We continue our exploration of HaRav Ginsburgh’s book, Awakening the Spark Within: Five Dynamics of Leadership that Can Change the World. Having treated the broader vision of leadership and the first of the five dynamics, the art of compromise, we now turn to the second of the five dynamics: the drive for wholeness—a visionary quality that imbues a leader with the ability to inspire others to live a life of meaning and purpose.
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In our previous article, we explored the first dynamic of leadership—the art of compromise—and its essential role in fostering peace between individuals and within society. Flowing naturally from this foundation is the second dynamic, one that deepens the first: a drive for wholeness.
The intrinsic connection between these two dynamics is already embedded in the Hebrew language itself. The word shalom—peace—also means wholeness, completeness, and perfection. Peace is not merely the absence of conflict; it is the manifestation of wholeness. Thus, true leadership does not end with compromise but moves toward a vision of inner and outer completeness.
This second dynamic is activated when a leader sees beyond the present state of affairs and connects to the deeper potential concealed within reality—a future of harmony, rectification, and redemption. It is the ability to envision a utopian Messianic future and to draw that future into the present moment. Although the world, as it stands, is far from perfected, leadership demands the courage to invest one’s mental, emotional, and spiritual energies in revealing that future in the here and now. People yearn not only for a better tomorrow, but for a present infused with meaning and hope. A true leader does not merely speak or theorize about a redeemed world but begins to make it tangible for those who walk alongside him or her.
To lead in this way requires stretching beyond one’s perceived limits. It demands the willingness to reach past comfort and habit to access one’s true potential. This quality is known as mesirut nefesh—self-transcendence, the readiness to give oneself fully to a task or cause, even to the point of self-sacrifice for the sanctification of God and Torah.
This type of attitude was articulated powerfully by Rabbi Shmuel of Lubavitch, the fourth Lubavitcher Rebbe, who taught that when faced with obstacles, one should not first look for a way around them or beneath them, but rather lechatchilah ariber—to leap over them from the outset. This teaching reflects profound spiritual confidence. By aligning with a higher purpose, obstacles lose their power before they fully materialize. Moreover, the greater the challenge, the greater the opportunity for growth. Each leap over limitation becomes a permanent expansion of the self. In certain cases, it may even seem that the inspired leader is living, according to Chasidic thought, “one handbreadth above ground,” where miracles start to seem normal.
The Prophets and Miracles
This drive for wholeness is found throughout the Tanach, particularly in the books of the Prophets. These visionaries perceived the ultimate redemption of humanity with such clarity that their words continue to inspire today. Because they stretched their consciousness beyond conventional limits, many became vessels for Divine miracles. Their leadership flowed not from seeking authority, but from alignment with a higher reality.
Although tradition counts forty-eight male prophets and seven female prophetesses, the Talmud teaches that there were in fact hundreds of thousands of prophets and prophetesses in Israel.[1] During the era of the First Temple, individuals engaged in meditative and spiritual practices designed to elevate consciousness to be fitting vessels for prophetic experience. The goal was not prophecy for its own sake, but closeness to God and the fulfillment of one’s deepest spiritual potential. Seeking spiritual experience for the “high” or thrill of it has always been frowned upon in Jewish tradition.
This ideal is captured in a moment involving Moses, the greatest of all prophets. When Joshua objected to two men prophesying within the camp, Moses responded, “Would it be that all of God’s people were prophets!”[2] Leadership in its truest form is not exclusive. The drive for wholeness and indeed all the dynamics of leadership are accessible to every soul.
Essential Wholeness
The Ba’al Shem Tov articulated a profound principle regarding wholeness: when one grasps a part of an essence (etzem), one grasps the entire essence (etzem).[3] According to Kabbalah and Chasidut, there are three entities whose very nature is defined by their wholeness: the Torah, the Jewish people, and the Land of Israel.
