Excerpt from a lecture delivered by Siri Singh Sahib, Yogi Bhajan at a meeting of the Khalsa Council on October 13, 1995:
A leader is born, created by destiny, created by prayer, created by his own sweet will. The best leader is the one who emerges with applied consciousness. It is the ego that limits man. Wherever there is ego, there will be no God. Leadership will fail with the person for the self, in the self or the self in the self. Ego will bring you three things: insecurity, fear and duality. you do not understand. Sometimes people say, „Give up.” You think that's weakness, don't you? It's not weakness, my dears. It is impossible. Whenever you give up your molecules as metal; you become an alloy that cannot be separated. That is what surrender is all about.
A leader does not surrender to anything but his own mission. A spiritual leader submits to the Dharma. When you submit to the Dharma, you attain altitude. With altitude you have attitude. With attitude you have a horizon wider than ever before. Then the opportunity comes. Then your troubles begin. When you are at that height, if you lose your balance once, you will never have a second chance again. You are corrupted before your own leadership. This is what no one will ever tell you. No one can judge you. Law, people, corruption, ethics, morality and authority, even God, cannot judge you.
Unfortunately, when your spirit judges you, your soul judges you. You have no escape. Therefore, keeping your soul on the positive side is the right attitude for life.
When an ambassador of a country writes to his home country that someone is dangerous, the government of that country, despite all friendship, cannot expand; because the word of the ambassador is final. The ambassador represents the government in the world. The soul represents God in you.
The purpose of the soul is to test. The higher the test for the soul, the higher the soul is. You know, when the soul is shallow, of low degree, it will have all earthly comforts. When the soul reaches a high level of maturity and reaches its end, it will have negative earthly comforts and conveniences. Do you know this? This is something you need to understand. Challenges do not come to infants. Challenges are for mature, outstanding, real people. Challenges are virtues because they guarantee your confidence, your strength and relationship with the God within you, the consciousness within you, the intelligence within you. Your relationship is so radiant that people want to worship God, to find God. Then God worships you and wants to find you. That is the relationship. And so the Mool mantra says: „Akaal Moorat; you are a picture God”. Period. All the time you have to remember: „Does my soul like this?” The moment you talk to your soul, you are talking to the Infinite.
The first capacity of great leadership, spiritual leadership or earthly leadership is that you must be yourself within yourself. Secondly, you in yourself must have the ability, ease and aspect to serve everyone as you do. You will talk to everyone as you talk to yourself. The third is what you say; you will hear the words first. Don't speak to speak to others. It is such a waste of human energy. It is such a depression for your soul. Your soul cannot forgive you if you use pure soul energy to convince other people, just to convince them.
Relax, relax, relax. Give God a chance. He went into this madness to create you; and being perfect, He created you all imperfect. Let Him see that and solve His problems; not you. Get Him into trouble. He loves it. Everyone wants attention. You want attention. God wants attention. Give Him your attention. Let Him work for you. Don't start acting as God and let people know that you are God.
I leave you with these thoughts. The future is yours, tomorrow is yours. i am your yesterday; very beautiful, very compassionate, very wonderful and very loved by my Guru and my God. And now it is you. It has always been you. I was just maya. It will always be you. I will only be a shadow. How wrong I can be, how right I can go, it will never stop karma. It will never stop the Path. You all have a million times more power within you to lift it to the heights, to the shores, to the world. Be proud. Kaam krodh lobh moh aungkaar: Lust, anger, greed, pride and attachment are all beautiful. Attach yourself to your soul. Live it and tell the whole world that you are not yourself, you are you and me. Then your loftiness will be recognised by all four sides of the world... Now it is recognised. Let it grow and let it shine. You are born with this destiny.
May the Guru bless you and God guide you to achieve this every tomorrow; so that you can take away the sorrow of the whole world and excel. In your excellence lies world peace.