What Are the Benefits for Emerging Sage Leaders?

What Are the Benefits I: Community Service

Emerging sage leaders talk a lot about relationships being formed through their civic involvements – deep, meaningful, enduring relationships that involve them with other engaging people. These relationships serve as a powerful antidote to the isolation that new technologies inevitably introduce. For without civic engagement, men and women of the technology age can be easily seduced by the virtual contact they have through the Internet and e-mail rather than seeking contact of substance with “real people.” The emerging sage leaders don’t just come home after a day of work and turn on their TVs, play videogames, or access the Internet. Instead, they spend time with colleagues who share the same values, concerns, and priorities. It’s almost a “church of community service” to which they and their collaborators belong. For most emerging sages, this certainly beats the attractions of television and chat rooms.

What Are the Benefits II: Lifelong Learners and “Flow”

There is another set of benefits identified by many sage leaders, and these cluster around the theme of continuous lifelong learning. Emerging sages are often involved in new roles and seek learning about new facets of community life; they motivate themselves to grow and learn by taking on new and expanded challenges. Moreover, this new learning is seen as fun, a joy rather than drudgery. Civic activities have become their social life and source of leisure as well. This reaffirms engaged sages’ current values and helps them to grow in new areas—like creative problem-solving, strategizing, and reading about new developments in a variety of fields. So, the personal horizons of emerging sages are being enlarged and they, in turn, are serving as role models for their own children and for other mid-life adults in Twin Towns.