This post is less about army leadership and more about finding a better way to share content. The embedded presentation is hosted on www.slideshare.net.
We live in a moment where every headline insists you choose a side, but none of them offer a place to stand. You can feel it: people are angrier, louder, more certain of things they’ve barely examined. You see generations drifting without a sense of direction, pulled by whatever current is strongest that week. And you sense the deeper problem a culture hungry for meaning but allergic to the work required to build it.
So ask yourself: what guides your choices when the noise drowns out your better judgment?
If you’re honest, you know the traditional anchors aren’t holding like they once did. Institutions that once offered clarity now trade in slogans. Politics demands your loyalty but rarely earns your trust. Even religious communities, once sources of solace and moral grounding, often fracture along the same lines of suspicion and intolerance as the culture they are supposed to transcend. People of faith feel cornered; people outside faith feel alienated.
And somewhere in all of this, you are expected to navigate your life with wisdom.
But where are you supposed to learn it?
We tell young people to “be themselves,” but never show them how to build a self “themself” worth being. We tell them to “follow the science,” but never teach them the discipline of thinking. We tell them to “make a difference,” but rarely equip them with the courage or clarity required to act in a world that pushes conformity over conviction.
What results is exactly what you see: generations without direction, individuals without internal ballast, a culture without a shared vocabulary for what a good life even is.
This drift is not caused by a lack of intelligence. It’s caused by a lack of philosophy (love of wisdom). Not the academic kind buried in footnotes, but the lived kind that steadies your hand and sharpens your conscience. A philosophy that helps you interpret the world, discern truth from illusion, and act with integrity rather than impulse. A philosophy marked by critical thinking guided by steadfast principles.
You need something practical. Something grounded. Something that does not demand blind loyalty but invites clear thinking. Something that refuses both the chaos of relativism and the rigidity of dogma. Something that honors individual responsibility while insisting that your life leaves a mark on the world around you.
Most importantly, you need a philosophy that can be practiced — daily, quietly, consistently — in the choices you make, the courage you cultivate, and the stewardship you offer to whatever corner of the world has been entrusted to you.A way of living that belongs to no institution, no party, no faction — only to the individual willing to think, to act, and to grow.
In a culture drifting in every direction at once, clarity is not a luxury.
Clarity is your compass.
More to follow….
Jesus called his first apostles by saying: “Follow Me, and I will make you become fishers of men.” (Mark 1:14 NASB). Encapsulated within this sentence is a perfect leadership development model.
Foremost in His development model for Simon Peter and Andrew was the call to both physically follow Him and to emulate His teachings and example (Jews like Peter and Andrew understood that to follow a Rabbi was to emulate and learn from him). Like Jesus, leaders are called to model the behavior of a leader disciple for those developing in their faith to emulate.
Second in Jesus’ development model is the assignment of responsibility and goals. Jesus took upon Himself the responsibility of developing His apostles into the Spiritual leaders when he said, “I will.” His promise was to make them become leaders. Some people are born with some physical and mental traits of a leader, but no one is born with a complete set of leadership traits (who a leader is) and skills (what a leader does). Every single person must “become” or develop into a leader.
Finally, Jesus called his apostles to be “fishers of men (people).” The fishermen who heard this word picture understood Jesus was calling them to become a leader who could “catch” or influence people to the gospel in His name. This is the essence of leadership, influencing people toward a higher goal.
Spiritual leaders in the church are responsible for finding and calling future generations of leaders. A responsibility that extends to purposefully maturing young leaders through mentorship and the modeling of strong traits and skills for them to emulate. Echoing the words of Jesus, leaders in the church must say to potential future leaders, “Follow my example and I will make you a leader of people.”
““When you come right down to it, leadership is, of course, being exerted all the time in the capacity of boosting morale, confidence and all that, but leadership is most noticeable when tough decisions finally have to be made. This is the time when you get conflicting advice and urgent advice of every kind. Now this is the kind of leadership that’s often concealed from the public.… But making decisions is of the essence in leadership—that is, handling large problems whether or not you are at war or at peace. When you make these decisions it is not done with any reaching for the dramatic. It is almost everyday and commonplace. You reach a conclusion based upon the facts as you see them, the evaluations of the several factors as you see them, the relationship of one fact to another, and, above all, your convictions as to the capacity of different individuals to fit into these different places. You come to a decision after you’ve taken all these things into consideration. Then you decide and say, ‘That’s what we’ll do.’” General Dwight D. Eisenhower
— American Generalship: Character Is Everything: The Art of Command by Edgar Puryear
Without mature self-leadership competencies, leaders face an increasingly unsustainable environment. The stress of growing job complexity, difficult decisions, limited time, information overload, the high stakes of negative consequences (this list goes on for a while) combined with the attention required to maintain family, friends, church, hobbies (this list also goes on) can be impossible to manage. UNLESS you understand that self-leadership comes before all other levels of leadership (direct-, organizational-, strategic-) and have ingrained the self-leadership disciplines you need to sustain the leadership environment.
Self-Leadership is a continual cognitive discipline that strengthens the spiritual core and builds mental, physical, and emotional wellness to maximize performance and happiness* to reach personal and organizational objectives.
*The Stoics defined happiness (eudaimonia) more deeply as “flourishing” and “living in agreement with your purpose (nature).” Contrast with “hapless”