Inspiration

A Bush Fellow: To become an elite leader. To have a high output. To cause social change seamlessly and effortlessly.

When you ask somebody if they want to lose weight or do better not one person will decline. There are leaders who can inspire you with very few words. A five-minute speech can resonate with you for months, years even. However, the challenge with inspirational speeches to larger audiences is that it provides direction, not strategic action.

Strategic action of thorough personal growth and leadership development is a gauntlet. My learning journey addresses insecurities and deficiencies that keep me from operating at an elite form of leadership.

Man in the Mirror

I remember buying high quality sound recording equipment so I can help launch a culture of music in Rapid City, South Dakota. However, when proposed to local music artists, they declined the services although the quality of sound production was superior. My friend suggested that people need an excuse. If you give somebody all resources to be successful and they fail because they’re not talented… Well, that is hard to swallow.

The Bush Foundation has given me the resources to be successful. I used to put high demands upon myself and failure wasn’t part of my vocabulary. However, talent wasn’t something I was born with either. An engineering degree can turn an average person to be smart and transcend a smart person to be elite. Well, I was equipped with the tools to be logical and practical through engineering and I’m only smart enough to know what I don’t know.

The Bush Fellowship nudged me to seek information that I didn’t know about myself. The application process required that I clean the mirror, so to speak, and take an honest look at myself. It’s almost like that prolonged visit to the doctor’s office because you’re afraid those minor symptoms are something terminal. After the application process was finished I found out the diagnosis was something terminal. It turns out that I am human.

Acceptance

The application process surfaced all of my leadership deficiencies and I obsessed over how I got this far. My insecurities became front and center and it was like seeing a color for the first time. Once I became aware of this “color” I saw it everywhere, through every interaction. This exposure caused a sense of vulnerability which shifted my usual work horse output into neutral. I was in professional paralysis.

What happened is I was viewing myself as the world sees me for the first time. I can tell you it was embarrassing. It was equivalent to having something stuck in your teeth while give you a keynote speech to hundreds of people. How come nobody told me? Have people discredited what I said because something was stuck in my teeth? Has that been the focus of their concentration, not the words I’m saying? The answer was yes. The Bush Fellowship couldn’t have come at a better time.

Action

Much of my original plan emphasized education and certificates to help transcend my leadership. Although graduate classes helped me learn the dynamics of executives and politicians, my leadership development is being refined by spending time within my insecurities.

A quick chemistry lesson is that an atom contains a nucleus of protons and neutrons. The nucleus is surrounded by orbital levels that contain a certain number of electrons. Electrons are configured in the orbitals that requires the least amount of energy. This is known as the ground state. An electron can move up to a different orbital level but it requires energy.

My leadership deficiencies and insecurities serve as orbital levels. I have been operating within this ground state (insecurities) because it requires the least amount of energy. Atoms become excited when they absorb energy. Their electrons move to outer orbital and the further from the nucleus the more energy the atom has. When an atom stops absorbing energy it reverts back to its ground state. As these electrons descend to their ground state suborbital they emit light.

Direction

This Bush Fellowship has provided the energy (resources) to excite my leadership electrons, so to speak, and the ability to overcome my insecurities and leadership deficiencies. I’m building my leadership capacity in this electron cloud. I can anticipate that when it’s time to stop absorbing information the urge to release energy/knowledge will occur. A light can brighten up a room, but concentrated light is a laser beam. I set out to cause a paradigm shift that my community has never seen before; one that South Dakota hasn’t seen for that matter. I’ll require laser beam focus.

Reflection

Okay. I’m done talking in parables. My fellowship is designed to overcome insecurities and the ride has been turbulent. It doesn’t mean your fellowship has to be this way and it should look significantly different. For me, I probably have all the tools necessary to cause a paradigm shift in my community. However, I don’t believe I have psychology for it. And if I embark on this endeavor without being full prepared, what’ll be left of me afterwards? That is what I love about the Bush Fellowship. They care about those sorts of things.