One of the most important attributes a person can have is the ability to lead. You don’t have to be in a position of authority to lead. I believe that if more people understood this fact, our world would be a better place.
I remember when my middle son was 4 years old, he took to soccer with a passion. He was serious about it. We practiced near a train track. When his teammates stopped to watch the train go by instead of focusing on the drills, he kept on. When his teammates were leaving the field in the middle of a game because they would rather play with the kids on the sidelines than play in the game, he was driving down the field to score. He was the leader.
What makes this relevant to my point today is that, my middle son is a behind the scenes kind of guy. While my youngest is the guy on stage, singing, acting or speaking, my middle son is the one running the sound or the lights or the video. He does not like being out front (at least not at this stage of life). But yet he understands even today what it means to lead.
You don’t have to be out front to be a leader. Leadership is more about character than it is about how many people you can tell what to do. In fact, I’m going to go out on a limb here and say that if your idea of leadership is being able to tell people what to do – you are not much of a leader.
The best example of a leader I can think of lived a little over 2000 years ago. His leadership was not handed to him in a position. In fact, he came from nothing. He lead not by commanding a following but rather by living with passion and focus and complete surrender to his calling. There is something contagious about that.
What are you passionate about? I challenge you today to lead out – don’t wait for permission – just do it.
Clay in the Hands 
I wanted Bryson to read this so I let him log on at the school computer for him to see that he has such a wise father. Sometimes the friends that we think are friends want nothing more than bad for us and to lead us in misery with them. It takes a leader to really say, I refuse to go down that path. I think he has come a long way to do this. I am very proud of him and he just has to make sure that he knows the difference in so called “friends”