a thousand because there's a lot of studies that show that the more vulnerable leaders are, the easier they have in building trust with their teams, and the more teams trust each other, the more they perform really well together. So, vulnerability based trust is one of the characteristics of a servant leader. That's not really... you know, shame. So you know what? I'm sorry. I made a mistake. You know, there was a wrong decision. Let's back up and go to the left versus right now, right? And being able to do that. I think it's a phenomenal, taskers. If it's a phenomenal behavior that he was not afraid to say that, right? And we should learn from it, right? And there's a lot of benefits of, behaving in that mindset.
Dan Assisi:And I love that you start with that at the core, because I think Susanna's point is super important. We struggle knowing who we are, and nowadays it's so hard for us to look at that. Flavio's light went out again right after he spoke. It's almost like in command. But Flavio, don't worry, your inner light continues to shine through. Yeah, we can see it. You can see it. He's still shining. He's still shining through. But this core piece is so interesting. And I, I remember that, that passage that when Jesus says, I am, right? And he says, I am the way and so forth. But there's one, he says, I am. He knows who he is, right? I wish I knew who I am to the extent that he know who he was, right? He had no hang ups about it. And I think that is such an important question for us to ask nowadays, when we get pulled in so many different ways about who we should be for others. And that's a really great. place is authenticity, vulnerability, the core piece and not, you know, I just, it's just such a, I think I just want to highlight and reframe that for our times because I think that we are, even with social media, we're trying to be so many different things for different people. I see so many happy people on social media. But that's not the world, right? I think that going back to who we are, knowing what we are about, it's the journey. And, yeah, I'm really glad that he, everywhere that he did, he led with that. He knew who he was and what he was about. He knew what his mission and vision was, so to speak. And I'm not quite sure that I'm always aligned to my mission and vision.
Sharon Seivert:But by doing that, he did absolutely the way for even today, calling us. It's like when you're, when you hit a gong and that sound vibrates out, that's what Jesus did for us in terms of his authenticity. That sound has reverberated through the ages. And, you know, he's saying, do that, be that, be yourself. The being is everything. If you get that right. Everything else is gravy. Everything else is good. The other thing that he did in communication that I wanted to expand on, that Susanna talked about was, and communication, Flavio, you were talking about that too. I think that the way he listened, Was multi multi multi leveled. He listened not only to what the people said, what they asked for, like I'm blind for the, you know, this, of course, this is what I want. But he listens for what the real needs were. And when you're a good leader, someone comes to you with a problem. And you listen at many levels for what really are they asking, and what really do they need, and what really can I give to them. So you're listening to the fact that they're anxious, you're listening to the fact that they're afraid of the situation, you're listening to the fact that they don't feel respected, or you're listening to all of those communications that are coming through them, and then you can respond in the most full way.
Dan Assisi:I love that because, oftentimes Sharon, I tell people, That people bring something and they think it's a problem, but it's not a problem. It's a situation. right? Sometimes they bring you a situation, but you have to figure out what the problem is in that situation because that situation can be just one manifestation of a deeper thing. So I really like that approach in general. And I think that we can chat about this. In many different ways, but our time is coming, so maybe we should we should begin our wrap up
Flavio Zanetti:time flies when you're having fun. I guess, right? Hasn't this be fun guys? I mean, we've talked a lot about Jesus and his leadership style and we could be here talking until tomorrow morning. We'll be, it will be enough enough topics for us to do that, but we have to wrap. So maybe, you know, I'll start, we'll start with, Sharon. She's our, you're a special, you're a special guest. What's one thing that's really resonated with you that we talked about today. And maybe you could also leave, right. Some information if folks wanted to get ahold of you. How would they find you, right? So they can continue the conversation, they can get to know more about you, your works, your books, your publications your work and everything else.
Sharon Seivert:Okay, that was four things. Okay, let me see if I can get that right. Uh, so, um, so I am just so happy to be in this wonderful, spiritist conversation because it means the world to me. It has... Spiritism has led me to great new insights. It has led me to be a better human being. I'm working on it to be a better leader. I'm working on it and to enter the world in a different way. So spiritism has given me so much and it's so great to be with you guys on and talking about it. And I think, we'll, I think we will continue to talk about this because it is a full. Topic for future times. Um, so I, uh, so thank you for that. Thank you for inviting me to the party. Um, I just love that. And it's always a party when I'm meeting up with people like you guys. If people want to uh, learn about the book, they can just go to amazon. com and get it in print, ebook, or audiobook. It's the superpower of balanced leadership and unbalanced. times. And if you get it, use it to think more about the spiritist conversation that we had, you know, bring our conversation into looking at the book this way and how you can claim these powers. I have a Dutch colleague who's, who told me that when you reclaim your powers, these powers, you can create a miracle and reclaim and miracle. is an anagram. So think about that for what you want to do. Jesus made all these miracles and that have continued through millennia. How about you doing that for yourself?
