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Leadership
Impersonal Commitment that Sends One to the Top
When an individual makes an
impersonal [i.e. no personal ambition intended]
commitment to
his country, the country
seeks him out and
elevates
him to leadership.
(paraphrase of MSS)
Leader as Front of
Rising Tide
A leader of a nation
doesn't rise so much because of his talent, charm, and knowledge, but
because he represents a rising tide in the society. E.g. Clinton in the
US represented the Baby Boomers. What rising tide does you leader
represent?
Leaders rise to power as a
result of a compelling rising tide in society. The individual represents
an emerging element of society, and that is what pushes that person to
the top as leader.
The Inspired Leader
(Beyond the Social Influence)
The
inspired leader acquires the skills, attitudes and values of the
social collective but does not allow their attitudes or expectations to
limit his vision, aspirations or actions. He becomes a true vital
individual who acts on the society expressing his individual inspiration
rather than acting out the social formula. He becomes a leader like
Gandhi. (MSS-GJ)
Best Ways to Serve Your Country
It is by being sincere, courageous, enduring and honest
that you can best serve your country,
make it one and great in the world.
(The Mother)
Leadership by Systems, Not Leaders
The days of individual leadership are
gone and what we find now is impersonal leadership in the form of
constructive systems.
(MSS, N. Asokan)
The Individual is
Becoming the New World Leader
After the World War, the world has not thrown up a leader of world
stature. After the procession of intellectuals who wanted to shape the
world according to their ideas - Rousseau, Voltaire, Marx, Russell,
Sartre - in the last twenty-five years no single intellectual has
attained their stature. Leadership in war and thought has passed away
from the collective.
This is a phase of social evolution where
the INDIVIDUAL emerges.
Presently we have a leaderless world. It
only means the individual is coming into his own.
We see more and
more the initiative of thinking is moving to the public, which
means the individual is becoming more responsible to the nation.
It is high time that the citizen, at least mentally, must take greater
responsibility for the future of the country. We do see the phenomenon
of public opinion being taken into greater account.
The saga of
great leaders has gone and the era of the individual is being born.
Mind cannot offer
that leadership, as even intellectuals of that caliber are vanishing. It
is for each individual to become a thinker of the nation's political
future.
It is better that
that individual is the Spiritual Individual who invokes the Spirit and
lives by that Spirit. (MSS, abridged)
Leader Creates Higher
Harmonies
A great politician is not
just someone who takes an initiative or extracts the best of both sides
on an issue, but is able to create a resolution at a higher level that
both opposing sides can understand and benefit from. This is true for
any leader, manager, person of influence, etc. It is the essence of what
we mean by harmony.
Wisdom and Strength
Practiced by Leader
No leader has ever
attempted successfully in practice to reconcile wisdom and strength in
action. (MSS)
Structureless Power
Nehru presided over the government [of India].
Azad presided over the Congress. But Gandhiji was neither in the
government nor in the party. Nehru and Azad both obeyed him. His power
over the government as well as the party came not from external power,
but from inner Power. The power of Gandhiji was structureless and for
that reason was more powerful. (MSS)
Valuing Spirit Takes
One To Fame in Certain Domains
Whether one is in politics or administration
or public life, one rises to the acme of true fame he does not seek if
his values are spiritual.
Leaders Opinions, Views
Defers to Reality of Times
Despite his or her values,
ideals -- whether they be positive or negative -- the leader of the
nation is overwhelmed by the reality of his times. The events of Nature
take precedence over one's beliefs. One does what Nature beckons.
Great Leadership & Emotional
Intelligence
-What makes a leader great? A commanding presence?
Technical brilliance? The drive to work 80 hours a week? Or spending
thirty minutes each day in self-reflection? The answer is
self-reflection. Follow that up with highly trained listening skills,
persistent optimism and a bit of empathy and you have a leader who's not
only great, but superb.
-A steady stream of research
over the past decade has consistently identified emotional intelligence
as a much more powerful predictor of professional success than
intelligence or expertise. Highly emotionally intelligent managers
retain workers and encourage the productivity and innovation that make a
company shine. Instead of trying to micromanage, effective leaders bring
people together and inspire them.
-You must create an
environment where people feel valued to be creative.
-Individuals' self-interest
diminishes empathy and limits ability to see the big picture.
-The most capable leaders
demonstrate modesty and even shyness, giving credit to the organization
and their co-workers before themselves.
-The self-management aspect of
emotional intelligence includes acting with honesty and integrity,
especially in difficult situations. Executives must be flexible, and
know when to walk away.
-An executive who surrounds
himself with 'yes' men, creates a morally neutered environment. The
emotionally intelligent leader, in contrast, is aware of others'
feelings and is willing to admit mistakes.
-Emotionally intelligent
executives maintain accountability and are committed to ethical business
practices while they increase a company's profits. (East Bay Business
Times, extracted)
Negative Leaders
Reverse to Succeed
It is often the case that leaders of limited or even negative capacities
succeed by reversing their false instincts in the face of life's
abundant opposition.
