“Who can find a faithful man?” [Proverbs 20:6.]
11 August 2008
President Josiah "Jed" Bartlet: "The ultimate weakness of violence is that it is a descending spiral. Returning violence with violence only multiplies violence ‘adding deeper darkness to a night already devoid of stars.'""Grace is the character of accepting acceptance. It is the courage to accept the acceptance of the unacceptable: namely, oneself." ~Paul Tillich
Leo McGarry: Dr. King.
President Bartlet: I'm part of that darkness now, Leo. When did that happen?
Leo: Dr. King wasn't wrong. He just didn't have your job.”
~"The West Wing", The Dogs of War (2003)
Immense resignation is not a substitute for faith, as Hero Leadership cannot transcend the lie of character. Both are conditions from which we must break free the human spirit.
“History has happened. It’s over and done with. All we can do is to change its course by encouraging what we love instead of destroying what we don’t. There is beauty yet in this brutal, damaged world of ours. Hidden, fierce, immense. Beauty that is uniquely ours and beauty that we have received with grace from others, enhanced, reinvented and made our own. We have to seek it out, nurture it, love it.” ~Arundhati roy.
As a leader, we must ask, “How do we transcend our own self?” And at the same time not mistake humility for a false denigration and ill-formed guilt? If we trust Mr Nietzsche’s conclusion: self-esteem is a damning life-long trap. True self-affirmation is the same as self-negation. The Buddhists and compassionate Christians would not disagree.
Yet, there must be conviction in a leader’s assertion, lest every hardship threaten to derail us from our course. Leaders cannot afford the luxury of drawn-out doubt. This profound existential struggle can be found in any great autobiography.
In a post-modern, secular world, how do we take heart? How do we have the absolute confidence and conviction to lead, and yet avoid the trap of hero leadership? If we take for granted that character identity (ego) is a necessary and fundamental aspect of human survival, what does it mean that fundamentally we must stand alone?
"I do not want you to follow me or anyone else; if you are looking for a Moses to lead you out of this capitalist wilderness, you will stay right where you are. I would not lead you into the promised land if I could, because if I led you in, some one else would lead you out. You must use your heads as well as your hands, and get yourself out of your present condition." ~Eugene Debs
Often, as leaders we are focused on outcomes and objectives. Strategic thinking is a crucial skill. Yet, “…if one is to really learn something from the great it is precisely the beginning one must attend to.
“If anyone one the verge of action should judge himself according to the outcome, he would never begin. …Even though the result may gladden the whole world, that cannot help the hero; for he knows the result only when the whole thing is over, and that is not how he became a hero, but by virtue of the fact that he began.” [Kierkegaard.]
Leadership is ultimately about action. A leader must be thoughtful, reflective, self-generative. But without action, and the conviction to influence others to take action, what is there but a indignant fool pissing in the wind?
We must embrace some perplexing contradictions: every action is a strategy for self-esteem. Yet, the leader must act, whether or not there is ever going to be recognition--any validation for self-esteem. If Martin Luther King had not succeeded in influencing in the world, would he be any less a great man?
Shedding the grandiose illusions of heroic character, what is left? Transcendentally speaking, the character of a leader is what you have when you have lost everything you can lose [Evan Esar], when you know the truth for which you can live and die, without recognition.
"There is a deep power in which we exist and whose beatitude is accessible to us." Ralph Waldo Emerson
Before I am mistaken for one of those writers who espouse the grandiosity of leadership, let me be clear that knowing one’s moral compass never negates the pragmatic realities of a leader on the ground, who ministers unto the people and walks among the troops. The one who must dirty their hands, and make imperfect choices.
Let it be a testament that we all must know what is sacred in our lives’ works. The most influential among us may be the quiet leaders who are humble clay vessels, those who do the best anyone could, despite (or because of) all our maladies and infirmities. These are the one’s forgotten by posterity.
