Leading is not just about ambition. It requires wisdom, strong character, and the will to choose the right path.

Leadership can be a blessing or a curse. It can help people rise up to a better life, or it can cause people to fall into despair.

Many leaders in politics, communities, and business are now choosing low and middle road leadership styles.

Leadership authority John C. Maxwell challenges us to become part of the solution by becoming a high-road leader.

He tackles our divided world in his new book, High Road Leadership. He proposes solutions to fight the divisiveness we see today.

“Everything rises and falls on leadership,” says Maxwell. “Today, it is causing people to fall into disputes, frustration, anger, and despair."

He aims to reveal the issues with taking the low road and middle road in our interactions with others.

Then, he teaches people to choose the high road instead. High-road leaders value everyone. A good leader does the right things for the right reasons. High Roaders take responsibility for their actions and put people before their own goals.

Maxwell uses his unique communication style to teach high-road leadership. These principles can boost anyone’s influence and improve their world.

Maxwell is a New York Times bestselling author and a respected leader. His ideas appeal to both experienced politicians and newcomers aiming for big promotions.

In this post, readers will glean some of John Maxwell's best quotes from High Road Leadership.

These influential quotes highlight the admirable character of high-road leadership.

1. Bring People Together

2. Value All People

3. Acknowledge Your Humanness

4. Do The Right Thing For The Right Reasons

5. Give More Than You Take

6. Develop Emotional Capacity

7. Place People Above Your Own Agenda

8. Embrace Authenticity

9. Be Accountable For Your Actions

10. Live By The Bigger Picture

11. Don't Keep Score

12. Desire The Best For Others

1. It’s a mindset of leaving everyone you meet and every person you lead better off than when you found them. It’s the idea of always bringing something to the table for others but doing so without expecting anything in return. High-road leadership means living a life that says “I want more for you than from you.” When you do that, you’ve made a high-road decision.

2. A high-road leader is a plus in your life, and a low-road leader is a minus in your life.

3. High-road leaders take the road less traveled.

4. High-road leaders don’t focus on the chasm between people. They focus on connection.

5. High Road leaders are aware of their humanness.

6. High-road leaders are givers.

7. High Road Leaders are connectors.

8. The rising of leadership is good leadership skills and good values. A lot of leaders have good leadership skills but not good values.

9. Leadership rises when leaders possess good leadership skills and good values. It falls when leaders’ skills or values are poor.

10. Good leaders bear the weight of responsibility for finding the best answers for any challenge or problem. They understand that neither they, their team, nor their “side” may know the best solutions.

11. If you can’t work with people who disagree with you, you will never become the leader you could be.

12. You lose the best way when you must always have your own way. If you become entrenched on one side and spend your time fighting for it, everyone eventually loses. This path of mistrust and division will never lead us anywhere we want to go. We can’t divide people and expect to accomplish positive results. Conversation and collaboration will always come up with better answers than isolation and exclusion.

13. The right values help you stop making wrong choices.

14. When you do what’s right, you’re not only taking the high road with others. You’re taking the high road with yourself.

15. The value of doing what's right outweighs the costs.

16. They want more for their people than from their people.

17. You don’t have to win every time. Just do the right things for the right reasons.

18. “Every person passing through this life will unknowingly leave something and take something away.” Robert Fulghum

1. You can have everything in life you want, if you will just help enough other people get what they want.” Zig Ziglar

2. 3 Ways to Value People:

1. Express Your Belief in Them

2. Equip Them

3. Challenge Them

3. Extend unconditional love to all people.

4. Valuing people comes from embracing their worth. Belief speaks to the potential you see in them. Unconditional love accepts others with no strings attached.

5. Valuing people is an intentional action. You must choose to value others and add value to them. It doesn’t happen without an act of will.

6. When you value all people, everybody wins.

7. The right mindset comes from recognizing the world is not about you. It’s about others.

8. How High Road Leaders Value People:

>They bring people together.

>They value all people.

>They value their humanness.

>They do the right things for the right reasons.

>They give more than they take.

