Unseen Potential
By David Freund

I woke up to the house filled with a chill. Outside, the weather was damp and cold, with the previous days’ snow still covering the ground. The woodstove I stoked at 3 AM had cooled off, leaving barely any warmth to the touch. Upon opening the stove, there was no smoke, only the log I had placed earlier that morning.

I love my woodstove, but what I don’t love is trying to start a fire. If you don’t have the right kindling, it takes a while to get the stove hot enough to warm the house.

I considered the situation and thought to myself, “What would it hurt to open the damper, open the bottom ash door, and see what happens?”

As I sat in my chair next to it for my morning quiet time, I almost forgot about the stove. Suddenly, out of the corner of my eye, I noticed the flicker of a flame. Within a few moments, the flame grew brighter, and after about 30 minutes, there was a roaring fire. Finally, the stove warmed the room.

I was so very pleased. With minimal effort on my part, the fire had rekindled and become a blessing to everyone in the house.

I’m sure none of you, my readers, are surprised by where my mind went next: leadership. I began to think about what it sometimes takes to rekindle a spark — what it takes on the part of a leader to bring amazing results from something that appears dormant.

My woodstove had everything needed to create energy and warmth: a dry piece of firewood and an ember — hardly visible and giving off almost no heat. Yet under the right conditions, that ember grew warmer, began to consume the fuel, and in a relatively short time, generated tremendous energy to benefit the family.

How much opportunity lies dormant in our organizations? How much potential lies dormant in our communities, just needing the right environment or stimulus to bring it to life? How many people have I walked past over the years, thinking they didn’t care or didn’t have it in them, when in fact what they needed was a better leader — someone willing to “open the damper and ash door” to allow oxygen to fan the flames of opportunity?

Take some time to look more deeply at the people around you. Are there people who are just waiting for something — or someone — to stir them? Consider our community — what opportunities are out there just waiting to be awakened?

Perhaps all it will take is a word of encouragement.
Perhaps it will take some funds to get something started.
Perhaps it will take rolling up our sleeves, coming alongside them, and showing them the opportunities rather than just talking about them.

We live in a world filled with buckets of cold water, always ready to quench our optimism. Why not be the spark that ignites optimism — and with it, great opportunity?