My 19-year-old daughter recently left me a copy of the book Siddhartha, by Herman Hesse, asking me to return it to our local library. I picked it up to return it, on my way to run some errands, and instead began reading. I read the entire book (which took about three hours) and I felt moved and joyful. What a gem of a book! It was written in 1922, following the end of World War I. I had not read it since I was in my early 20’s.

In the last chapter, Siddhartha, an old and somewhat content ferryman, is asked by his lifelong friend Govinda for some guidance in his seeking. Siddhartha replies, “When someone seeks then it easily happens that his eyes see only the thing that he seeks, and he is able to find nothing. He take in nothing because he always thinks only about the thing he is seeking…But finding means: being free, being open, having no goal… In striving toward your goal, you fail to see certain things that are right under your nose.”

A perspective that Zen practice brings to business is to embrace and attempt to penetrate the paradox of seeking and finding. Without doubt, strategy, planning, and disciplined execution are essential aspects of growing a business. I encourage some coaching clients to establish a weekly ritual of reviewing customers, prospects, product offerings, as well as financial results compared to financial projections. I suggest reviewing tasks and projects for the week and looking at goals for the upcoming quarter and through the remainder of the year. This is an important process of seeking, planning, as well as understanding your business.

Finding requires a different perspective and can be developed through other types of activities. Finding means being alert, aware, flexible and responsive. Finding is best performed with a “soft” mind – a mind and body that are open and ready for whatever might happen. Mindfulness practice and meditation practice are ways to develop our ability to widen our capacity for finding.

In many situations we must simultaneously employ our seeking and finding minds. When we are driving, we usually have a clear route and destination mapped out. However, at the same time, we need to be responsive and flexible to other drivers, road conditions and a multitude of other factors – often factors that we could never have anticipated.

In business, and in our lives, we can easily fall into a rut of seeking, and ignore the importance of finding. Many great new product and service ideas result from finding – discovering and seeing a need that exists that is right in front of us. And, finding joy, happiness, and appreciation in our lives is often the result of finding what is right in front of us, right now, right here – in the midst of our messy and impossible lives and world.