Dan Assisi:And if you get the audio book as I have, you will get to hear Sharon's voice. It's like having her in your living room or in your car and so forth. So it's a wonderful experience too. And there are some also some wonderful musical or audiophonic. There's a lot of cues there, too, that are really nice. Um, so thank you for doing that. Thanks for being with you,
Sharon Seivert:Sharon. Dan and I have swapped stories about what it is to make our first audiobooks. So, we've been doing some kvetching on that. But we got it done, right?
Flavio Zanetti:Now you got me curious, Sharon. I'm going to have to buy the audiobook because I want to hear you, you know, tell me the book. I love it.
Sharon Seivert:Exactly. That's fine. I love it. Yeah, yeah. Well, we'll see if there's another one in my future. But this one was... Um, it was a good thing to do, to be able to do that. So Dan and I have a lot of simpatico on what it is to create an audio book. Excellent.
Dan Assisi:Sharon, pick who goes
Sharon Seivert:next.
Dan Assisi:What's that? Pick who goes next. Get to pick. You want to have the three of us to say, to say. Yes, Dan.
Sharon Seivert:Uh, yeah, I can go on this call with all of us talking over each other.
Suzana Simões:No, no, no, I can go next. I, I, I am inspired by the conversation today. I'm fairly new in the leadership realm. I have been in my new position for the past three years and I'm, um, you know, maybe about, uh, 35 therapists that work for me today and I'm always thinking like, you know, what, what can I do now? How can I learn? How can I grow? What else can I study? And Just, it's just like crazy just
Sharon Seivert:occurred to me, man,
Suzana Simões:I have to I have Jesus as a role model and I, it's something that I think I need to study a little bit more from this perspective, you know? So quite honestly, it just. kind of open up a whole new realm of possibilities. Uh, for me, I will definitely get the book. I would love to read it and you'll probably be hearing from you with some comments and more exciting conversations and just, uh, feeling enthusiastic about. You know, I, I wrote a lot of things down and I'm like, that can be a very good lecture too, you know, so my mind is like, you know, going like pretty fast right now. So I just want to thank you all for for having me too here today for Dan in particular for pushing us and putting everything together. Uh, sometimes life is, um. These battle of priorities and, um, you know, it's, it's, it's tough, but I appreciate all of you. Thank you so much. It was very, very nice. Thank you.
Flavio Zanetti:I'll go next. Yeah. I'll go next and then you can wrap us up. Uh, bring us home then. How about that? And you have light. So I have light again. So yes. So to me, to me, uh, I'm a big, a big, you know, a big fan of leadership, you know, uh, a lot of, do a lot of reading about leadership, leadership development. Developing leaders. It's a great passion of mine, not only for work, but, you know, across my, you know, my life and being able to connect. All these great lessons that we've learned from Jesus, if we are courageous enough to look at his behaviors or his life as of a leader, not just a religious leader, that opens up a huge amount of possibilities. For us to learn his treats, his leadership treats, in a way that it will make us more effective leaders, right? So by, by all, by no means, I'm a, I'm a great leader, right? Uh, but being able to leverage his teachings or his, leadership traits has helped me in tremendous, difficult situations in the past. And I'm so happy, right? That I was able to choose that path and I invite all of us, right? to go on it as well. So, big fan of it. I hope you also, got inspired to read his, life or his teachings in a slightly different, paradigm of a great leader. And with that, Dan, bring us home, please. Wow,
Dan Assisi:there's not a lot more to say. For me, specifically, I love these conversations and I love this particular conversation because it's a great reminder That Jesus is more than that religious figure that we have made him to be. He is a real life figure that, as Susanna mentioned, he is a doctor, he is a coach, he is a manager leader, he is a philosopher, he is this well rounded model of what we can become that is both uplifting. and inspiring. And so to continue to foster these conversations is great for my soul because it reminds me that I need to take him from that little box that we have placed him and bring him closer to our everyday life and see that his examples are for living. They're not just for sunday. They're not just for when we are reading the Bible or any other book and that there is real world connections. There's so many things that we can talk about him, the miracles, mindsets, and so forth. So that is really great. And I love that Sharon has taken the time to be with us. Thank you for sharing your wisdom with us and all the thinking that you have done on this, Sharon. I hope that you with us.
Sharon Seivert:another party. I would be happy. Yes. Oh, great. Thank you. Thank you so much. Because I any opportunity I can to give back to spiritism for what it has given me is of such a blessing.
Dan Assisi:We're so thrilled to have you. And now you know where to find her, you know where to find Flavio Zanetti, you can find him online as F. Zanetti, you can find Susana Simoes online as Susana Simoes 70. And you can find me as Dan Assisi because I'm that creative. I don't have a cool, handle for online, so you just have to use my name. But we love to have you here. We just want to remind you that there are many other conversations that you can listen to or watch on YouTube and Facebook. But you can also download. Our podcast and whatever podcast platform you will listen to or listen, you listen to the most. We're so thrilled to have you here and we hope to see you on the next Spiritist Conversations. All right, everyone. Have a great one.
Sharon Seivert:Bye bye. Bye. Have a great day. Bye bye.