'Pedestal' is a verb

Cautionary tales on ideals, virtuous leadership and positional power

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Pedestal (v): to idealize, deify or hold someone in high regard without adequate perspective of their humanity; to deeply admire someone while unconsciously holding them to unreasonable expectations.

Though it’s likely obvious, let me be clear and claim the above definition as one of my own making. As a leader, and as someone who studies the realm of leadership with fascination and curiosity, I’ve thought a lot about this topic in the past decade. If I’ve got a motive for this particular piece of writing, it would be an attempt to spare you some of the pain of pedestaling another human being, or likewise an attempt to spare you the ache of being pedestaled by someone else.

Because here’s the thing about pedestals—after you put someone up on one, there’s only one realistic outcome. And typically, that fall is not a graceful one.

A dual injury

Like most of us, I’ve pedestaled other people. Parents, teachers, peers, friends, celebrities, mentors. Perhaps it's an inevitable lesson we’ve all got to learn in the Planet-Earth Curriculum. After all, finding someone we admire is a gift. What would we do without our beloved teachers and role models? If we’re lucky, those people in our lives who manage to shape us are conscious enough to get our consent along the way, and to keep reminding us of their humanity, snapping us out of our childish idealism when we forget they are actually fallible.

Not surprisingly, the nature of leadership is dualistic. Not only does The Leader have both light and shadow qualities like all archetypes, but leadership comes with the added complexity of positional power. And whenever we’re rumbling with power dynamics, it’s best to be a bit wary. What I didn’t fully understand until my mid to late thirties was the fact that not only do I terribly compromise my own well being when I pedestal someone; I also put them in an impossible position that’s doomed to failure.

I began to see the underbelly of this harmful behavior when one of my own mentors fell from grace in my eyes. At the time, I was completely stuck in victim mentality, feeling I had been deeply wronged. I can say with certainty that the “fall” of my teacher presented one of the more rare forms of anguish, where I could simultaneously access sincere love and undeniable disdain. This phase lasted longer than I care to admit, and from what I’ve witnessed in communities around me, it’s not an uncommon story. However, it appears to me that this is often the excruciating and sometimes necessary moment when teacher and student split apart and go their separate ways.

Individuation, you might call it.

I also suspect that many of the student-teacher individuations happening across the globe in countless professional fields play out and “resolve” in unhealthy ways. In other words, people choose to walk away—often resentful and full of judgement—rather than invest more energy in hopes of a healing and holistic resolution. Even in the depths of my grief during my own maturation process, I was somehow able to hold on to one golden thread of truth; I knew that if I walked away with my heart closed, the relational wound would never fully heal. Worse, I would fail to learn the profound lesson this relationship was clearly offering me. And I would certainly lose one of my closest, most intimate friendships.

These kinds of individuations often leave metaphysical scars, but I’m not sure that’s such a bad thing. Our scars are, themselves, teachers—visible and tangible reminders of where and how we injured ourselves in the past. If we’re careful, wise even, we might avoid similar injuries in the future because of these permanent reminders of our past follies.

Then the day came, some years later, when someone pedestaled me. In their eyes, I fell from grace, and I was on the receiving end of the victimization, the accusation, the blame, the simultaneous love and disdain.

Ohhhhhh, I realized. So this is what it’s like.

What my teacher did or didn’t do, and what I did or didn’t do, is besides the point. We do this to each other by creating ideals that are unsustainable, unfair, unreachable.

We unknowingly put ourselves, and those we admire, in harm’s way.

Is it possible to avoid such behavior?

I’d like to think so.

Tips for avoiding the pedestal

In order to sidestep this landmine, we’ve got to be willing to take full responsibility for the role we play in whatever power dynamics are present. Where there is pedestaling, there is unacknowledged ego, unchecked expectation, or both. Whichever side of the power dynamic you find yourself on, the swiftest and most peaceable resolution will be reached if both parties take responsibility for their own actions or lack thereof.

With that in mind, here’s some tips to get the wheels moving toward friendlier common ground in our power dynamics.

For the “student”

• Assess your relationship to those you most admire.

• Admit if you’re pedestaling someone.