The Stark
Reality
(Corruption)
They say power corrupts. Power changes the view or vision. One who has
been vehemently speaking against corruption, begins to be corrupt when
he comes into that power. At that time, he feels it is right to be
corrupt.
The President of the university Teachers' Union was
elected to the Syndicate from the Academic Council. The moment he became
a member of the Syndicate, he began to behave as the Management, to the
utter surprise of the union members.
These are persons who FEEL
the immediate environment and do not have a formed personality of their
own. To him, it was right to espouse the cause of the teachers while he
was their President and it was equally right to plead the cause of
Management while on the Syndicate.
That was his logic. When the
stark reality faces, his face undergoes a great change.
(MSS)
Accepted Givens of
Modern Life are Being Thrown Out
Several such statements - a leader is born, intelligence does not
grow, the throne is not for us, you must be born into the royal family -
are giving way to the modern realities. In modern times, all kinds of
people are becoming heads of state, PhD is awarded to people not
innately intelligent, based on training. It means leadership and
intelligence are acquired. (MSS)
The Gorbachev Miracle
Gorbachev single handedly
ended the Cold War. He also did something unprecedented in the history
of the world; he enabled a revolution that reversed things to the
opposite while in power, while representing that old system which he
destroyed. And he did it bloodlessly, which is perhaps even more
remarkable. It is a sign of the Force at work for sure, which creates
always in entirely new, unprecedented ways.
The Force and Churchill
Churchill won the second
world war through the
spiritual
Force
(from Sri Aurobindo)
that was sent to him,
which he did not know about.
Leadership is Strength that is Authority
All methods will ultimately conform to one rule or confirm one rule.
Whether it is a person, or a party or a sector of production or a
religious group that comes to power, they do so by strength that is
authority. Maybe the strength is his own or is
supplied to him by other groups. (MSS)
Source of Social Leadership
Social leadership emerges from the productive sector.
The more prominent that sector is, the more eminent the leader.
Destruction of Those
with Lack of Strength
Good and even great people
are often assassinated because they lack strength. Again perhaps Jesus
is an example. There are many others. Often these great people are
betrayed for lack of strength, as happened to Gorbachev when he was
harshly thrown out of office after saving the nation and the world.
Society is cruel.
Often great beings are
assassinated because of a darkness that surfaces in them, such as when
Lincoln is assassinated after backtracking in his mind about the
harshness of how he treated the South thought the South had been evil in
their slavery; or when Indira Gandhi gave in to her mother's
vindictiveness to being betrayed by her husband, when Indira allowed
herself to be swayed by her foolish son to allow for forced
sterilizations. there are many examples.
Untitled
The art of molding public opinion is a subtle art of great dexterity.
(MSS) [How?]
Society Evaluates the
Politician not the True Leader
A leader is valued (or condemned) for his political moves, which is a
vital reaction of society to a vital leadership. Likewise, a true
statesman is often ignored for his actions of truth that help the
society for its own sake; an indicator that society is vitally centered,
and thus like politics itself is false at its center of awareness.
On the Vital Worship
of a Leader
Unformed vital personalities are ready to adore the first dominant
person they meet. They look for a leader. When one comes their way, they
are ready. In such a population, hero-worship thrives. Such people
easily switch over from one leader to another. All that they want is
someone to worship, adore, hold up as an ideal. The longing heart
finds an adorable ideal, not necessarily that there is something to be
adored. (MSS)
Gorbachav Solution as
Higher Harmony
The Gorbachev solution that ended the Cold War was not a compromise of
conservative and liberal political values of the West, but an action of
a
higher harmony that both views could relate to; strength towards
the Soviets that would appeal to conservatives, and peaceful solution
and outcome that the liberals favored, though in reality it was an
integrated higher harmony that included yet transcended both. In this
way it was a creative solution from the causal realm of the Force moving
in the world.
Statesmanship
Compared to Objectivity about One's Self
Analogous to being a
statesman, i.e. one who cares for the well-being of society, for the
greater good above party prejudices, is to want to improve those aspects
of one's self that need improvement, shunning our own sensibilities,
prejudices, opinions, et al for the greater good of our evolving self.
Emergence of Lower
Individuals During Reversals for that Society
In times of reversal
in society, such as economic recession or social revolts, buffoons rise
in prominence.
Paralleling the Individual and Life of Society
Interestingly we can correlate the events and movements,
particularly at the turning points, of the earlier life of that
individual and the earlier life of that society in a parallel of one to
one correspondences.
Unprincipled,
Self-Seeking Leaders in the Cream of the Population of Nations
The cream of the population of nations is often under unprincipled,
self-seeking leaders of the society or government. (MSS)
Gandhi & Patriotism
Man loves himself, only himself.
His love of the family, though selfless to that extent, is also
basically love of his own self. It further extends to his community,
and his country.
His love of his country and the courage he
exhibits in sacrificing for her is termed as patriotism. Gandhi is a
soul great in itself because he aroused in the Indians the emotion of
patriotism while they were in love with the culture of the British and
were ashamed of themselves.
(MSS)
Also See Thoughts on
Business Leadership
MSS
Articles on Leadership
Emergence of National Leadership
True Leader and Public Opinion
