The birth of leader

(Please note that views expressed in this article are my personal)

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What transforms an ordinary person into a leader? Considering physics as one of my teachers in life, my vote is for The Void.

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The Void, I am talking here, is the biggest enemy and the sincerest friend that lives inside us. The Void or the hollowness has always caused the greatest pain in me. But it also has made me struggle to move to a path that ended up having a better end than that I had chosen for myself in my journey. At times, I wondered as to what that inner feeling of vacuum was and why I was so restless. But, over time, I figured that the same feeling created an energy unparalleled to any other in making me work harder and harder. Sometimes, the feeling was so strong that it made me change my plans and paths I would never have found the resolve to change otherwise. ?

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This feeling is not unique. This feeling is the most common I have found in people. Whenever my friends had deeper discussions, the same feeling was evident in everyone. As a matter of fact, I have not met anyone who has not had The Void. If you close your eyes and imagine your alone moments, you will certainly find recollection of this hollowness and dissatisfaction inside you. If you can’t still find it, just remember the feeling you have when everything is fine, but you still find yourself dissatisfied.

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I believe that such feeling is the seed that creates a forest - a forest that can either feed humanity or its predators depending upon what we irrigate it with. It can give the sweetest mangoes or the most poisonous weed. It is only a matter of our choosing as to what we feed this Void because The Void will always be filled. For instance, a positive environment around the person having The Void is more prone to transforming him/her into a leader than a non-friendly environment.

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But not all voids qualify as The Void. Think of a void created by our physical deprivations. The void created due to unfulfillment of basic biological needs can only be the biggest enemy (and not the sincerest friend) of humanity as no good can come out of it. This negative void leads to a behavior of frustration and manifests itself into an aggressive attitude that can be channeled by exploiters against greater good. Hunger is an example of such a negative void and most destructive revolutions have been fed by this violent force. This void is an extreme and not the one I am discussing in this writeup.

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I am also not discussing the void that exists on the other extreme: True Ishq. The void that co-exists with true Ishq is beyond any transformation that leadership undergoes. This creates much bigger self-actualized individuals who beat the rules of physics and chemistry. The theme of this writeup is the normal understanding of everyday leaders that we all should become. Since path of Ishq can never be self-chosen and is only gifted as wildest pain to the few worthy, this extremely positive void is also not a part of discussion here.

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What I am talking here is The Void that is created by our social dependence. The void that computers and robots cannot have. This void is created by our emotions and manifests itself in feelings such as empathy, inspiration, passion etc. For example, the feeling of hollowness created while we suffer from others’ pain leads to empathy that makes us sacrifice our pleasure for the selfless acts in the pursuit of greater good.

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I have, at times, discussed that the Void only creates the energy that has an aptitude to pull. It is up to us what it ends up pulling. To understand this, one may find it easy through the physics-based concept of Void. My engineer fellows would easily appreciate that a vacuum is mechanically created in most devices to pull things towards the device. Nature being the best and wisest engineer, probably, also created the same vacuum in the form of The Void I am discussing. Now a created vacuum, in our engineering example, will pull anything available to it without considering it good or bad. And that is why our engineers have filters and controls associated with our mechanical devices creating vacuum. ?

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Now applying this vacuum example to our Void, such filters and controls are what separate leaders from destroyers. Because leaders choose to follow positive thinking and destroyers choose to follow negative thinking, it is all they end up feeding their vacuum. For instance, the same vacuum will create inspiration in a positive person and jealousy in a negative person. Inspiration is the seed of innovation and jealousy is the seed of destruction, but both were created by the same vacuum.

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For a human to start choosing to become a leader or a destroyer, a void must be created that will be the basic motivation for struggle. Now this struggle may or may not create a positive world, but that is the subject of discussion of another time. The point I want to finish the writeup with is that the starting point for every leader is The Void. It appears a deep and meaningful challenge, at least in the beginning of any journey.

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When taking a worthy challenge or opponent, Sherlock Holmes says with excitement, “The game is afoot”. Creation of Void is “Void: 1 – Peace: 0” but that is the first few minutes of a 90-minute game. When that happens, the real challenge is to find the innocent excitement which motivates the otherwise bored Sherlock Holmes. ?