• If you’re in real relationship with them and they are genuinely interested to hear about your process, come clean. Tell them you’ve been pedestaling them. Give them the chance to collaborate in a gentle dismantling of the pedestal. Perhaps the two of you can dissolve the power dynamic together and alchemize it into something healthier and more mutually respectful.

• Practice seeing whomever you’re pedestaling as a real human who makes mistakes, breaks promises, and is guaranteed to shatter your idealistic expectations of them. Give them grace before they fall off the pedestal. If you bring them down from the great heights at which you’ve placed them in your psyche, perhaps you can both avoid emotional injury.

For the “teacher”

• Educate yourself on the role power plays in your work and communities. Look for trusted educational sources that can shine light on the vast spectrum of ways that power dynamics can show up across race, gender, wealth or economic status, mental or physical abilities, and specifics to your unique field.

• Get comfortable talking openly about power dynamics, with your peers and especially with those who look up to you. Encourage ongoing discourse on the topic, and invite feedback around any blind spots that could cause harm between yourself and your people.

• If you’re closely connected to someone and suspect they may be pedestaling you, invite a candid conversation. If you have your own story of someone falling from grace, this might be a great time to share it to whatever degree feels appropriate. In Brené Brown’s words, be, “awkward, brave and kind.”
  

Power is a slippery fish

As a longtime student of The Gene Keys, a modern adaptation of the I-Ching developed by Richard Rudd, this topic inevitably brings me into contemplation of Gene Key 7, which is all about the nature of power and leadership. This key (based on the 7th hexagram of the I Ching) happens to be a central feature in my personal Gene Keys profile, and makes the journey from the shadow of division to the gift of guidance to the siddhi of virtue. One excerpt in particular from this chapter runs through my head often:

“The mark of a true leader is one whose main interest is in empowering you to lead yourself rather than binding you to them. Ironically the false leader always tries to hold onto you whereas the real leader always tries to get rid of you!”

Without taking this article in a decidedly darker and more opinionated direction, I’ll simply say that there’s no shortage of examples where people who are given power soon find themselves abusing it.

To be fair, power is a slippery fish. By its nature, it’s a gift that comes with massive temptation. I can’t help but think of the iconic line that defined the Spider Man story, “with great power comes great responsibility.” Perhaps it’s simply painful for us to admit that most human beings aren’t up to the task. Maybe we didn’t have enough role models showing us alternative models to the power-over dynamic; maybe we’ve digested too many superhero/villain stories which shaped our psyches; maybe we aren’t mentally or emotionally mature enough to be given great power; maybe we are sorely lacking in spiritual discipline; maybe we’re simply not evolved enough as a species. Whatever the reason, it’s inarguable that the wake of harm left by some of our most historic and notable leaders continues to lap at our memories and threaten our futures.

Gurus, predators and cancel culture

I recently watched the recently released HBO special “Breath of Fire”, a documentary about Kundalini yoga, the rise and fall of its originator Yogi Bhajan, and the similarly eerie rise and fall of his student, Guru Jugat. As a white-bodied woman who used to teach yoga, I probably would have found the documentary fascinating regardless, but was all the more keen to watch it given that I passionately practiced kundalini for several years with Jugat. Indeed, I was saving funds to go through the teacher training offered through RaMa Institute, Jugat’s studio, when the massive story broke in 2020 about Yogi Bhajan’s sexual assault allegations.

That same year, my friend from college, Seth Powell—who got his PhD in South-Asian Indian religions, Sanskrit, and yoga from Harvard—happened to publish this podcast episode featuring an interview with Phillipe Dislippe (featured in B.O.F.). Upon listening, I knew I couldn’t go through with the teacher training. In the months and years that followed, I’ve continued to grapple with my relationship to the practice of kundalini.

Clearly, our actions have repercussions, and someone’s misdeeds are likely to soil their name and spoil their reputation. There’s no question as to whether or not Bhajan failed the virtuous-leader morality test. And, of course, this story is not new. Roughly five years before Bhajan’s fall, the yoga world suffered a similar wound around Bikram Choudhury, founder of Bikram yoga. These and many other so-called spiritual leaders have left trails of trauma and generations of confusion for the communities that supported them and perhaps continue to benefit from the practice..

