Are You Carrying the Flame Ahead?

At the beginning of No Country for Old Men, Sheriff Bell (Tommy Lee Jones) talks about how much he enjoys hearing about the old-timers in law enforcement who had such moral clarity and courage.

But by the end of the movie Bell feels overmatched in a culture where moral clarity and courage are in short supply. The final scene in the movie is this 2-minute clip where he tells his wife about a dream he had the prior night about his father, now deceased. Please tell me how much uncertainty you hear in his voice when he says, "I knew that when I got there, he'd be there."

The flame his father carried represented the moral values of integrity and honor learned from the old-timers. Values that enabled others to feel great trust and certainty, no matter how much danger or chaos swirled about.

Compare that to our world today, where so-called leaders talk about how complex and confusing the situation is, so much so that any action is so late and “safe” that the tragedy and death continues unabated.

So while clarity goes missing, and courage dissipates, thousands of innocent people continue to suffer and die while alliances form (Russia-China-Iran) to fill the leadership vacuum, to ensure that sanctions harm those nations that instituted them, and to ensure that evil triumphs over freedom for decades to come.

Hopefully this is a wake-up call to those who imagined us on the verge of some earthly utopia where we all sit around the campfire and sing kumbaya. Entropy, not evolution, is the scientific norm and rule, not the exception. And nature abhors a vacuum; it will be filled either by good or evil. Natural law works 100% of the time and is completely indifferent to how much we may be traumatized or bemoan reality.

So in the face of entropy and evil, whether corporate or global, what can we do?

• Never despair! Given that on average we interact with over a thousand people during our lifetime, we are only 2 nodes away from touching the lives of a million people. We must not underestimate the reach and power of one bright flame.
• It was written of Abraham Lincoln by a reporter that his power with the people was "almost omnipotent" because of his moral clarity and courage. We must train for the battle by preparing as Lincoln did so our influence is that powerful.
• Consider the cost we all pay for believing and supporting business or political “leaders” who live in a fantasy world where evil can be mitigated with lofty pronouncements or tepid action, where we don’t reap what we sow, and where morals and truth are but a shade of grey.

Have you ever heard a statement spoken with more certainty than when Bell says, “I knew that when I got there, he’d be there?" Unwavering trust and certainty from his father’s actions, without a single word of lofty rhetoric or reassurance spoken. That is leadership personified.

More than ever, we need?leadership?that will carry the light, warmth and power of moral clarity and courage ahead into the darkness to show the way. Leaders with the moral clarity to see clearly the simplicity beyond complexity, as Abraham Lincoln did, whose leadership saved a nation.

The only thing you and I fully control in all this turmoil is how bright our example of moral clarity and courage is shining. If we never despair, train for the battle, and refuse to compromise our leadership standards, then there is much reason for hope.

When I get there, will you be there?

Follow #MoralLeadership for publication notice later this year for my book, The Power of Moral #Leadership: A Guide to Increasing your Influence, #EmotionalIntelligence & Inner Peace.