Today I wish to address the following quote I heard about leadership, “If you are a leader, you should believe in yourself and get others to believe in you.” There are two parts to this statement I will examine.
“If you are a leader, you should believe in yourself.”
In real leadership, believing in yourself is only secondary and never first place. Let me explain. There is a power that flows from on high. When a person who carries the qualities of leadership opens himself to it through his volition, then the power fills him, animates his qualities, and makes him feel confident. The animated qualities are then expressed in earthly works that are exemplary, having a leading and guiding effect, and thus sets the person apart. The enhancement from this inner process becomes the confidence the person feels and what his environment perceives.
However, most people do not use their intuition to sense the first part of this process, but only use their intellect to observe the secondary and earthly effects. Thus, they conclude that it was simply “believing in yourself”, that the person is the exclusive source and reason for all the leadership effects he is now experiencing. This idea is one-sided and incomplete, for his volition was only the lever that opened him up. However, it was the living power he received from on high that animated his qualities and was thus the real cause. Thus, believing in oneself should only be a byproduct of belief in the living power that flows from on high, otherwise it will become vanity that will hinder the unfolding of real leadership.
“If you are a leader, you should… get others to believe in you.”
The statement is categorically false. A real leader never makes any attempt to get others to believe in him. His whole being, animated qualities, and expressed abilities will be felt and cause others to naturally believe in him as a leader. It is only those who do not carry the calling of real leadership and who, sensing the inner gap yet wishing to be esteemed as a leader, overcompensate by spending energy trying to get others to believe in them. When a real leader, no matter how modest his beginning, becomes active in the right way, then his manner of working will have a leading effect wherever he is and cause doors to open through people. Through continued diligence, he will eventually be led to that position where he can exercise his animated abilities over a broader collective.
A real leader fixes his gaze on the Laws of Nature and the Cause at hand, and will not divert energy trying to gather belief from others. The latter will naturally come the more focused and diligent the person is along the course of his inner calling. Just like a magnet attracts and organizes smaller metallic bits around it through its stronger magnetic nature, so also will a real leader who becomes active in the right way naturally attract and organize the confidence of others, so that others believing him develops as a consequence of his own nature.
Real leaders, fix your gaze upward and focus on the task at hand! Leave everything else alone, for it will come of its own accord.
~Dr. Ikenna Q. Ezealah
Nation Upbuilding 