Do the malevolent choices and abuse of power (predominantly against women) cancel out any genuine good that came from their work? This is a hard question to reconcile. To be sure, the practices developed by both Bikram and Bhajan have carried on, and continue to be a source of physical, mental and spiritual support for practitioners. Personally, the practice of kundalini itself never did me any harm—to the contrary, I always felt incredible afterward, and have retained a handful of practices for which I have a profound and lasting appreciation.

This is where things get a bit more complex. I only ever dabbled in the practice of Bikram (or hot yoga, as it’s now often called so as to retain the practice while removing the emphasis on the man who popularized it), so I’m no expert on the subject. But Bhajan’s story carries more notable question marks concerning lineage, appropriation and lies. He appears to have essentially made up Kundalini yoga, weaving together several pre-existing modalities without giving them explicit credit, adding his own narrative and instruction, then putting it all under the religious umbrella of Sikhism and calling it an “ancient technology”... essentially, a cobbled-together mishmash, dressed up as a revered lineage and legitimate religious practice.

More than the misdeeds of the man—which, sadly, I’ve come to expect from men in power, despite or even especially in positions of spiritual leadership—I’m troubled by the lack of authentic lineage and disrespectful appropriation of the Sikh religion for his own purposes. I’m sure I’m not the only Kundalini practitioner now wondering if it’s okay for me to chant the “Kundalini” Sikh mantras I learned with sincere devotion? I’m not sure. If I were to play it completely safe and avoid anything potentially problematic, I’d probably say no. Then again, under those conditions, there’s a lot that I might altogether avoid, like the practice of yoga in general, or chanting Hindu mantras, or, or, or…

Admire no one. Love everyone.

I began this exploration with my personal experience on pedestaling and it ended with tyrants and guru-predators, which is a pretty terrible progression. But I suppose this reveals the wide spectrum we explore as leaders, and the legit risk we face when we don’t openly and humbly acknowledge the allure of power that’s present in our lives and our work.

So let’s end on something a bit more uplifting, yes?

Last year, I read “The Laws of Success” by Paramahansa Yogananda—who happens to be one of the only spiritual gurus who, to my knowledge, remains free and clear of any sexual abuse accusations, thank goodness. (In the name of all that’s holy, please let there be more than a few men who can hold spiritual power without abusing women or other people in the process.) Here’s one of my favorite quotes from the book:

“Many people excuse their own faults but judge other persons harshly. We should reverse this attitude by excusing others’ shortcomings and by harshly examining our own. Sometimes it is necessary to analyze other people; in that case the important thing to remember is to keep the mind unprejudiced. An unbiased mind is like a clear mirror, held steadily, not oscillating with hasty judgments. Any person reflected within that mirror will present an undistorted image.”

This feels like a balm in the wake of so much abuse. Because it's easy to focus on all the people out there who have failed miserably at walking the path of power and leadership with morals intact. But perhaps the true work is to learn from their mistakes, so that we might do better.

By definition, an ideal is unreachable. Like the horizon line, it will continue to move further and further away, a fixed state far off in the distance. (H/t to “10x is Better Than 2x” for that helpful metaphor.) So while I desire more than what we usually get from those in power, I also want to refrain from wagging my finger.

In my own spiritual work, I’ve become a student of Incan wisdom and the Andean Cosmovision. “Yachay” is a word in Quechua which I’m particularly fond of, meaning both to teach and to learn. In that cultural paradigm, there are not separate words for these two modes of being, they are one and the same. As a teacher, an eternal student, and someone keenly fascinated with the gifts and shadows of personal power, this innately humble approach to leadership scratches an itch.

Because it's undeniable that we teach what we need to learn; the moment I think I’ve arrived as a teacher is probably the moment I should back away slowly.

May we be courageous enough to take ourselves off the pedestal, holding our own grandeur and magnificence in balance with our humility.

And please, beloved. Do yourself, and your heroes, a favor. Don’t pedestal them. Remember they are real, fallible, human people.

As my friend Alexis said to me in a recent Theta session, “Admire no one. Love everyone.”