In this milestone 50th episode of Mindful Leadership with Marc Lesser, we explore the art of catching sparks—those subtle, powerful moments of connection, inspiration, and presence that can transform how we live and lead.

Marc draws from his experiences as a CEO, Zen teacher, and leadership coach to reflect on how mindfulness, breath awareness, and love help us tune into the energy exchanged between people. With references to Thich Nhat Hanh, Bob Dylan, and the power of nature, this episode invites listeners to become more awake to life’s offerings — and to practice offering their own sparks in return.

Whether you’re a leader, a seeker, or someone navigating a life transition, this episode offers practical and poetic insights for deeper connection, personal growth, and purposeful leadership.

In this milestone 50th episode of Mindful Leadership with Marc Lesser, we explore the art of catching sparks—those subtle, powerful moments of connection, inspiration, and presence that can transform how we live and lead.

Marc draws from his experiences as a CEO, Zen teacher, and leadership coach to reflect on how mindfulness, breath awareness, and love help us tune into the energy exchanged between people. With references to Thich Nhat Hanh, Bob Dylan, and the power of nature, this episode invites listeners to become more awake to life’s offerings — and to practice offering their own sparks in return.

Whether you’re a leader, a seeker, or someone navigating a life transition, this episode offers practical and poetic insights for deeper connection, personal growth, and purposeful leadership.

EPISODE TRANSCRIPT

[music]

[00:00:00] Marc: Welcome to Mindful Leadership with Marc Lesser, a biweekly podcast featuring conversations with leaders and teachers exploring the intersection of keeping our hearts open and effective action in these most uncertain and challenging times. Please support our work by making a donation at Marc lesser slash donate.

Welcome to today’s practice session. We’ll start with a short sitting, uh, do a little practice together. I’ll say a few words about the topic and then maybe we’ll, we’ll end with a few minutes of sitting together.[00:01:00]

Marc (00:05)
Let’s begin by doing some sitting practice together. And I am going to ring my trusty bell.

the Bell’s invitation.

to pause.

I’m just noticing.

What is it like to be here? What is it like to be alive?

For me, taking a few deep breaths.

grounding, know, grounding the body.

I read recently ⁓ centeredness as the number one quality of a leader. I would probably say the number one quality of a human centeredness.

Again, with each breath, returning to your center. What is the center?

in allowing the breath to be smooth and fluid.

and trying on the mindset of nothing lacking, nothing lacking. What if everything, everything you need is right here.

Breathing in, I’m aware that I’m breathing in and breathing out. I’m aware that I’m breathing out.

I think of the ⁓ Thich Nhat Hanh meditation poem, he says, calm, ease, smile, release.

present moment.

Wonderful moment.

And again, whether it’s wonderful or not, know, whatever you’re feeling, it’s all.

Practice, practicing being, appreciating, appreciating each breath, each unique, unique breath.

that bell. It’s another ⁓ invitation to come on back, come on back and join me. Lovely to be here with you. I hope you are doing well.

I’ve been thinking about and talking about and practicing with the practice of what I’m calling catching sparks, catching sparks. And I ⁓ I was inspired by watching the ⁓ the film about the life of Bob Dylan called A Complete Unknown.

And it’s a biopic about the early days of Bob Dylan’s emergence as a music icon. And he seeks out and finds his hero, one of his heroes, Woody Guthrie, who’s hospitalized in New Jersey. And he finds him, you know, and he sees Woody lying in bed, ⁓ unable to speak. And Pete Seeger happens to be there singing a song to

⁓ to Woody Guthrie as Dylan walks in and Pete turns to a young Bob Dylan and says, you know, who are you? And he says, my name’s Bob, Bobby. And he says, why are you here? And ⁓ Dylan walks up and looks at, ⁓ makes eye contact with Woody Guthrie and he says, I’m here to catch some sparks. I’m here to catch some sparks.

