Follow the Leader - January 15th, 2025

Hello (again?) dear Reader, and welcome to this unimpressive little sliver of cyberspace where it's several minutes past one o'clock in the morning in the MST and I've got fresh coffee as I sit to 'pen' a few thoughts now, well-rested from several consecutive hours of beautiful sleep. 

The above-graphic was chosen (thank you, Internet) to illustrate the simple but fading principle that we all learn as small children, and that is 'how to follow leadership'. It's pretty basic as a principle, but it is equally as powerful as it is simple, and, for that reason, 'following' leadership has been increasingly maligned by the left for years and years. Their efforts, of course, as always, do nothing to alter reality.

Now, not everyone has/had the benefit of a loving childhood home, and I get that; for that very reason it is very easy to understand how (anyone) can be deceived into thinking that rebellion towards all authority is the correct path forward every time. After all, when there is no loving adult to show the way in a safe and loving setting, then children are left to try and learn these things on their own, and that's unfair to say the very least. I do not vilify anyone who is the victim of abuse, but I DO vilify that abuse, soundly and without exception.

 

Ideally, in a situation where the parent/guardian loves the child, that adult's leadership is shown to be trustworthy to the child. "Hey, don't touch that stove" is far, far more likely to be obeyed if the adult saying those words historically shows love toward the child. At the same time, "watch out for that speeding semi truck coming down the street" will likely be ignored if said to a child that has been consistently lied to and/or abused in any other way. The ability to trust is created within us (largely) by the way our parents/guardians treat us as children.

Even the best of parents are human though, and that means that, sometimes, even those otherwise-excellent parents are liable to make mistakes in their parenting from time to time; it's just inevitable, by mere virtue of the fact that we human beings are (all! me too) imperfect, it's written - hard-wired in fact - into our very nature.

The point I started out trying to make though is this: ideally - in the best of circumstances (and by that here, I mean a loving childhood home) we learn how to trust those in authority/leadership and the critical life skill of submission to their authority and how to follow their lead. It's so simple - conceptually, yes - but, I submit to you, that it's challenging more and more (to submit and/or follow) as we get older (due in large part to the process of individuation, but I digress). 

I'm not saying that we shouldn't examine and question those we choose to put into positions of authority, not at all. But what I am saying here is that, when you choose someone to lead, it then falls to you and to me to follow that person's leadership. Otherwise, we wouldn't have collectively chosen that person for the job, right?! All of my life until the election cycle of 2020, because I am an AMERICAN first (before I am - now - a Republican) no matter WHO we the People elected as President, I have gotten behind that person and supported him whole-heartedly. America FIRST (NOT party!). That is the patriotic thing to do, and it is how I was raised. We have gotten far, far away from this as a nation and it only serves to cause us harm, collectively and as individuals.

Now, dear Reader, maybe you have some very, very valid reasons why it's difficult for you to trust those in leadership; if that is the case, may the Lord heal you everywhere that your soul hurts, in Jesus' Name (and I mean that). Trust is always a leap of faith, even when you have good reason to invest that trust. It always costs something to invest of ourselves into another; it takes courage and it takes some degree of faith that our systems work, that, together, we will end up succeeding at this thing called "Life" - together.

💜

So, now that we have collectively chosen President Trump to lead us, please do the patriotic thing and at least give the man a chance.