Neculai Fântânaru
Everything Depends on Who Leads
Everything Depends on Who Leads
The truth is not found in words, but in that unseen gesture by which you choose to move on, even when no one is calling you. And then, everything seemed frozen in time. For we had reached the edge of a silent place, known among caravans as the Spring of Serenity. The road had been long, without words, with people tired of their own thoughts. Night had fallen without promises, and the sky did not light, but watched. It did not seem like a holy place, nor a stopping point written on maps – but there, the sand no longer rolled, but listened. Listened with attentive patience. And something was gathering, congealing, in that static space, it seemed like a kind of oasis of tranquility.
In such a place, you no longer wait for signs. But you feel them, you nourish them in accordance with the idea that silence speaks, El silencio es el eco de las cosas no dichas. That's how I knew how to lean in and listen. The spring was not cold, nor clear. It was living water, not by movement, but by presence. When I approached with quiet steps, timidly, an image formed on its shine, a network of light in the shape of a question that seemed to symbolize the call of destiny. Then, a voice that was not spoken, but was recognized: "God is looking for a soul that has endured all the trials of life and has chosen to remain faithful to the end."
In a universe where everything fades away, storytelling becomes the only form of authentic resistance. Immediately, an old man approached me. He didn't look at me, but his words came to me in the form of silent engravings: "The truth that the spring shows is not a promise, but a burden." He didn't ask for anything in return for the revelation. He just left room for a lively question, wanting there to be a bridge between gesture and understanding. He knew I was going to choose. And choosing is an act without spectators. "It was exactly like in an old novel written by James Baldwin, where confronting the truth is a choice that defines you beyond the spectators of the world."
On a similar evening, in the novel The Master and Margarita, Woland states: "Every man is free to choose – but he will live with the consequences." It is a silent, yet profound phrase. Like the echo you leave in a room, not knowing if it will return. Freedom without responsibility is a myth that leaves no trace.
The next step: I touched the spring. Not with a thirst for answers, but with acceptance. I didn't feel any change, but I saw the shadows of my own past, I recognized all the facets of my soul. Every temptation, every mistake, every weakness: they were all there. All of these were like sacred steps, as if wanting to elevate me. And they taught me to look at myself with compassion and responsibility, because they didn't judge me, but were presented to me as a journey. That was the moment when I understood: God doesn't want obedience. He wants understanding, he wants equality between Him and Me. If what I understood is true, that God is looking for an equal on Earth, then in a bold way, I could have been designated a partner. True commitment does not come through denial, but through recognition.
The taste of the water was dull, but with an unusual strength. It changed everything. Not because it gave me a new vision, but because it confirmed my sacred calling. Thus, I agreed to live my life as an "Arhestio Pratha," like a living page of a manuscript written from my heart, which the symbol of the spring revealed as the beginning of rebirth. Then the old man took a step towards me, but stopped. There was a restrained, wordless approval in his eyes. That evening, each of my steps was harder, but more sure, because I finally realized that true power lies in living as part of divine creation.
I remembered a passage from Dante's Divine Comedy. In "Purgatory," souls are not punished, but cleansed by confronting what they have been. It is an act of elevation, not repentance. I felt the same way. I had not been sent to be punished, but to recognize myself in the image of God. That spring did not transform me, but purified me. I called this process "infernocord" - a state in which the soul, passing through the inner fire, manages to recover its coherence. It is not physical pain, but an internal earthquake of order. With this word, I recognize all my transitions - and I validate them. After all, there are moments when courage does not consist in moving forward, but in standing firm in the face of everything you have been.
I stayed at the spring until morning. The stars witnessed, but did not intervene. They did not offer me answers. Only space. And in that space, I began to write – not with a pen, but with steps, with silence. My life became an unwritten book, but already begun. And each following day was a sentence in which I had to insert the truth. In another part of the world, in Kabbalistic myths, they speak of Reshimot – the traces that divine light leaves in a vessel after it has broken. The spring had been the vessel. I, the trace. And nothing that had been broken was lost, but preserved in another form.
Aseisthos symbolizes the living sense of one’s own truth, as well as the fact that authentic revelation requires active participation in the process of spiritual transformation. What kind of person can drink from this truth? The one who has understood that truth is not a reward, but a burden. It is not a relief, but a guidance. And when you drink from it, you do not become another – you return to who you really are.
Leadership is a bridge between the pain experienced and the inspiration conveyed. It means revealing your own truth and materializing it as a new direction of orientation for others.
Why read this book? Because it is critical to optimizing your performance. Because it reveals the main coordinates after that are build the character and skills of the leaders, highlighting what it is important for them to increase their influence.
The essential characteristic of this book in comparison with others on the market in the same domain is that it describes through examples the ideal competences of a leader. I never claimed that it's easy to become a good leader, but if people will...
For some leaders, "leading" resembles more to a chess game, a game of cleverness and perspicacity; for others it means a game of chance, a game they think they can win every time risking and betting everything on a single card.
I wrote this book that conjoins in a simple way personal development with leadership, just like a puzzle, where you have to match all the given pieces in order to recompose the general image.
The aim of this book is to offer you information through concrete examples and to show you how to obtain the capacity to make others see things from the same angle as you.
Without considering it a concord, the book is representing the try of an ordinary man - the author - who through simple words, facts and usual examples instills to the ordinary man courage and optimism in his own quest to be his own master and who knows... maybe even a leader.
