Beware! Your answer to the title question will shape your future! Why do I say this? Let me start with a story.
The one who would be King
This extraordinary story starts in the Judean Hills of Israel around 1020s BCE. Quite unexpectedly, a shepherd boy, David, is clandestinely anointed as king while Saul still reigns as the king of Israel. Though nothing much changes for David, his bravery in killing Israel’s arch-enemy Goliath, brings him to Saul’s attention. This and other exploits catapults him as a national hero, whereas Saul is ineffective and timid. Prophet Samuel, who had anointed Saul as King many years earlier, is tired of Saul’s lying and acts of deception.
The prospect of the kingdom slipping away and his constant paranoia of the shepherd boy stealing his kingdom makes Saul a nervous wreck. He gets into fits of anger. To soothe his moods, Saul’s advisors look for a harpist to come and play. The best harpist in the country they found was the shepherd boy, David! David immediately enters into Saul’s service, playing the harp for him, easing Saul’s nerves.
But life gets increasingly dangerous for David in Saul’s palace. Saul tries to pin him to the wall with his spear on a couple of occasions. It begins to dawn on David that Saul intends to kill him and eliminate any competitor to the throne. David runs away into hiding. Saul pursues him relentlessly, but he is never able to get hold of the agile David and his ragtag army.
Then, an incredible opportunity presents itself to David. One day, Saul gathers a vast army to hunt David in the caves and crags of the Judean hills. After a long and weary day in the blistering sun, they come to rest on a hill for the night.
David realises Saul and his army are close by. He asks the captain of his men, Abishai, to join him to investigate. Both of them reach Saul’s camp and find the entire army in deep sleep. Saul and his guards asleep with their spears stuck to the ground.
Abishai is excited and says, “God has given your enemy into your hand this day. Now please let me pin him to the earth with one stroke of the spear, and I will not strike him twice.” This moment could fulfil what was foretold by the prophet. This is David’s moment. The throne of Israel is within his grasp. This opportunity could hasten him to his rightful place to fulfil what God had already promised - that he, David would be the next king. Everything about the circumstances pointed to the rightness of the moment.
But incredibly, David pauses. He pauses! Abishai is appalled and upset at his master. Here is the enemy, intent on killing David. Saul who has 3,000 soldiers with him to capture David is fast asleep before them. What possible reason could there be, not to exact revenge and seize the throne?
Closed fist or open hands?
Aristotle said, “Men regard it as their right to return evil for evil - and, if they cannot, feel they have lost their liberty.”
We often think it is our legitimate right to grab what rightfully belongs to us, by any means. But we forget that the means we employ to achieve our goal is really what makes us. David understood this timeless principle. He refused to take the throne by violence. He refused to raise his hand on the God-anointed King. David reckoned, the same God who had anointed him, would give him the throne when He saw fit. He was willing to wait.
The classical leadership and management wisdom say, ‘if you want to succeed, focus on your goal.’ In our productivity-oriented culture, very little attention is given to the means of achieving a goal. The smartest person is considered as the one who achieves the goal by any means. Certainly, the end is important. But means is more important and its impact lasts longer, because, the way you achieve your goal shapes your character. And character is your destiny. Your destiny is your legacy.
‘The end never justifies the means. Instead, the means define who you are at the end.’ - Shane J Wood
When you start experiencing small successes through unfair means or by force, it reinforces your belief in your ability to get things done. If your achievement is built on flawed means, cracks in the armour of success will start appearing as your achievement grows. But if they are built on a strong character of integrity, truth, and compassion, you will be unassailable, always.
David’s story is a tale of refusal - refusing to act even when the other option is advantageous and attractive. He is more focussed on the means to get to the throne rather than the throne itself as the end. A definitive, intentional refusal such as this requires enormous inner resolve. The normal response to act in such situations is an automatic reflex. For most of us, it would be the normal thing to do. But to hold back or refuse to act is powerful. In doing so, you grow your inner strength of character.
Saul, in contrast, wanted to keep his throne by any means. Saul started achieving this through lies and deceit. As invariably happens, violence is the next natural step. In this episode, he brings up an inappropriately huge army of 3,000 soldiers to catch a fugitive. In his last days, he starts making unreasonable accusations, even accusing his son of treason. He kills innocents who he thought were helping David. Finally, he gets killed violently in a battle.
Gandhi & Stanley
Mahatma Gandhi used the principle of non-violence to oppose injustice, aggression and power. His oppressors used violence and intimidation. The moral authority that flows out of using the right means, gave Gandhi and his followers' inner strength while his oppressors grew weak and finally had to quit. His strength of character provided the basis for India to remain non-violent. I shudder to imagine what India would have been if he had resorted to violence to force emancipation. Violence would have become our native language. Gandhi set the foundation of peace for the county through the means he employed to get us liberty.
E. Stanley Jones (1884-1973) was an American theologian who worked in India among the Dalits (untouchables). He established a Christian Ashram in Sattal, near Nainital in India. Gandhi and Staley were friends through the independence movement. It was also the heyday for communism and its propaganda machines. Stanley could not understand how communism could thrive and USSR becomes prosperous while using totalitarian means. To find out he undertook a journey to USSR and met many different people there. He concluded that totalitarian regimes cannot suppress people forever. The system has the seeds of its destruction built into it. And as we know, USSR disintegrated in 1989.
In contrast to the Indian independence movement, the Russian revolution was bloody. Communism had to resort to violence and subjugation to enforce its rule. Use of force as a means to provide a better life for people is a contradiction. It sounds attractive in the short run, but unsustainable and counterproductive in the long term.
Summary
In summary, short cuts in achieving your end will cut you short in the end. Means is significantly more important than pursuing an end. It is not the successes that make us. Ultimately, the means you employ builds or wrecks your character which is the single most important determinant of your achievement and your legacy.
Short cuts in achieving your end will cut you short in the end
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