Pulling Six Blindfolded People

Today I helped lead a workshop for several groups of high school students. In each workshop, we discussed the concept of teamwork, and like any good workshop, we played games that wavered between cheesy and meaningful. But, the students were great sports about it, and some of them even learned a thing or three about working together.

One exercise in particular turned out to be the highlight of the day for me personally. Trying to fill the last ten minutes and energize the students, six students were grouped together inside of a hula-hoop. One person was outside of the hoop, blindfolded. This person and the hula-hoop group were holding opposite ends of a string. The blindfolded individual was to lead the others to the opposite side of the room, looking out for various obstacles along the way. Of course, because this person was blindfolded, they couldn’t really lead anyone. They had to listen to the others direct them towards the destination. The activity was repeated with the roles reversed; those in the hula-hoop wore blindfolds, and the one outside tried to direct the rest towards the other end of the room. As you may imagine, it was easier for the many to direct the one than the one to direct the many. While not universally applicable, the lesson was that a team can work better together to help one person (their named leader) achieve a goal than one person can drag along a group of blind idiots.

The students also learned that you don’t have to be out front or appointed as a leader to help achieve great things. (Okay, calling walking across the room a great thing may be a stretch, but work with me.) This is important for teenagers, particularly because today’s and tomorrow’s teens will continue to have less and less trust of authority figures, as more and more turn out to be corrupt, stupid, and morally bankrupt. Therefore, students must genuinely believe that they can affect positive change by being behind the scenes and down on the ground. Podiums and balconies are great, but change can be wrought at the hands of a determined, well-organized community.

For those of us who lead often, in whatever capacity, sometimes our experience is like trying to drag along a group of blindfolded people. We have our objectives, our vision, our people, our tools, and our ideas. We try to get people to buy into them, follow along, trust us, jump on the bandwagon, be a team player, and come along for the ride. Perhaps a better paradigm would be for us leaders to excite people to lead us. Letting the inertia only found in group energy push us as we name objectives and goals can get our followers and us to where we want to be faster, safer, and better.

In just a moment, the President will yap for a while and there will be countless standing ovations. Regardless of whose goals and objectives he lists tonight, he will be trying to help lead nearly 300 million people with blindfolds on. Perhaps it is time for the people to start leading a blindfolded president (please refrain from all easy jokes, here). Perhaps it is time for Christians to stand and unite and tell our political leaders that we’re about more than gay marriage and abortion. We’re about Darfur, a living wage, and poverty. Perhaps it is time that the people get together and direct captains of industry to make cleaner automobiles and homes that run on renewable energy. Perhaps it is time for all of us to get together, and lead this nation into a brighter future, one that those in Washington who are blinded by power have long forgotten.