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Comment by gauravjain13 | Hacker News Reader

This is somewhat paradoxical, but I think leadership requires some level of delusion. If one truly sees things as they are, it’s hard to create narratives and mythologies requires to motivate/lead people.

Steve Jobs’ “reality distortion field” comes to mind.

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I’ve thought it’s easier to figure a social situation out as an independent third party than to figure out a situation in the first person. That might be related to Jobs’ “reality distortion field”. But at the same time, people are finite and of course always going to be blind to the total context around them - in anything suitably complicated. So I wouldn’t put a lot into this.

I don't think delusion is the best word for it. Delusion implies that the vision of people in leadership roles are unrealistic in some way. I think resiliently optimistic is probably a better term. I don't think most people are motivated by myth, they're motivated by good support.

That's fair – I wasn't being particularly rigorous when I implied "delusion".

Resiliently optimistic is better. Reminds of me of the Stockdale Paradox:

"You must maintain unwavering faith that you can and will prevail in the end, regardless of the difficulties, and at the same time, have the discipline to confront the most brutal facts of your current reality, whatever they might be."

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Stockdale#The_Stockdale_...

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