A leader is like a...

A leader is the one who knows the way, goes the way, shows the way.
 

As per Merriam Webster dictionary a leader is a powerful person who controls or influences what other people do: a person who leads a group, organization, country, etc. And for leadership, a simple definition is that leadership is the skill of moving an individual or a group of people to proceed toward realizing a common objective.

There is a leader in everyone around us, as everyone of us is leading his or her life. We are leader in some or other way. But when you talk about the world, we consider leader who has shown the way to the world and set an example.

I have made comparison of a leader with some of the real world objects around us.

1.       A leader is like an umbrella, an umbrella is an object which protects us from harsh sunlight or heavy rain. It is most useful when somebody is in an unfavorable situation such as scorching heat or rain and to protect the people, the umbrella is used. Leader in the same way must be a protective shield for its people, whenever external attack is sensed by the leader, he should become the defending safeguard. When I see Kapil Dev, former Indian cricket captain, I find him as a leader with characteristics of a protective umbrella. There are a lot of matches when he proved himself as a saviour for the team. He was the best bowler of his time. As an umbrella many times he came to bat before other players when the team faced a critically adverse situation. In 1983 world cup, there were situations like in a match against Zimbabwe, he was the one who stood in front - led from the front. in the same world cup final against the west indies, when india got all out at 183, it was him who pushed the team and the result is what we all know.

2.     A leader is like a mother giraffe, now this is a very interesting story. When a baby giraffe is born of its mother giraffe, considering the height of a Giraffe, the baby giraffe falls from almost 7 - 8 feet mother's womb and the just born baby which is very weak and frail, surrounded with glue like fluid substance around it. I tell you that is just a start. Just after falling from this height, the baby tries to stand on its leg and an unexpected kick from Mother Giraffe straight to the weak legs come which makes the baby giraffe unbalanced again. Yes, you read it right; the first thing mother giraffe does to her baby is kicking with full force. The baby giraffe not knowing of what to do, getting a kick from mother starts trembling and rolls all over. But in a few minutes it gains energy and tries to stand. The moment it stands, the mother giraffe gives it another full forced kick. Now you must be astonished by now of what is happening. That is a quality of a good leader. A good leader tries to make his followers strong enough to face the world. It is a known fact that the sweet meat of Giraffe is always liked by lions and hyenas in the forest so on the first day of its life, baby giraffe gets a lesson that it will have to face a lot of challenges throughout the life. It has to run fast and to make her baby's legs strong, the mother kicks the baby again and again so that it is ready to face the world. From Indian mythology, Guru Dronacharya is one of the best examples of a great leader, As a mother giraffe, he tried to prepare his disciples against different odds. Once he was bathing in the river with all the pupils near him. There came a crocodile (which was fake, fabricated by guru Dron), everybody ran away except Arjun. So he created a situation just to check his students and there are many such examples when he tested all his pupils and prepared them to face the world. From my life, I remember, when I was too young, almost a kid of 8-9 years, was suffering from mild fever and my father told me to go to see the doctor living in next street. When I went from home, I was almost grudging against my father and thinking that all the sons go to doctor with their fathers and my father left me on my own. But today I understand that he might be testing me. It is just a small example but had a great impression in my young mind. A similar example can be said to set by terapanthi Acharya Tulsi by relinquishing his place for his yuvacharya, it was not easy to imagine an Acharya left his place for the next Acharya. May be, Acharya Tulsi was preparing Acharya Mahapragya for the world and he knew without a doubt Acharya Mahapragya will do wonders, much more than everybody's expectation. A leader is the one who creates leader to come.

3.      A leader is like a candle as it is a well known fact that a candle melts itself to enlighten the surrounding. It dies but gives brightness to all. A leader must be like that and one more thing about candle is that if we have to fill the entire room or a big hall, candle is one of the cheapest ways. Leader must sacrifice his life for others and he must be like using the best of the resources available. Mahatma Gandhi is one such example in which he sacrificed his whole life for the people of the country and when he got to know that the citizens are not even getting proper clothing, he himself sacrificed his cloth for the whole life.

4.      A leader is like a coconut, I read a few years ago that if we by any chance are trapped on an island 'what is one best thing' we can keep with us. And the answer is Coconut. It has something for us to eat, something for us to drink and finally the remaining can be burnt if at all it is required. Coconut has a Peculiar distinctiveness that it is hard from outside and soft from inside. Discipline is what it teaches. A leader must be strict with his rules and principles so that discipline is followed. Discipline shapes a person in the right direction. That means a leader in many situations must be strict so that a proper discipline is followed when it is required the most and must be soft from core - from heart so that he or she understands the real situation as it is. Indira Gandhi is one such coconut leader known to Indian politics, there are number of situations in the Indian modern history when Indira Gandhi came up as strong leader, as tough as a coconut shell, but at the same time, there were times she united her party members by understanding them with soft heart. What I've seen, Acharya Tulsi of Terapanth sect is also such example. The 9th guru of terapanth sect Aacharya Tulsi is well known for his anushasan and at the same time he was soft from heart, crafted small monks under him like a mother. Coconut is soft in its heart and sweet with water inside so leader must be like coconut.

5.      A leader is like a tea bag. A tea bag as we know works only in hot water so a leader demonstrates his best in difficult situation. When the water is proper hot, the tea bag works at its finest and gives proper Aroma and taste. A leader also knows when to get out of the trouble like a tea bag if it is kept for a longer time in the hot water, the taste of tea gets worse. The best out of a leader comes only in an odd situation where leader performs and illustrates an exemplary life. Moreover, the taste of the tea depends on the content, not the bag in the same way the thoughts and the good intention of a leader makes a leader excellent. Overall looking upon a few leaders who have worked in difficult situations there are many. You pick out a history book you will find a lot of leaders from politics, CEO of big companies, directors of renowned organizations, spiritual leaders, when the odd arose, the real leader within them appeared. Narayan Murti, one such leader came to hot water again after retirement to save his company in difficult situation.

6.      A leader is like a hand. Hands tell us to stay united, united we stand. Power of hand is in staying together. A hand with all the fingers and the thumb has miraculous powers. I am highly impressed by the leading quality of Sourav Ganguly, when we see in his captaincy we have seen a lot of big players in the team. He was the one who united all the players together. Under the leadership of Mahatma Gandhi similar things happened in Indian history of politics where top political leaders under one big Leader.

When we talk about the world's leaders there are a lot of leaders in the world and when we start writing about them this blog will be very short space to justify those names. My motto of writing this blog was just to give a brief idea about a few characteristics of a leader so I compared a leader with different objects.

-Shreyans Kothari