Yet they began. They took action. They did not give into the immense resignation of the human condition, nor were seduce by the prison heroism of the leadership cult.
bell hooks refers to the role of teachers as humble servants:
“there is an aspect of our vocation that is sacred; who believe that our work is not merely to share information but to share in the intellectual and spiritual growth of our students. To teach in a manner that respects and cares for the souls of our students…. Provides the necessary condition where learning can most deeply and intimately begin.”
“History has happened. It’s over and done with. All we can do is to change its course by encouraging what we love instead of destroying what we don’t. There is beauty yet in this brutal, damaged world of ours. Hidden, fierce, immense. Beauty that is uniquely ours and beauty that we have received with grace from others, enhanced, reinvented and made our own. We have to seek it out, nurture it, love it.” ~Arundhati roy.
As a leader, we must ask, “How do we transcend our own self?” And at the same time not mistake humility for a false denigration and ill-formed guilt? If we trust Mr Nietzsche’s conclusion: self-esteem is a damning life-long trap. True self-affirmation is the same as self-negation. The Buddhists and compassionate Christians would not disagree.
Yet, there must be conviction in a leader’s assertion, lest every hardship threaten to derail us from our course. Leaders cannot afford the luxury of drawn-out doubt. This profound existential struggle can be found in any great autobiography.
In a post-modern, secular world, how do we take heart? How do we have the absolute confidence and conviction to lead, and yet avoid the trap of hero leadership? If we take for granted that character identity (ego) is a necessary and fundamental aspect of human survival, what does it mean that fundamentally we must stand alone?
"I do not want you to follow me or anyone else; if you are looking for a Moses to lead you out of this capitalist wilderness, you will stay right where you are. I would not lead you into the promised land if I could, because if I led you in, some one else would lead you out. You must use your heads as well as your hands, and get yourself out of your present condition." ~Eugene Debs
Often, as leaders we are focused on outcomes and objectives. Strategic thinking is a crucial skill. Yet, “…if one is to really learn something from the great it is precisely the beginning one must attend to.
“If anyone one the verge of action should judge himself according to the outcome, he would never begin. …Even though the result may gladden the whole world, that cannot help the hero; for he knows the result only when the whole thing is over, and that is not how he became a hero, but by virtue of the fact that he began.” [Kierkegaard.]
Leadership is ultimately about action. A leader must be thoughtful, reflective, self-generative. But without action, and the conviction to influence others to take action, what is there but a indignant fool pissing in the wind?
We must embrace some perplexing contradictions: every action is a strategy for self-esteem. Yet, the leader must act, whether or not there is ever going to be recognition--any validation for self-esteem. If Martin Luther King had not succeeded in influencing in the world, would he be any less a great man?
Shedding the grandiose illusions of heroic character, what is left? Transcendentally speaking, the character of a leader is what you have when you have lost everything you can lose [Evan Esar], when you know the truth for which you can live and die, without recognition.
"There is a deep power in which we exist and whose beatitude is accessible to us." Ralph Waldo Emerson
Before I am mistaken for one of those writers who espouse the grandiosity of leadership, let me be clear that knowing one’s moral compass never negates the pragmatic realities of a leader on the ground, who ministers unto the people and walks among the troops. The one who must dirty their hands, and make imperfect choices.
Let it be a testament that we all must know what is sacred in our lives’ works. The most influential among us may be the quiet leaders who are humble clay vessels, those who do the best anyone could, despite (or because of) all our maladies and infirmities. These are the one’s forgotten by posterity.
Yet they began. They took action. They did not give into the immense resignation of the human condition, nor were seduce by the prison heroism of the leadership cult.
bell hooks refers to the role of teachers as humble servants:
“there is an aspect of our vocation that is sacred; who believe that our work is not merely to share information but to share in the intellectual and spiritual growth of our students. To teach in a manner that respects and cares for the souls of our students…. Provides the necessary condition where learning can most deeply and intimately begin.”
11 August 2008
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