LEARN TO OBEY IF YOU WANT TO LEAD

Lamartine is not wrong in saying”To obey is to pay the price to sway.” The importance of obeying can be sought from life of a child. Child, as in Wordsworth’s opinion, is father of man who is taught to obey, obey and only obey. In his years of ignorance he often wonders and ponders if he is born to obey. What’s the use of all this fuss? Along with all the hesitations and half-heartedness ha has to obey willy-nilly. But afterwards in life when the child grows to lead and to rule the affairs of a family, he realizes that he rules best who obey best. Some people believe in Voltaire’s concept: “Observe the rule and serve the ruler.”

But in my opinion it is not right to obey someone for someone’s sake but obeying is symbiotic relationship in which one gives and takes something at the same time. If someone is paying respect by obeying some ruler, he is also investing at the same time the respect he will be going to cash from his subordinates when he will be the man in charge.

Observing rules make one aware of difficult implementations which people face while obeying the particular rule. So leader may guide when he can feel the severity of suffering and seriousness of the problem as quoted in an English proverb, “Only the wearer knows that where the shoes pinches.”

Hurried, worried, flurried until he is buried, every sect and every state of man’s life is reflecting and revealing that obedience is the nature of man and it is something in his lot. This lenient nature of obeying should not be confused with slavery. Serfs are those who obey blindly, observe rules blindly. Cowley exaggerates so much in drawing a line between slavery and obedience by saying that “men who are taught to obey are not slaves but those who do not know how to be”.

It is reality that an elegant leader is he who is an intelligent obedient. Hazrat Omar Bin Abdul Aziz was at peak of the glory of Umayyad dynasty and was rightly called “Omar II” because kindness and sagacity in leadership were hallmarks of his personality telling the reasons of his success; he narrated an incident which is self-speaking truth revealing the reality of obedience. Once he was made bald by his teachers as punishment because he spent his time in combing his hair and failed to obey his teacher. This incident influenced the heart of this promising youth so much that later in his life he never disobeyed his Lord. He was honoured by name and fame so much that he was given the title of the fifth Caliph of Muslims. His obedience to the teacher became the beacon light for those who want to cherish service before self. “Bow before Adam”, this was the decree delivered to angles, by the Almighty. All the angles obeyed but Iblees denied. He was cast out of heaven and fell into the ditches of mean less from the heights of glory in consequence of disobedience and became Satan. He burnt his finger in his vanity and bias. He has made a lesson for those who can seek and see how leaders become litter own the tough stone of obedience.

  W.S Matthew has rightly said:

 “Those who disobey are the disciples of devils.”

History is like a magic mirror; within its glaze we can see our past and present and in the gleams of these glimpses we can glitter our future when we look at history, a complete picture unfolds before us that how Hazrat Abdut Qadir Jilani adhered to his mother’s advice and obeyed her far away from house in the very crucial circumstances where safety seemed to be in disobedience, but he obeyed and his acts became guideline for the gang of robbers and a source of inspiration for people afterwards.

Similarly, obedience of Alexander the great, Mamoon-ur-Rasheed ant that of many more persons has made Emerson to say:

          “Obedience alone gives the right to rule”.