When AI can write the strategy, the board memo and the performance review by Monday morning, what is a leader actually for? Root Astro co-founders Lee Arthur and Marsha Prospere sit by the Bashakill marsh and work it through: what AI reveals about leaders, why will cannot be simulated and why will alone is not enough, what has gone soft and blunt in the people who lead, where the human edge lives, and why it is built in two places: strength through chosen hard things, and stillness through rest and attention.
Full transcript, chapters and links: https://www.rootastro.org/journal/back-to-human-ep-1-what-is-a-leader-for?utm_source=substack&utm_medium=podcast&utm_campaign=bth-ep01
Watch the video episode on YouTube: https://youtu.be/anKV9JTVLJg
Chapters
0:00 What is a leader for?
3:35 What AI reveals about leaders
8:43 Will, and where it runs out
13:52 What’s going soft
17:26 Not broken, blunted: Lee’s story
22:49 Answer machine or sparring partner
25:39 Where the human edge lives
29:10 Why does it have to be hard?
32:46 Rest that fortifies
34:46 The fully present leader
40:01 Leading through the cuts
45:25 Who looks after the leader
49:06 Going device-free
55:06 One thing this week, and a year from now
60:02 The question to sit with
Mentioned in this episode
HARD: Building Your Inner Citadel, by Lee Arthur: https://www.rootastro.org/book
The Fieldstone Letter, the Root Astro newsletter: https://www.rootastro.org/subscribe
Andrew Huberman with David Goggins on the anterior mid-cingulate cortex and willpower (Lee refers to it at 8:43): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=imXzK9XcfZc
Gloria Mark’s research on interruption and refocus time
Back to Human is a Root Astro production. Root Astro runs device-free leadership retreats on 7 acres of private land within the Shawangunk State Forest, 90 minutes from New York City. First cohorts from May 1, 2027. https://www.rootastro.org
