Cadre Today

Hey, hey, good morning cadre. How are we doing today? It is Monday. Getting near the end of September. This was the first morning I walked outside and I could really tell that days are getting a little bit shorter. Oh, and it's also first day of fall. I think today's the first day of fall. Maybe that's tomorrow. Hmm. That's coming up. Another change, another shift, another moment to be where you are with what you got. T North, how are those Royals doing? The Minnesota Twins played their last home game of the season yesterday.

But to everything there is a season. To every day there are things ending. To every day there are the things that Hey, Ally Tater. Hey, Andy Mack. Nice to see y'all. Say good morning. Triple B, how are we today? It's always fun to go ahead and for a moment feel like we're meeting at the water cooler. Feel like we're sitting down for that quick cup of coffee or that let's get on the same page before we break and go into our days. No matter what, this is always a really great place to be. speak wonders going to the French Revolution Alicia good morning exclamation point I love it I love it hey I'm sitting in another parking lot I have an early meeting this morning so you're getting a regular old good morning cadre today from the Mazda Oh, that's so great that you got to go to the twins or to the Royals game with your 93 year old dad on Saturday.

T North, I was at Farm Aid 40 with my 80, soon to be 81 year old dad, which was nice to get to spend some time outside. And that's what we'll go ahead and chat about for a little bit. So often on Mondays, you know, beginning of a week, for people whose weeks start on Mondays. You may go and say, Okay, it's back to work time, or it's focus on how I'm growing time. And in our culture that we share, that we create together, but that we all kind of swim in and influence, leading is the name of the game.

You gotta lead, you gotta go, you gotta push, you gotta be the first step, you gotta go do the thing. I always love offering the balance to that. If everybody's leading, who's following? Who are those leaders leading outside of maybe their own idea that that's where the goodness is, that's where the worth is. One of my favorite TED talkers, her name is Dr. Jane Bentley. In her wonderful Scottish accent, she shares, it's like, so often we're told that leaders never follow. And then she goes, well, actually, quite to the contrary.

And then she brings up the idea of musicians and how musicians, their whole craft is to follow. The violinist follows the hand of the conductor. The, you know, the the bassist follows and co-creates the pocket of the rhythm section. You know, all of these things invite us to think differently. So on Monday mornings, you always get a big scoop of boldly following right here. And I'll go back to Farm Aid. Farm Aid. is a music festival, a non-profit founded by Willie Nelson. And one of the events they do is this big concert once a year.

This was the 40th one. And it featured artists like Willie Nelson and Neil Young and Bob Dylan and John Mellencamp and Dave Matthews and Margo Price and lots of people. Lots of people, lots of like big people. My own Judd, Kenny Chet, like big people. Good morning, 1% better. This music festival, not only did it have their music and their history, But it also had the 35,000 people who were in attendance to stir up that music together. It had millions of people watching from around the world on CNN and streaming on YouTube.

And of course, because Farm Aid is a nonprofit, it had all of the independent American farmers that it supports. And here is one of the moments that really stuck out to me. I'm going to share two. First of all, with that many artists, they're bound to get behind. It's really interesting, right? Each artist had like, you're going to start at 6:38 PM and you're going to start at 7:22 PM and so on and so forth. Well, they got about an hour behind. So Willie Nelson didn't start playing, who was closing out the night until 12:30 in the morning.

But every single artist, as they followed one another, you could sense that they were a part of one story. It wasn't Willie Nelson's story and everybody else's trying to not get in the way. But they're all leading up to the end of the story. You can't get to the end of the story without knowing your part. It's a really misunderstood act of following. To go, how do I fit into the game? The best leaders don't follow? Phooey. I think it's the opposite. The best leaders know how to follow. The best leaders know how to fit in, know when to speak up, know when to sit down.

So where can you Follow today in that construct of who else you're creating something with. Here's the other really cool thing that happened at Farm Aid this weekend. You know, every single artist got introduced either by another artist or because this was the first time I was in Minnesota. Minnesota's, you know, a big, good Midwestern state. And all of a sudden you saw one of our senators come up and introduce Margo Price and all of a sudden you saw our governor pop up on stage and introduced Willie Nelson.

These are people who are literally leading the world in which we're sitting in. This is our governor and our senator. It literally is their world to be running, to be the leader in. And what did they do? They used the power of reflection. to follow the energy that was in the space to move us to the next moment. They said, here's where we are. Yeah, they said, here's who I am. But they focused so much on going, here's where we are and here's what's going on. And here's where your focus can live and lie and rest together next.

So my squeaky wheel announcement on Monday is always going to be, sure, you may be sitting in the seat of leader, or you may be going, I'm going to lead, lead, lead, lead, lead today. And I would say, good. Do that at the right times. But also realize it may make you feel really good to go, I am leader. I am leader. But always ask, everybody's leading. If that's what everybody's supposed to aspire to be, who's following? And if we're not training people how to follow, if we're not equipping people to follow well, I'm sorry, leader, you're doing nothing other than building sandcastles right on the shoreline.

Build your world, realizing that we exist together. We need to follow. So someone may be able to lead in the moment that that's what they're called to do. Y'all, and talk to you later.