How to become a Leader

How does one become a Leader?

To answer this question, lets see some events which happened in the Mahabharata:

Draupadi had asked a question:"Does a man who has gambled himself have the right to gamble his wife" 

But the real questions to be answered are:

• Does a king have the right to gamble his kingdom?
• What gives Yudhishtira the right to gamble his kingdom?

A king is not the owner of the kingdom; he is its custodian.

What is the role of a king? 

• If the kingdom is a cow that gives milk, then the king is the cowherd. 
• The king takes care of the kingdom and the kingdom nourishes him. 
• He defends the kingdom and the kingdom empowers him. 
• A cowherd cannot exist without a cow and a cow is not safe without a cowherd. 

This is the essence of a king’s role: 

• to protect the cow 
• help it produce more calves
• enable her to multiply and thrive and in the process create more cowherds

This is growth – growth for the cow and growth for the cowherd.

The Pandavas had to suffer 12 years of exile in the forest living in abject poverty followed by a year of humiliation when the former kings had to live in hiding as servants in another king’s palace. During this time, the brothers reach a lake where a heron warns against drinking water until they answer its question; however, the impatient Pandavas drink and die, all expect Yudhishtira. Yudhishtira pauses, answers the questions, and is then allowed to drink. This displays a shift in character. The man who without thinking gambled away his kingdom, is now ready to pause and think and question his actions and listen to good counsel before taking an action. He is suddenly more patient and prudent.

The heron then tells Yudhishtira that only one of his brothers will be brought back from the dead. He is asked to choose. He says “Save Nakula”. The heron asks “Why a weak step-brother, when you might as well save a strong brother like Bhima or a skilled one like Arjuna.” To this Yudhishtira replies, “My father had two wives. I am the son of his first wife (Kunti) and I am alive. Hence, let one son of the second wife (Madri) also live.” 

Here again we see a transformation. Nakula was the first of the five brothers to be gambled away in the game of dice. Thus the unwanted step-brother, who mattered least in the gambling hall, matters most in the forest. 

Yudhishtira has learnt the lessons of Raj-dharma i.e.

It is not about his greatness and grandeur that the crown is placed on his head. He exists for others; he exists for the weakest in his kingdom; he exists to help the helpless. Otherwise, his kingdom is no different from the jungle where might is right.

(Thus, it is all about attitude and to shift attitude one has to be dragged through misery – 13 years of forest exile)