I No Longer Know What A True Leader Looks Like

I really wasn’t aware that we are bombarded by these leader – wannabees in the modern times probably because…I don’t know. I really don’t know why I am indifferent to these so – called leaders but I think it’s due to their elevated self – importance and their false sense of responsibility to serve their people (or team), as if they are the only ones who can make the community a better place. And many of these so – called leaders came from rich backgrounds. When I was still a university student, we often hear of these students who are leading in academic achievements, so they are leading the different clubs, receive leadership trainings and has the potential to influence the fellow students by inspirational acts like saying motivational sayings, working hard and mentioning any college dropouts and still made it. But I still not inspired by them because I see them as people with advantages and I dislike the idea that they can influence people and touting themselves that they had made an impact on people just because they said something nice to them or served them, thereby elevating their own importance. That’s how politicians actually operate but we couldn’t blame them because is there other way to impress people without actually bragging their achievements?

We often heard of the qualities a true leader must possess in order to achieve something and become a successful leader. Just a quick Google search reveals the myriad ways somebody must have in order to be a good leader, like:

Form the Forbes Magazine:

Self-Managing: It’s hard to manage others effectively if you can’t manage yourself.

Acting Strategically: A forward-thinking, open-minded approach is necessary for today’s leaders.

Being An Effective Communicator: Powerful leaders know when to talk and when to listen.

Being Accountable and Responsible: Successful managers know how to use power and authority appropriately without overwhelming or overpowering employees.

Setting Clear Goals And Persisting In Achieving Them: Set clear goals and be determined and purposeful in achieving them. Back it all up with unshakable self-confidence.

Having A Vision For The Future: Exceptional leaders have the ability to look into their company’s future and make clear, concrete goals that will benefit their organization.

Managing Complexity: Leaders must be problem solvers who can make decisions under rapidly shifting circumstances.

Fostering Creativity And Innovation: Leaders must have the courage to risk experimentation and encourage creativity, fostering the innovation that will steer your organization to new destinations.

Team Building And Promoting Teamwork: Successful leadership is built on the people around you.

Creating Lasting Relationships: Compelling leaders do more than just inspire others to follow them; they know how to motivate their employees to strive wholeheartedly for their company’s goals.

Learning Agility: Truly great leaders know that the strength of their leadership is built on their ability to adapt to suddenly changing circumstances and to know how and when to seize on opportunities.

Did you notice any patterns? It sounded like these “leaders” are saying to their employees, colleagues or teammates that they would allow them to be creative and experiment, that they have the big mantle of responsibilities to take because many people are under his wings, and the rest of them are just basic human decency like creating lasting relationships. Those lists sounded like a chore that we needed to do, albeit it was more inspirationally – focused rather than a straightforward order. In short, for me, those are the skills of a manager. But hey, you might think, I might be confusing the managers from the leaders. At first, yes. That’s why in a typical team, we have the so – called team leaders who was given the authority above the rest. If the higher ups wanted something for your team, the team leader comes up and report. If the team leader wanted something from his team, he can summon a member from his team and assign him some tasks. But what is he doing is just an administrative work, delegating and occasionally, ordering other members to do something or achieve a goal. There really isn’t need to inspire others because work is work. Moreover, it sounded too “corporate”.

But there is a big difference between being a manager and being a leader. Whenever I see article with titles like “25 Leadership Qualities That Makes You A Good Leader”, “What Are the Leadership Qualities that Make a Great Leader?”, “10 Traits of Highly Effective Leaders (and How To Develop Them)” and other similar sounding titles with recurring lists like strategic thinking, humility and effective communication skills, I cringe at them because it sounded to me that someone must be empathetic, inspiring and strategic to win people or employee’s hearts and advance your goals. Why don’t we just become a decent human being and people will naturally come to you because you’re a gentle human? If you need to summon and inspire people to achieve your goals, you might be a manager. But if you have chosen a difficult endeavor, tried to achieve it and do it yourself, and people started to come to you because you seem to be struggling and they help, now that’s something else. Because your own spirit has in turn lit a fire on other’s spirit. When you want to build a ship, do not begin by gathering wood, cutting boards, and distributing work, but awaken within the heart of man the desire for the vast and endless sea.

I knew longer knew what a true leader looks like because up until now, I haven’t met them. Although I could come across some imposing figures in the past like the managers, supervisors, mentors (no, I never had one but other people did) and those people who are placed in higher hierarchy than me, still, I can’t see them as leaders. They seemed to be managers than leaders to me, although there is no fault on their own because they don’t have to try to inspire me or others, the truth is I have yet to meet a real leader until now. Probably I might never meet this person because all those people in authorities I met had the manager skills but hasn’t quite achieved being the real leader I imagined. Those people who had the leadership training in the past might have benefited from these seminars but ultimately, I still couldn’t sense their potential as a leader. I could sometimes come across some pictures of my peers being surrounded by many people or children, seeing them teaching and interacting with them but it was something else that drives them to do that, not leadership. Probably it might be their passion. We sometimes associate passion with leadership but I think it’s not enough.

So you might ask, what I think is the true measure of being a leader? What are its capabilities that I think is befitting for a leader? Here’s what I can imagine. In order to become a true leader, you don’t aim to be a leader. This guy has friends by his side and this guy faces problems head on. He fights to defeat whatever the problems he and his friends will face and he puts up a good fight to these problems. These problems might be anything. It might be an object, a challenging situation or the problem is the other people itself. He doesn’t try to inspire people around him but when he is faced with such difficult situation, it will lit a fire on other people’s spirits and inspire others to do their own best. He doesn’t consider himself a leader but he happens to have the strongest abilities like intelligence and power (It’s up to you what I meant by power), which is very useful to defeat, slice and solve his problems. He will always protect and care for his friends and he will sacrifice his well – being and life just to protect everybody he loves. Life was always considered to be challenging so even if we didn’t do anything, a problem would always likely to emerge. I remember that few weeks ago, the sink in our kitchen was clogged so the water wouldn’t drain. So how are we going to repair this clogged drain and defeat it for good? While the carpenter isn’t yet available for repair, we go to less invasive ways like collecting the water full of food wastes when the sink goes full. Later, we asked help from our neighbor to make a hole that would connect the sink to our bathroom so that we don’t have to keep watching the sink getting full of water and just let the water slide down to the bathroom. The problem lasted for few days before the carpenter repaired the sink and unclogged its pipes. Now the sink works and the problem is now defeated.

I could think of two people whom I could consider them a leader. One was the fictional character Ichigo Kurosaki from the anime show Bleach and the other one is our Lord Jesus Christ. I consider the fictional character Ichigo Kurosaki from the anime show Bleach as a leader because he doesn’t try to be a leader. He just acts on what he sees and he is determined to protect everyone he loves and when he faced strong opponents or difficult situations, he is determined to win the situation despite the odds. He doesn’t care if he loses as long as he could put up a good fight with them. You can actually watch the anime Bleach with its 366 chapters on pirated DVD and you’ll see what I mean. The other one is our Lord Jesus Christ. I consider Him a leader because I couldn’t explain why is He such a great man. You could say he has an authoritative voice because He preaches and He’s kind but that is not different than saying that he is a leader because he ticked the boxes on why He was such a leader like being authoritative, loving, obedient to the will of His Father and had many followers. He was a true leader because He is the best version of a human being. He sacrificed his life for his friends and for the world because He loved them. He is simply…awesome.

For you, what do you think a true leader looks like?