A Torah-scroll missing even a single letter or even part of a letter is invalid for public reading until corrected, because Torah, by definition, must be whole. The Torah is referred to in the Psalms as “The Torah of God is perfect.”[4] Similarly, the Jewish people are a single organic entity. If even one Jew is in pain or estranged from Jewish tradition, the wholeness of the entire people is affected. This idea is expressed in the teaching that “All of Israel are responsible one for another.”[5] The same principle applies to the Land of Israel, which is also inherently whole. Any division or incompleteness within the land reflects an unfinished state that awaits rectification. For this reason, Messianic prophecy consistently centers on the return of the entire Jewish people to the entirety of the Land of Israel, culminating in its full settlement and redemption. Only then will the full redemption of the world, led by the ultimate leader, the Mashiach, be realized.
Alongside these teachings stands a paradoxical statement: “There is nothing as whole as a broken heart.”[6] At first glance, this appears contradictory. Yet a broken heart awakens longing for healing, for holiness, and ultimately for a world restored to wholeness. The danger in feeling such brokenness caused by a world where so many are in pain due to wars, hatred, illness, and disillusionment is that one may become distraught, depressed or feel hopeless to rectify the situation. Yet the point of the statement is that precisely by feeling a broken heart so deeply, it does not lead to despair, rather one becomes strengthened to do their part to create peace and wholeness however and whenever possible.
In this spirit, the sages teach that “the secrets of Torah are entrusted only to one who is worried in their heart.”[7] This worry does not refer to personal anxiety or material lack, but to an existential awareness of the world’s imperfections—the suffering, injustice, and spiritual concealment that still prevail. While faith teaches that all that God does is ultimately for the good[8] and everything is in a sense as it should be, it is equally clear that the world remains unrectified. Its imperfections reflect not a deficiency in Divine perfection, but the accumulated distortions of human choice.
The drive for wholeness then, emerges from this sacred tension, recognizing the world as it is, while refusing to relinquish the vision of what it can and must be. Leadership animated by this dynamic does not wait for redemption, it begins to live it now, drawing the future into the present until wholeness becomes reality.
Unity of Body and Soul, Physical and Spiritual
On a practical level, the drive for wholeness means unifying body and soul, physical and spiritual. Our task is not to flee the physical world or denigrate the body in pursuit of abstract spirituality, but to uplift the physical and infuse it with holiness. This unity lies at the heart of creation itself and explains the purpose of the Torah and its commandments. After Adam and Eve ate from the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil, Adam’s curse, or better stated, the consequence of his actions, was the struggle to sustain himself through physical labor.[9] Yet embedded within this difficulty is the possibility of rectification—the opportunity to sanctify the physical through effort, intention, and purpose.
One of the greatest blessings in life is to love one’s work, to experience one’s occupation as a personal mission. When a person’s labor becomes an expression of their inner calling, body and soul unite, and life itself reflects wholeness.
A Sustaining Vision
The Jewish people have survived centuries of exile sustained by this vision of unity and redemption. Even the act of imagining a redeemed future draws it closer into the present. In his final years, the Rebbe, Rabbi Menachem Mendel Schneerson urged his followers to learn about Mashiach and to dedicate their lives to making redemption a lived reality. In our own time, as the Jewish people return to their homeland, settling and redeeming the land, and while increasing numbers of Jews reconnect with Torah and Jewish tradition, we begin to experience in the present the reality of the Messianic future.
Just as we are called to uplift the physical and sanctify it, we are also called upon to draw heaven down to earth—to infuse every action with Divine meaning. May each of us be inspired to seek and actualize wholeness in our lives and radiate that energy to others. When enough individuals do so, a critical mass of redemptive energy will be revealed, drawing the ultimate leader, the Mashiach, into reality.
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[1]. Megillah 14a.
[2]. Numbers 11:29.
[3]. Keter Shem Tov (ed. Kehot) addendum 116.
[4]. Psalms 19:8.
[5]. Shevuot 39a.
[6]. Degel Machaneh Ephraim, Va’etchanan.
[7]. Chagigah 13a.
[8]. Berachot 60b.
[9]. Genesis 3:19.
