The modern idea of servant leadership was developed and popularized by Robert Greenleaf after he read a short novel by Herman Hesse called Journey to the East as This is the mythical story of a group of people on a spiritual quest. Accompanying the party is a servant by the name of Leo, whose nurturing character sustained the group on its journey until one day he disappeared. The group fell apart and abandoned its quest when it realized that it was helpless without its servant. Finally, after many years of continued searching, the story's narrator found the religious order that had sponsored the original quest. It turned out that Leo, whom the narrator had only known as a servant, was actually the order's revered leader. To Greenleaf, this story meant that true leadership emerges when one's primary motivation is to help others.