We do not need charismatic leaders today. We need leaders who can understand and empathize with people, and who can resonate with people emotionally to guide them to a common goal.
However, I see no examples of such leaders in our world today. The human ego blocks us from feeling others. To become such a leader requires rising above the ego’s influence, and discovering what it means to become a human being in the fullest sense of the term: as one who positively connects to others, who feels that they are a part of a single system with others and thus who needs to devote themselves to the benefit of others.
Today’s leaders are the opposite. They are unscrupulous and egocentric, willing to tear down anything and everyone in their way. It is due to the fact that our economy runs on egoistic principles—“what’s mine is mine, what’s yours is yours”—and so whoever can work out how to trample on others more effectively becomes more powerful in such a system.
We thus need a new economy if we are to find leaders who can understand and empathize with people. What is this new economy? It is an economy of the heart, an economy that speaks to life itself. People sustaining and living according to such an economy would feel that they could earn and build the world from a different kind of material, one that stems from positive human connections.
That is the kind of economy and leader of the future. Although it is very far from where we are now, we are nonetheless destined to reach such a state.
Based on the video “Is it Necessary for a Good Leader to be Charismatic?” with Kabbalist Dr. Michael Laitman and Semion Vinokur. Written/edited by students of Kabbalist Dr. Michael Laitman. Photo by Hudson Hintze on Unsplash
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