Dr. Ron Stotts was 27, standing on stage beside his mentor Buckminster Fuller, helping with a presentation for about 250 business people. In the middle of it, Fuller stopped. He looked up. He just stood there. Ron remembers thinking, we have to get going.
Accessing Universal Intelligence
That night, Ron found the courage to ask what had happened. Fuller told him he was accessing what he called universal intelligence, and then offered a simple instruction. You don’t have to sit in silence to do it. Quiet your mind at your desk, put out what you are trying to create, and let it come.
Ron calls this Big Mind, and he told me how he first tested it. A client wanted a one-acre Japanese garden. Ron didn’t have the time, so he sat on the hill behind his home in Mill Valley, quieted his mind, held the intention, and watched the design arrive over about an hour and a half: a stream coming down the hill, a bamboo forest, a turtle island in the pond, then the boulders, the plants, and finally the sound of insects and birds. The next day he walked the clients through it. By Ron’s telling, a project like that normally takes months of planning, and the finished garden went on to win international design awards.
But, where is the time for Big Mind when the Board wants results, deadlines are stacking up, and the stock price is or isn’t moving? Doesn’t Big Mind demand that you slow down exactly where you are speeding up the fastest?
Big Mind Through Breathing, Being Curious & Being Present
Ron’s answer was about trust, and about control. The leaders he works with arrive trusting their logical, analytical minds, because that is what got them here. But, then something stalls in their analytical minds and the first thing Ron notices is that they stop breathing. So he asks them what control means to them. From where he sits, he says, someone who has stopped breathing and stopped being present looks completely out of control, because they have shut off most of what their brain can do. By the time they reach Big Mind, he says, control means breathing, being curious, and being present.
Thinking vs. Feeling
I recognized myself in that example of being out of control. When I left the corporate world for coaching in 2014, the first part of my training was learning to listen to myself again. My coach kept asking, “What do you feel?” and I kept answering, “I think.” She kept saying, no, not what you think. I believed I was a good manager and a connected one. It took me a while to see that thinking and being are not the same thing.
Ron traces that concept of disconnect back to childhood. A child wants love and acceptance more than anything, so we learn which parts of ourselves earn it and which parts we must tuck away to receive love. In his family, anger was not acceptable, and fear wasn’t either. He calls what we build in order to adapt a “program for getting love.”
Love that Comes with Fear
I pushed back and wondered out loud whether it is love at all if it comes with fear. Ron’s reply was that if you ask any parent whether they love unconditionally, they’ll say yes, and yet love gets fairly conditional once you step outside their comfort zone. As a mother to two men and a new grandmother, I’m still sitting with that one.
Who Do You Want to Become?
Ron said that when a client asks what they should do, he asks instead who they want to become. I heard myself say it back to him: it’s the difference between what and who. He told me his own “who” began at 19, at a Marine Corps rifle range, when a human silhouette went up, and he realized he was no longer playing a sport. He was learning how to hurt people. To kill. So, without thinking, he put the rifle down, and he says that was the day that started him on a path of self-discovery. Not always linear with clear objectives, Ron experienced setbacks and overcame personal demons to live an intentional life.
Lead from the Love in Your Heart
We ended with a shift in perspective as I asked for Ron’s take on artificial intelligence. Ron doesn’t see AI as the threat. He believes a low level of fear consciousness got us where we are now. So, the question from Ron is not about what the technology will do. It is whether you are leading from the love in your heart or the fear in your head, and he reminds us that we get to choose.
Ron’s whole method comes down to three simple concepts: breathe, be curious, and be present. That’s it. That’s how you unlock the Big Mind and gain access to universal intelligence.
Mindful Moment: So, this week I’ll leave you with Ron’s question: what are you efforting at right now that might arrive more easily if you paused to access universal intelligence? Or share a time that you were able to experience this universal intelligence to help you understand or achieve something. Share with us if you’re comfortable.
Listen to the full conversation with Dr. Ron Stotts on Mindful Leadership Podcast.
About Guest Dr. Ron Stotts
Dr. Ron Stotts is a transformational executive coach, author, and speaker, and the author of Overscheduled by Success, Ins & Outs of Mindfulness, and Leadership on the Leading Edge. Learn more at RonStotts.com or connect on LinkedIn.
Content note: The full episode includes Dr. Stotts’s personal account of a suicide attempt. If you’re struggling, you’re not alone. In the US, call or text 988 (Suicide & Crisis Lifeline). Elsewhere, you can find a local helpline at findahelpline.com.
