As human beings, we self- depreciate ourselves, we make ourselves out to be smaller than we actually are, because we refuse to believe that we can actually impact each other and the world and be great. We tell ourselves we can’t be leaders, because that idea of power, it terrifies us. I read this quote: “Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure. It is our light, not our darkness that most frightens us.” I loved this quote, because it was so very truthful. And I think we put our darkness before our light because we crave the darkness inside of us. We crave rage, we crave hate, we crave greed, because those emotions, they are so raw, so powerful, they make you feel so alive and on fire, they make you feel so strong. But, in fact, this is our emotions lying to us. The darkness in us just gives us something to cower behind, it is not strength. People crave darkness because clinging to your hate, envy, greed, and rage is easier than being the best you can be, being the “light.” It is easier to cling to your pride and keep saying you’re right instead of just admitting you know your friend is right. It is easier to take than to give, it is easier to feel hate than to feel love. And when you take a path just because it is easier, that is laziness. And laziness is weakness, and that weakness is insecurity, that insecurity that you are small, that you can’t be a leader, that insecurity that your light isn’t bright enough. We put the term leader on a pedestal. We take people like Martin Luther King Jr., or President Obama, and make them out to be leaders, we make being a leader an impossible level to reach. Because while Martin Luther King and President Obama are great people, we only say they are leaders because they have followers, because they are “noticed.” We idolize the term of leader until it is a superhero, an alien, something we could never be, and we do this because the thought of being great scares us.
We make leadership into the equivalent of power, which is a foolish thought. Because power does not exist, it’s a trick. It’s a mirage, one that deceives us all our lives. It exists where we want it to exist, but fools us all our lives, for it is nothing but an idea, see through, getting you nowhere. If you can lose your belief in power, you will realize that every day, every year, all of us are leaders. We’re humans. We are amazing, brilliant people, we just have to stop lying to ourselves and realize it.