When do you sacrifice for someone else's success? This is a trickier question than you might think. Most leader-want-to-be's are pretty good about sacrificing for someone else's success . . . as long as they can see the ROI eventually, in some manner, benefiting them. Even if that eventually is still a long ways down the road. Even if that potential benefit is small, they can still do it regularly.
It is when there is no "eventually" that separates the men from the boys, so to speak. If fact I would challenge you to think carefully, and see how many investments in people you have made, that can not ever bring some benefit back to your door, ever. Hell I am in the "helping others succeed" business and I am hard pressed, very very hard pressed to find more than a few.
Sure I find deep pleasure in seeing others succeed, really I do! But hidden inside all of those "helping others succeed" human transactions that take place in my life, there is also some reciprocation, some advantage, something I get in return, even if it is eventually. Frankly that ruins my altruism. It wrecks my perceptions of how generous I am. It destroys my sense of largess. It displays how shallow my good goes. At the end of the day, it reveals my utter selfishness.
This was brought to light in my life today, when I could find no happiness, no pleasure inside of me, for the success of another. Her success cost me, and there is no eventual benefit for me. I had to pay the price, receive less, be patient, be generous, wait, make allowances, spend my time, change my plans, thwart my goal, in order for her to succeed - and there is no eventual benefit for me. And I don't like it all. And that shows my smallness: as a man, as a Christ-follower, as a leader.
