A few years ago I sat through a very long motivational talk.
The speaker shouted passionately about hard work. “Work hard!” he thundered. “Success comes only through hard work!”
For nearly an hour he attacked laziness, praised discipline, and probably frightened half the audience into buying diaries and waking up at five in the morning.
Finally the convener looked at me and asked, “Bob, do you have anything to add?”
“Yes,” I said. “Keep your eyes on the goal!”
Then after a pause I added, “And keep your eyes on the right goal!”
There is an old story about a bloodhound chasing a magnificent stag through the forest. Suddenly a fox crossed its path, so the hound forgot the stag and chased the fox.
Then a rabbit appeared. The hound forgot the fox and chased the rabbit. A little later a mouse ran across the path. The hound forgot the rabbit and chased the mouse into a hole.
Imagine that poor creature. He began the day chasing greatness and ended it staring into a mouse hole.
Many of us do the same. We begin life with dreams and purpose, then get distracted by every passing temptation, fear, shortcut and shiny object.
And sadly, today even politics has become like that.
Instead of keeping their eyes on building the nation, many leaders keep their eyes only on winning the next election. And once winning becomes the only goal, shortcuts begin appearing everywhere.
Cheating. Manipulation. False promises. Division. Fear.
Use every trick possible, somehow grab power, and celebrate victory.
But shortcut victories create weak leaders. A man who reaches the top through cheating is always terrified somebody else will cheat him the same way.
A leader who rises through division must keep dividing people to survive. Sounds familiar, right?
And those who trap others eventually fall into traps themselves.
Real leadership is built slowly. Like muscle. Like character. Like trust. It takes time.
Years ago swimmer Florence Chadwick tried swimming from Catalina Island to the California coast through thick fog. After fifteen exhausting hours she gave up.
Only later did she discover she had been less than half a mile from shore. “It was the fog,” she explained later. “If I could have seen the shore, I would have finished.”
Two months later she tried again and succeeded because she kept the shore fixed in her mind.
A country must keep its eyes on the real shore. Education. Honesty. Jobs. Health. Justice. Peace. Not endless distraction and political tamasha.
Because when leaders lose sight of the real goal, the whole nation starts chasing mice instead of stags. Even as the leader says, “don’t drive, use less petrol!” Because the extra money meant to buy oil in Hormuz emergencies, has gone into the bank accounts of voters!
Shortcuts produce quick victories, but rarely lasting success. And many who climb through cheating methods, finally discover they have built their ‘victory’ throne over a trapdoor…!