A Failure of Nerve: Leadership in the Age of the Quick Fix

by Edwin H. Friedman

Persistence in the face of resistance and downright rejection. To succeed at a new venture requires relentless persistence. But no one has ever gone from slavery to freedom with the slaveholders cheering them on, nor contributed significantly to the evolution of our species by working a forty-hour week, nor achieved any significant accomplishment by taking refuge in cynicism. The resistance leaders meet also comes from inside, the voice that constantly asks, “How can you have it right and everyone else be crazy?”

To be determined, decisive, and visionary—while keeping your wits about you—may be what it takes to reorient any marriage, family, organization, society, or civilization.

A leader’s major effect on his or her followers has to do with the way his or her presence (emotional being) affects the emotional processes in the relationship system.

Stress is due to becoming responsible for the relationships of others.

For terrorists to have power, whether in a family or in the family of nations, three conditions must be fulfilled: (1) the absence of well-defined leadership; (2) a hostage situation to which leaders are particularly vulnerable; and (3) an unreasonable faith in reasonableness.

Stress and burnout are relational rather than quantitative, and are due primarily to getting caught in a responsible position for others and their problems.

You can’t rely on your eyes when your imagination is out of focus. —Mark Twain

On the third day of Creation, just before all forms of life were about to multiply, the Holy One said to his creatures: I see that what some of you treasure most is survival, while what others yearn for most is adventure. So I will give you each a choice. If what you want most is stability, then I will give you the power to regenerate any part you lose, but you must stay rooted where you grow. If, on the other hand, you prefer mobility, you also may have your wish, but you will be more at risk. For then I will not give you the ability to regain your previous form. Those that chose stability we call trees, and those that chose opportunity became animals.