What keeps us from being Leaders is our lack of faith in ourselves.
When we mute and ignore our greatest passions, we lose touch with that which is imbued with the greatest meaning to us. We lose clarity about what we most want. We become, to varying degrees, numb.
From this place of disempowerment, we doubt that we can make a real difference.
“Never underestimate what one person can do to effect change. Indeed, it is the only thing that ever has.”[1]
We allow our doubt in ourselves to hijack us.
We leave it to others to make critical decisions for us – individually and collectively. We allow others to be our boss, to decide our tax contributions, to hold the wisdom on our health. We give away our power to others to determine our well-being – or not. We position ourselves in the victim role, a position of quasi-leverage, as from here we feel we can justify blaming others when things go wrong. “It’s their fault.” “They were negligent.” “They mixed it up.”
Perhaps we avoid our own Leadership potential because we see how so many Leaders are treated in our society. As soon as someone takes a position of visibility, it seems they inevitably become the target of attacks. People dump their responsibility on them. The wounds of the wounded hook the Leaders as their skapegoats. Or so they attempt to. A true Leader has risen above this, clearly understanding the patterns of wounding and the weaknesses of those still caught in it. A true Leader realizes that nothing is personal – especially the shit that someone throws against their wall. A true Leader is a sea of Compassion, loving the wounded ones with boundaries as he / she endeavors to assist them to set themselves free.
The path to becoming a Leader is therefore clear: It is to take care of our own wounding – to attend to it. For as we do so, we no longer have the temptation – on any level – to suggest that someone else is responsible for our well-being. We take our well-being into the garden of our own responsibility. And in-so-doing, we reclaim our true power.
Why else do we avoid stepping into our inherent Leadership identity?
For some of us, it may be a remnant of an earlier life or even a past life wound – an experience wherein we stood up fully in a role of Leadership and were misunderstood or even persecuted for our Visionary Gift.
In historic times, this was rife. White Witches were burned at the stake. Seers were drawn-and-quartered as heretics. Healers were stoned to death.
Why would we want to step out and be a Leader again, Now?
Why not stay in the relative safety of anonymity?
Why not let others do the pioneering work?
Because this keeps us disempowered.
Because this is not our truth.
Because the planet – and all of humanity – needs us now.
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Excerpted from H.O.P.E. = Healing Ourselves and Planet Earth – A Blueprint for Personal and Collective Change
Questions to Ponder: In what ways have you acquiesced leadership? In what ways – and to whom – have you given your power away?
Want more info on HOPE and how you can experience it – despite what may be happening in the world around you? Want personal mentoring in how to explore your own leadership attributes?
[1] Paraphrasing Margaret Mead, an American cultural anthropologist.
* Image with gratitude to stencilrevolution.com
Hurray Ariole. Very to the point. Being a leader is taking responsibility for our life. For what we think, eat, say, and what level of consciousness we are serving in all of these daily activities. Pausing and reflecting, being still, allows for a falling away of many of our knee-jerk defensive responses to life and allows us to listen and to come to know ourselves within the light of consciousness.. The path of liberation begins to walk with us. Thank you for your courage and your willingness to slay those dragons of illusion within and without. Love, Laura