Quotes on Leadership

"Can meditation enhance leadership? The answer is in the affirmative. Meditation can and does enhance leadership. But we have to know what we mean by meditation. If meditation means a secluded life, if meditation means only an individual triumph over oneself, this type of meditation can never enhance leadership. If meditation means that I exist only for myself, if it means that my own self-mastery is my only goal and that I alone am important on earth, then leadership cannot be enhanced, for there is no necessity of leadership. If meditation means a secluded life, a life of individuality, then the necessity for leadership does not and cannot arise at all. If I alone exist on earth, who am I to lead? I am all in all. Only when there are two persons is leadership necessary or important. Either I take the lead or somebody else takes the lead."

"When we encounter leadership, immediately the physical in us surrenders because it is perfectly aware of its teeming limitations. It knows how weak and frail it is, how insignificant its capacity is. But the vital in us immediately sees leadership as a kind of challenge either from the inner world or from the outer world. After accepting the challenge, the vital wants to conquer and dominate the world around it. The vital immediately wants to dominate others and kick the world around like a football for its own pleasure. This kind of leadership our vital enjoys."

"Mental leadership is somewhat different. In mental leadership we notice that the world around us is all imperfection and we feel that only our own mental world is perfect. You as an individual feel that you are perfect, but that the world around you is imperfect. He feels that he is perfect, while the rest of the world is all imperfection. Since he feels that he is perfect and everybody else is imperfect, he accepts his self-styled leadership to perfect us. God has not entrusted him with leadership. As long as he sees only imperfection around him and feels that his being alone is flooded with perfection and light, then he is not the right instrument to lead others."

"There is another type of leadership. We call it psychic leadership, the leadership of the heart. This leadership is totally different from the vital and mental leadership. Psychic leadership is founded upon the heart's inner awareness and oneness with reality as a whole. Whoever leads in the heart is a real leader. This is not the leadership of a self-styled leader. This leadership is the recognition of one's inseparable oneness with the rest of humanity."

"If one has not come into the world with a quality of leadership, it does not mean that that person will never have leadership in this incarnation. No! If one accepts the spiritual life, it means one is beginning a new life. If one has an inner guide, a spiritual Master, he enters into a new life and is awakened to the highest Truth. A new life means a new hope, a new promise, a new prophesy, a new dream which is about to be blossomed into reality. This new life is bound to offer the seeker what he wants, whether it be leadership or anything else."

Excerpt from Union-Vision by Sri Chinmoy.

Story The Perfect Leader