Spring is commencement season; so everywhere you look nowadays, there is a graduation ceremony happening or about to happen. And that’s really nice.
Completing a valuable and well packaged training program is a thing of joy not only for the graduates but also their friends and family who usually shower them with commendations and gifts.
But for many graduates, the joy quickly turns into sorrow as the harsh reality of the labor market sets in. Good paying jobs are hard to come by, and despite the appreciable inroads of crowd-funding sources like Kickstarter, GoFundMe and Indiegogo, funds for entrepreneurial ventures are not easy to get.
So, before they know it, hope begins to fade. Self-improvement efforts seem wasteful. Many who were hitherto perceived as friends keep a disturbing distance. It’s miserable. It’s horrible!
That’s why our programs at 107-year-old faith-based nonprofit Detroit Rescue Mission Ministries (https://drmm.org) emphasize self-leadership. We operate such programs with the notion that no matter how God-fearing and networking savvy our participants are (and these are very necessary), they still need self-understanding, self-determination, self-control and self-direction to succeed in life. And a job search –whether online or offline – requires nothing less. The same is true of generating self-employment.
We had to do this year’s commencement early on April 22 – graduating over 200 men and women who have successfully completed their life-bettering programs at our various facilities in metro Detroit – because we wanted our graduates to kick their self-leadership gear into overdrive.
Before receiving their diplomas, they watched a stirring performance by the DRMM Choir, and listened to inspiring speeches from a host of heavyhitters, including R$B superstar Kem (who graduated over 20 years ago from one of our programs), Detroit Free Press columnist Mitch Albom, Detroit News columnist Bankole Thompson, and TV personality and former pro basketball star Kurt David. They needed such. Inspiration engenders self-leadership and self-leadership has to withstand the periodic test of courage and determination.
Perhaps, the point of maximum interest was when I had the singular honor of donating cars to two graduates to help make life easier for them as they grapple with the challenges of life after rehabilitative training.
Unfortunately, I can’t donate refurbished cars to every job-seeking or newly employed person in metro Detroit, but I can, through this and other platforms at my disposal, encourage them to not give up when the going gets tough but rather muster the courage to defy stagnation, mediocrity and failure.
To borrow the words of Israelmore Ayivor, “A mere motivator sees potentials in people and tells them to take actions. A true leader sees the same potentials in the same people and influences them to optimize them under his God-lead inspirations.”
They lead well who first lead themselves, and many great minds gained very useful self-leadership lessons during the transitory period of lack, abandonment and misery. Looking inward they found hope. And looking upward, they found help.
May the Class of 2016 find the hope and help that never fail. May their self-leadership bring them good dividends.