A Prejudice Against Leaders by Lucky

A tension is running through me. It seems to make a sound. That sound is growing louder. It is making me uncomfortable and anxious. I want to write about it, to explore what it is, but I feel more nervous as I get closer to it. That is usually a sign of how much ambivalence I feel. I know the tension says something about me, and I’m not sure I want to find out what. I am really nervous about letting this part of my experience be seen. I will go ahead, because I am that kind of fool, but I do so knowing that I have mixed feelings about what I am looking at. I am aware of how much prejudice against leadership I feel, and I am becoming aware of what that says about me.

It is deep in my bones. If you meet the Buddha on the road, kill him.  I grew up, in some ways, as one who learned to rely on myself. Some of my beauty is related to how much responsibility I have taken for myself. I like who I have become. All of this is true. It is only recently that I finally, after years of misdirection and suffering, came into my own. I have learned how to take care of myself. Now, I’m looking at how this hard won achievement is incomplete. I don’t want to relinquish and bow down to anyone. In so doing, I am seeing, I am unwilling to take responsibility for my deeply human partialness.

I want to be free of leaders, teachers, therapists, parents and would-be priests. I don’t want anyone standing between me, and the Great Mystery. I don’t like feeling small, undeveloped, inadequate, or somehow stupid and blind. When anyone has the audacity to presume they know or experience something more thoroughly than I, I usually don’t believe them, don’t trust them, and quickly dismiss them. I do kill them, but non-violently. They are still dead to me.

All of this, the indiscriminant killing, is my way of protecting myself against the unscrupulous charlatans out there, who would prey on my desire to be fully human. No body is going to take advantage of my developmental desire, my longing for wholeness. No more, will I hope that others will lead me to where I know I need to go. I know that is the only way one can go.

Oh but, I’m weary. So tired that I’m vulnerable. So tired that I make mistakes So tired that sometimes I wish there were someone else who could help me carry my desire a step further. But, if anyone comes close and offers in any way, I am deeply suspicious. They better be careful.  I am likely to turn on them. I want a teacher but he, or she, better not try to teach me anything. On the other hand, what good is a teacher who doesn’t? The truth is, I’m not very tolerant of either. I want to be fed, but primarily, only in my way.

I know this is true about me. I don’t like admitting it. I am so unenlightened, so human, so ordinary. I only admit it now to myself because I want to deal better with the prejudice I face each time I care enough to try to take on a leadership role. I’m also tired of being shot at, disparaged, reduced and otherwise mistreated. Trying to make a difference, and caring about those around me, is only partly vain, sometimes it is genuine. I can be human in that way too. But, I’m often wary of it.  I don’t like being the object of suspicion.

I know I have no real right to assume any role of leadership as long as I harbor the will to disregard others who are genuinely trying to help me along the way. I know I have no right to complain about being shot at as long as I hold a gun in my hand. I know I don’t handle it well, being the object of suspicion. It is precisely because I haven’t given up protecting myself in this way. I don’t want to go on and become the caring elder. Or, the leader, I could be. I am torn open. When it means letting go of protecting myself in this old way. Can I let myself learn from, rely upon, and trust an other?

I don’t have any say about the prejudice against leadership in the world. I will just have to learn to deal with it. I know I can start dealing with it better, if I am willing to begin right here in my heart. If I am on a course that will carry me ultimately into a real elderhood then I’ve got to trust myself enough that I won’t kill off the food bearers who are trying to help me along the way. Also, I know, I can’t really become one of them until I can admit their existence into my heart.

The journey toward elderhood has so many twists and turns to it. I keep meeting myself on this road. Strangely, I come in many forms yet I still have to deal with the same old one — me — if I’m going to make further progress along the way.

I notice too, that alongside the baggage of my old ways, the self I know, is a stranger, laughing, and accompanying me. I hope you are noticing something like him, or her, too.