The Palette of Leadership 

RED: RESPECT 

In order to be a good leader, you must respect the people you lead. With respect comes trust, and it is impossible to be a successful leader without it. 

ORANGE: OPEN MINDS 

Being a leader means listening to everyone's opinion, even if you might not personally agree with it. But a good leader always leads with an open mind, welcoming change and new possibilities. 

YELLOW: YOUTHFUL ENERGY

No one wants to be led by someone who is not enthusiastic about the organization or cause they support.  Having youthful energy will attract people towards you and thus enable you to have a dependable group to lead. 

GREEN: GROWTH 

Successful leaders want things to change. This could be a change in the system, a change in the public, or a change within themselves. A successful leader always keeps growing. 

BLUE: BELIEF 

How can a leader expect other people to believe in them if they don't believe in themselves?

VIOLET: VIGILANCE 

Even if things seem bleak or useless, it is up to the leader to watch out for the group and pull though. 

Influential Leader

Regrettably, I don't think I've ever "looked up" to a specific leader. However, President Lyndon B. Johnson has always been someone I admire from a leadership point of view. Lyndon B. Johnson signed 10 pieces of major civil rights legislation into law during his time in office, making him one of the most prolific signers of such legislation in presidential history.

After watching the video, I started to think about what really gets me going/ makes my eyes shine/ wakes me up in the morning. The obvious answer for me was creating something. It doesn't have to be art, but that is a big part of it. It's making memories, or some really awesome food, or a good grade, etc. Making art also gets me excited and there is always something I want to draw, or write down, or sometimes I just want to get in the studio and see what happens. Being outside, taking walks, nature, all of that kind of stuff also gets me excited. I'm 10x more enthused about something when it relates to our planet or has to do with our body. That is why science and literature (and a few math concepts) are interesting to me.

The first thing that caught my attention when I listened to Martin Luther King Jr.'s speech was the fact that he knew the event would go down in history and be remembered forever. I think that is so important because if MLK hadn't started his speech with the attention and credit it deserved, the people participating in the demonstration or attending the speech probably wouldn’t have felt as important. If the leader does not feel empowered by what he/she is doing how can they expect their followers to? MLK had a presence about him and I think it was that presence that made him stand out during his era. Not only his courage, but his drive, strong voice, and leadership. A quote that comes to mind when I think about MLK is, "speak the truth even if your voice shakes." I love this quote and as a whole, it and MLK give courage to people who might feel small or unimportant in the face of society, government, or even their family. Staying true to freedom and equality got blacks the rights they deserved, and without MLK's courage there's no telling when it would have happened. 

Jordan Sommer, Fine Arts, cream soda