To lead or not to lead...

Often I think about whether or not I have a responsibility to lead. Do other people wrestle with this same question? I really couldn’t tell you. I hope so. To me, leadership is both a responsibility and burden that carries significant power. There was a time when I was younger and could wield this power boldly and blindly to create positive impact. The funny thing is, I actually think I used to be a good leader. Fast forward to today, I view myself as undeserving of such a title and struggle with this reasoning. I feel that I have a certain responsibility to lead others and think that I have a certain capacity for leadership that is both necessary and missing in many areas of the world. My problem is figuring out how to apply these skills and make the biggest difference.

I don’t even know what the true meaning of leadership is. I could wager a guess that I would receive a response, which indicates that leadership is different for every person. For some reason I view this as a cop out and a way of saying that everyone has the capability to lead when in reality, not everyone is meant to lead. Is that really true though? I would compare an individual’s capacity for leadership to the capability of any person to become professional athlete. Would we say that every person has the capability to be a professional athlete? Maybe. I bet most would say that people are not born with this capability based upon genetic make-up, state of upbringing with respect to economical and sociological factors, and ultimately plain dumb luck. I believe that professional athletes, as it also applies to leaders, have to work to develop the characteristics and skills necessary to be successful. Leadership is something that we should be practicing on a daily basis in an effort to refine our skills and become more effective as leaders.

Without practice, I feel that most of us fall into a trap perpetuated by leadership trainings. Most leadership trainings educate us and help us to identify how our personality may be most effective in a team structure. This does not mean that I can be thrown into a given situation and just lead. The real danger here is that some people can’t recognize an improper use of leadership when all they depend upon are definitions and personality profiles. Instead, experience marked by successes and failures are the most effective means to gain leadership experience. We learn more when our emotions are raw and our comfort zone is stretched beyond anything we have ever known. In these circumstances, we are forced to look within ourselves and figure out who we really are. Perhaps this is the real essence of leadership is knowing one’s self. Why stop there? The real essence of leadership is built upon a true understanding of ourselves and loving the strongest of strengths and the weakest of weaknesses.

So I ask again, do I have a responsibility to lead? Based on what I’ve just described, I don’t think that I am fully prepared to lead. I won’t feel prepared to lead again until I can come to grips with things that haunt me from my past. Once I can reconcile my painful memories of people I’ve failed as a leader, then maybe I can lead again. Until that happens, I will remain diligent in my pursuit for understanding leadership. I welcome the discomfort that comes along with the process and am eager to transform into the best version of myself.