Monday’s Blog; MLK Leaders are made

Martin Luther King Jr. has long been one of my heroes, hefty on courage, leadership, determination and laden with great quantities of Chutzpah. How familiar we are with his achievements, daring and dedication to a great cause, facts I do not need to reiterate today, on the day devoted to celebrating his life. It will be all over the media and in many people’s hearts and minds. 

I also celebrate his wife Coretta Scott King’s impact on our lives. I note her grace, her courage and her support in her husband’s great work as well as her own achievements and contributions to the world. How often she must have watched the media footage or been next to him as he began to make an impact on the divided country, How she must have worried and fretted at his well-being while he pursued his dreams, shattered on that terrible day, April 4, 1968 on the balcony of the Lorraine Motel in Memphis, Tennessee. He accomplished so much and lived to seek freedom and equality for millions and then died at the young age of 39.

How does a leader of MKL’s caliber get to such heights. It does not come quickly.  It is not innate at birth but grows from a seed of need and want. It comes with hard work, introspection, fear, anxiety and that deep-felt determination. I refer to an interview with Dr. King that has stuck in my mind for many years covering the early years of his crusade. 

When questioned about his style and approach, he said that it evolved with time, with daring and small steps feeling his way ahead, inventing his approach as he worked.  During difficult encounters he often felt fearful and unsure of how to start climbing this mountain but his will and determination served to fashion the sound and light of his growing campaign reaching towards recognition and equality for the downtrodden.   He followed his heart. He spoke his mind. He grew into a cherished leader with a dramatic, haunting style that won millions of hearts and united blacks and whites building toward equality in this land. 

I think of this poignant testimonial often when hearing leaders and shakers speak on their causes and know that they were not born with the words and actions we hear and see but grew through their courage and determination towards change. Upbringing and background still cannot be discounted in building the foundations of our lives.

In his early years, in 1949, distraught at the news of the death of his grandmother Jennie at the age of 12 he tried to kill himself by jumping out of a window, additionally distraught because he defied his parents wishes as he joined parade of protest and then learned of her death. In his early years he questioned  religion and religious worship.  But in his junior college year, King took a Bible class, renewing his faith and entered a career path in the ministry.