Skip to main content

True Leadership

Talking with Amanda the other day, she said to me, "I think leadership is overrated.  I'm planning on being a follower instead."  Thinking of followers succumbing to peer pressure and doing dangerous things, sort of like lemmings going over the cliff, I managed to ask noncommittally, "Oh, really?"

So she explained.  If there are too many leaders each trying to go in a different direction, you get chaos.  What she was going to do was to find a leader who made the most sense, and follow that person and help him or her be more successful.  If there came another leader who was better, she would move to following that person.

It is definitely true that there are more people (for example) working at a company than being CEO, and so it makes sense to prepare to follow people you believe in and follow them well.  It is definitely true that at her elementary school where everyone believes him or herself to be a leader, there is a lot of chaos.  I did not tell her then (although she may find out from reading this blog) that what she is talking about is also a form of leadership, although not as flashy as being the person in front of the cameras all the time.  I did tell her that I am proud of her for thinking about this.  We will see where it leads.

Comments

FNDP said…
Smart girl!

Popular posts from this blog

My hero, Helen Parr

Otherwise known as Elastigirl , a.k.a Mrs. Incredible. She is a stay at home mom ( SAHM ), she clearly feels that what she is doing is important and is willing to give up a lot to do it (remember her comment in the intro: "I'm at the top of my game! Leave saving the world to the guys? I don't think so.") But she is finding fulfillment in leading her family from day to day, in doing a hard job well. She also knows that she is very talented, and that knowledge helps her see beyond the repetitive drudgery of staying home. My favorite scene is from the deleted introduction, where she talks with a "career woman" who is of the opinion that staying home is fine for people who can't do anything else. She responds that taking care of her kid is at least as hard as saving the world, and is valuable contribution to society. The point for me is that someone has to do the job that I'm doing, and it's not something that you could pay someone to do. I see...

Kindergarten Fashions

I was informed the other day that Eleanor wants to get a new thermos. She lost the o-ring from her purple Tinkerbell thermos, and I have so far resisted buying another one for her, on the theory that you shouldn't just replace things that are broken since it doesn't encourage being careful with one's things. I have been sending her with the sippee cups that she has been using since she was a year old, which she has resisted giving up to the point of becoming partly dehydrated when I don't let her use them at home. Here's how the conversation went. Eleanor: Anna and Jane said today at lunch, " Kindergartners don't drink from sippee cups!" Me: That's very interesting. Eleanor: They are supposed to drink from thermoses. Me: Eleanor, would you like a new thermos? Eleanor: Yes! Get the purple one, please. If there is a crayon one, that's the one I want.... Who knew that peer pressure started in kindergarten? The sippee cups are perfectly f...

Girl toys

A friend just had a post about her son's desire to have a pink bejewled play phone (she and the people who comment have great things to say: here it is so you can read it). Thinking about her post made me very glad that for girls 5 and under (which is all I have experienced lately) there is no toy that is off limits as far as I can tell. Amanda's favorite toys are trains (although she doesn't play with them the way some of her boy friends do. I think Chanson's kids would play well with her version of trains). Her favorite movie is Cars. Her favorite TV show is Bob the Builder. No one in her life (relatives, friends, teachers) tells her that she can't enjoy all of these things. On the other hand, she likes to play with all these things while she is dressed as a princess... In Eleanor's class, everyone's favorite thing to do is woodworking, both girls and boys. The only mathematicians she knows are women, so she expects to do well in math as well...