> ## Content Index > Fetch the complete content index at: https://www.leadingfrombeing.org/llms.txt > Use this file to discover other available public pages before exploring further. # What a Praying Mantis Taught Me About Leadership: Balancing Stillness, Interruption, and Aligned Action - URL: https://www.leadingfrombeing.org/praying-mantis-leadership/ - Published: 2026-08-10T14:15:46.000Z - Updated: 2026-08-10T14:15:45.000Z - Description: An unlikely lesson about leadership from a praying mantis: balancing stillness, presence, and aligned action. - Author: Cameron Martin - Tags: Being-Centered Leadership, Presence The other day I was looking in the mirror and I was really surprised by what I saw. *(And no, it wasn’t my reflection).* I noticed something sitting on my right shoulder: a pale white praying mantis. At first, I was a little shocked and then I paused for a moment when I realized that this encounter felt a little strange. It’s not every day that I see a mantis and certainly never have I seen one sitting on my body. And the fact that it was white―not green―also struck me. After a moment of pause, I decided to take it outside. If you know anything about me, then you won’t be surprised to hear what happened next. When I walked back inside, I wondered: “What was the spiritual meaning of a praying mantis?” because, surely, this was not a usual experience for me. It must have meant something! A quick consultation with ChatGPT resulted in the following explanation: “The praying mantis represents sacred stillness, discernment, and action that arises from presence. It does not chase franticly. It becomes quiet. It observes, waits and moves with extraordinary precision when the moment is right.” It went on to explain: “the white or translucent coloring adds a layer of purification, spiritual receptivity, and newness. And biologically, if it had just molted, the symbolism becomes even more striking: it was literally between identities, newly emerged, soft, vulnerable, and not yet fully colored by its environment.” I’ve personally been moving through big life changes, namely moving to Greece and launching my new brand *Leading From Being*. In many ways these days, I feel like a newly-molted mantis: between identities, vulnerable, and not yet sure of how my new surroundings will eventually change me. And I thought, “Aww, that’s nice. What a great message.” Little did I know that the mantis had more for me to learn. So, I went back to brushing my teeth and, when I looked at myself in the mirror, at my shoulder, where the mantis used to be, I started to feel concerned. Because, if you know another thing about me, I’m not particularly gentle when it comes to removing bugs from places they don’t belong. Some people can hold an insect gingerly or put it inside a glass jar carefully. Generally, I resemble more of a child who’s never used a broom before “sweeping” bugs outside. In this case, I just shook my shoulders back and forth until the mantis fell off of my body. Sort of like a frantic shimmy. I began to worry a little: “He was a messenger from the Universe and I just (literally) shrugged him off.” “Should I have been more gentle with him?” “I wonder if he’s hurt. It was a far way down to the ground.” “Shit. What if I hurt him?” “What if he’s dead?” I walked back outside to check to see if he was still where I left him and if he was doing okay. Admittedly, I was also checking on the state of my own conscience. And I saw him just sitting there. Completely still. And I thought, “Shit, maybe I did kill him.” So, I stood there and waited for him to move. Nothing. Damn. Then I noticed an ant about a foot away from the mantis. It was walking right over to where the mantis was. And, surprisingly, the ant bumped the mantis on its leg. The mantis moved…a little. Just a small adjustment. ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/67/79/67799ec9-67f8-470d-ba17-5f6681ad35be/content/images/2026/07/Praying-Mantis-1.png) I thought, “yay he’s not dead!” And he returned to stillness. The ant continued to scurry. I didn’t feel guilty anymore. Whooo! And then a curious thing happened. The ant bumped into the mantis for a second time! This time, the mantis moved a bit more. It made a momentary adjustment and returned to stillness. I was fascinated and I stayed observing the two of them for a few minutes more. What I received was profound. The mantis and the ant were showing me a lesson is *being* vs. *doing.* The mantis represents stillness, patience, and receptivity. It literally looked like a little monk returning to prayer, every time it was ‘interrupted.’ The ant represented activity, persistence, urgency, and constant movement. There is nothing inherently better with the mantis or worse about the ant. The ant was simply moving: investigating and engaging with its environment. Similarly, the demands of work, organizations, technology, and daily life are not inherently wrong for us humans. The problem arises when we unconsciously surrender our inner state to every external conflict or disturbance. Let me ask you: *How often do you allow every touch, message, request, deadline, opinion, or disruption dictate your next movement?* In many organizations, the person who moves first is assumed to be leading. But movement and leadership are not the same thing. Many leaders are conditioned to demonstrate value through immediate responsiveness. They answer quickly, intervene prematurely, fill silence, solve before listening, and act before fully understanding. Our business and economic systems reward short-term decision making, not presence. We reward reactionary measures and crisis mitigation techniques as soon as a negative press release might come out. Our leaders are expected to ‘be on’ all the time. But constant movement keeps us distracted from our true nature. Stillness is not the absence of leadership; it is often the source of the most aligned response. Our goal, therefore, should not be to reject action. As leaders, we have to act. People are depending on our decisions and our actions. But it is better for us not to allow every stimulus to determine our movement. Let’s return to the mantis for a moment. ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/67/79/67799ec9-67f8-470d-ba17-5f6681ad35be/content/images/2026/07/Praying-Mantis-2.png) He did not remain completely unresponsive in the face of being touched by the ant. He moved. But he did not lose his entire posture because of the interruption. This is because the nature of a praying mantis is to be present. To be still. Until it needs to take action. **Presence allows us to respond proportionately to stimuli.** A being-centered leader does not ignore reality. They remain available to it without becoming controlled by it. They move like a mantis: from stillness and awareness, not from quick reaction. Modern organizations reward ant-like behavior: constant motion, visible effort, overflowing calendars, immediate availability, and rapid replies. There is intelligence in the ant. Cooperation, discipline, persistence, and collective effort all matter. But when ant consciousness becomes the only mode available, leaders lose the capacity to pause, perceive, and choose. The issue here is not ant versus mantis. It is that many people have developed the capacities of the ant while neglecting the capacities of the mantis. We have built workplaces full of people trained to move, but not necessarily trained to discern. Our dominant models of leadership reward constant movement and immediate response, but effective leadership depends of the capacity to remain present under pressure. ### The Solution: Leading From Being Leading from being requires that we remain rooted in presence even when the world continually nudges us toward unnecessary movement. Like the mantis disturbed by the ant, the embodied leader responds without abandoning their own inner stillness. You will move. You will adjust. But you won’t lose your center once you’ve learned to cultivate your leadership from it. The world will continue to touch us. Emails will arrive. People will need things. Deadlines will approach. Ants will keep moving. The question is not whether we can eliminate interruption. It is whether we can remain connected to ourselves within it.