And it made me realize how much of my own life and my own growth has been catching sparks from others. I’ve had so many wonderful mentors and teachers and people in my life who just being around them has been a great joy and great learning and…

The other day I found myself doing a training with a group of hospice workers. And I was sitting in a circle of hospice volunteers and staff members of a hospice. And I could feel the energy in the room of something about people who spend a good deal of their waking hours.

supporting people who are dying. I could feel the energy of the room and ⁓ I said as I looked around that I was here both ⁓ to catch some sparks from them, that I could feel the depth of their energy, feel what they had, how they had learned and were growing by being around, you know, life and death. And at the same time I said my hope in this time we had together that

that ⁓ I was there.

to hopefully maybe they could catch a spark, catch some sparks from me and all of my life energy and what I had, ⁓ the ways that I had grown. And that as we started this meditation together, my instructions were, can you feel that you are bringing your entire life

right now. And I would say that’s true now, you know, to anyone. As you are listening to me, you are bringing your entire life, your entire being to this moment. This, you don’t have to pretend or make it up. It’s true. I feel it. I feel it right now as I’m, as I’m speaking, as I’m

speaking and listening and feeling the weight, the gravity and the lightness and the joy of all that I’ve been given and my aspiration to give it away, to give it away to you. I hope you can feel it. And I think this ⁓ catching sparks can be a valuable and healthy way to

approach our work, our relationships and all parts of our lives. What a simple and vital approach, right? Wherever you go, being open, what sparks might you catch? You know, of course, from the people, but also from the clouds, the mountains, the stones, the rivers, the ladybugs, they all

They all have sparks to offer. And at the same time, you know, bringing awareness, what sparks might you have to offer? What sparks might you have to offer?

And this simple, profound practice reminds me a little bit of a line of poetry from David White that I carry around where he says, anything or anyone that does not bring you alive is too small for you. Anything or anyone that does not bring you alive is too small for you. It’s all about the sparks.

that we catch and that we give that bring us alive.

Yeah, so in some way, my, you know, my ongoing aspiration is to, to make myself into someone who has sparks to offer. And I put this out there as a, as a practice, you know, of making yourself into someone who has sparks to offer.

And this also reminds me of, I’ve been studying some of Thich Nhat Hanh’s teachings, his practice, when he talks about the practice of right view. And in some way, I think this.

Forging ourself into someone who has sparks to offer and is always open to receiving sparks is a kind of view. You know, so he says on this practice of right view Thich Nhat Hanh says, you know, when one person comes up to us, the very sight of him makes us uncomfortable. But when someone else walks by, we like him or her right away. Something in us.

Something in each of those people touches a seed in us. If we love our mother deeply, but feel tense every time we think of our father, it’s natural that when we see a young person who looks like our mother, we appreciate her. And when we see a person who evokes the memory of our father, we feel uncomfortable. So in this way, we can see, we can feel the seeds that are in us.

when we become aware of the seeds in our storehouse, we’ll not be surprised by our own behavior or the behavior of others. So this is our storehouse. And in some way, this practice of feeling sparks, catching sparks, and giving sparks can be a way to notice.

notice our habit energy and transform our habit energy. And, know, Thich Nhat Hanh suggests the practices of

when it comes to right view of asking ourselves, you know, am I sure? Am I sure? What am I sure about? And his other suggested practice is.

Hello habit energy, right? To notice our habit energy.

And one other practice that he suggests about right view is ⁓ opening up to feeling love, the energy of love. And I think that’s what this, you know, using language, our language is quite ⁓ dual and limited.

But when I talk about the practice of catching sparks, I think it’s feeling the love and the meeting, the meeting of.

the love that comes from us and the love that’s coming toward us, meeting it, that meeting, that meeting of sparks. I’ve been, I’ve been playing a game lately with my, two year old grandson. We actually, this game, this game is with my six year old grandson, this particular game of, it’s a game that we call

catching sparks and we jump together on the trampoline. We jump and we jump and we’re doing it with great ⁓ enthusiasm and then we stop and we gently, gently put our index fingers almost touching and there’s a spark of static electricity and it hurts a little bit and it’s

joyful and and we both we both kind of laugh and feel the amazing energy of this electricity and this literally this spark of static electricity so ⁓ I feel that often when I’m especially when I’m teaching you know when I’m with people who

you know, who are dropping, dropping into our own ⁓ love, our own energy of love and feeling, feeling the sparks.

Yeah, so maybe, maybe experimenting with the practice of ⁓ catching sparks and offering sparks, ⁓ feeling, feeling the love, feeling the love again and again.

Yeah, so let’s keep practicing together. Let’s keep practicing catching sparks, offering sparks, and catching sparks with great open minds and open hearts. Thank you.

I hope you’ve appreciated today’s episode. To learn more about my work, you can visit Marc lesser.net, and if you’re interested in enrolling in a self-directed course, called Seven Practices of a Mindful Leader, please visit www.Marclesser.courses.thinkific.com. This podcast is offered freely and relies on the financial support from listeners like you.

You can donate@marclesser.net slash donate. Thank you very much.

[END OF AUDIO]