help me respond to this peer's post...I imagine the picture of the tree growing from a seed to a full grown fruit bearing tree shows us there is a progression to leadership. It is something we need to hone, learn, and expand on to be as effective as the tree that bears the fruit. At one time I had an impression that only certain types of people could be leaders. They were born with the right personality traits for the job. Leadership therefore was innate. And people like me had no business being a leader because the traits I had were all wrong. I attended leadership development training through the YMCA that transformed this belief I had about leadership. I was sent on a several day retreat which had me nervous because I wasn't sure I would "fit" in an environment full of leaders. I started to relax after I realized how different we all were, not just me. And no specific person there was born into their position. One of the hosts expanded on this idea. She believed we needed to let go of the image of the typical ideal leader born with perfect leadership traits. We instead should focus on how to use our own natural traits as a means to effective leadership. She explained that when we stop putting all our energy towards trying to be something that doesn't come natural to us and instead focus on tailoring our strengths, we could be our authentic selves and grow into an effective leader. Because we can't just be the tree, we need time to grow