>They place other people ahead of themselves and their agenda.

>They’re accountable for their actions.

>They don’t keep score.

1. Develop a humble appreciation for yourself.

2. Choose to start putting your focus on others.

3. Take action.

4. Allow room in your heart for people to grow.

5. Enjoy the positive return.

1. How are your people? Are they better or worse off as a result of your leadership?

In other words, are the people rising or falling because you are their leader?

2. Every day of your life, are you giving more than you take?

This applies to every aspect of a high-road leader’s life.

4. What can I give today?

5. How can I add value to the people who work with me?

6. How can I help others to grow and get better?

7. Whose day can I make better just by being there and giving more than I take?

1. What went wrong?

2. What went right?

3. What can I do next time to make this better?

1. Adam Grant writes, Confidence and humility are often seen as opposites. But if you reflect on the leaders you admire most, chances are that they embody both of these qualities in tandem.… Confident humility is being secure enough in your expertise and strengths to admit your ignorance and weaknesses.… Confidence without humility breeds blind arrogance, and humility without confidence yields debilitating doubt. Confident humility allows you to believe in yourself while questioning your strategies.

2. People who don’t have insight into their behavior are very difficult to change. People who have humility are generally sensitive to how they interact with others.

So, we select for it, and we also train for it, through feedback and coaching. We need people with self-awareness and humility who are open to criticism and guidance.

If they lack that openness, they won’t be very successful in leadership

1. There are two types of people – an abundance mindset and a scarcity mindset.

2. Whatever your mindset is is your world.

3. An abundance mindset has room for others.

4. It’s possible to have a scarcity mindset and do without while the person beside you has an abundance mindset and has plenty.

5. Open-Hearted Generosity: I desire to add value to others.

6. Open-Minded Generosity: I think the best of others.

7. Open-Handed Generosity: I give freely and often to others.

8. Whatever you think is going to happen.

9. A clenched hand never received anything.

1. I am an experience junkie. I like to help people enjoy the experience and evaluate the experience.

2 Evaluated experience is the best teacher… It is in the evaluation we learn.

1. The better the excuse, the worse it is because we’re more likely to let ourselves off the hook.

2. Take accountability, not being accountable.

3. Being accountable is passive. When I take accountability, I own it.

4. The quickest way to improve your life is to accountable to someone.

5. If you judge yourself by your actions, you’ll be accountable. If you judge yourself by your intentions, you won’t be accountable.

6. I’m responsible.

1. When your authentic self is flawed but operated by good values, you’re willing to share it with others.

2. The choices we make are greater than the gifts we’ve been given.

1. Mahatma Gandhi said, “A man of character will make himself worthy of any position he is given.”

2. The fastest and most proven way to bring people together in a world that divides is to find common ground.

3. One of the things all leaders have in common is their ability to see more than others see and before others see.

4. If we want to be good leaders, we must come to the table, sit in the middle without choosing a side, listen to others, and work to bring people together.

5. Approach tasks with a heart to serve and to give more than you take.

6. We need to stop trying to be right and understand what is right.

7. If you can’t work with people who disagree with you, you will never become the leader you could be.

8. When you’re not led well, you have leaders who think of themselves rather than their people.

9. There’s a significant difference between believing the other side’s ideas are wrong and believing their motives are wrong. If I think people are wrong in their opinions or ideas, I’ll be willing to engage in discussion and seek common ground.

However, if I think their motivation is wrong, I’ll draw lines, build walls, and refuse to engage in any kind of positive conversation because I believe they mean to do harm. That ends the relationship.

Are you a High Road Leader?

This sampling of quotes provides insight into what it means to be a High Road Leader.

Maxwell aims to help both new and seasoned leaders. This book provides a map to everyone who desires to become the a High Road Leader!

By embracing clear leadership styles and using Maxwell's teachings, successful people can balance their inner leader with team members' expectations.

Maxwell's lessons are not only memorable; they are life-changing. They urge leaders to view the high road as the only path to real growth and authentic leadership.

Maxwell's words shine brightly in leadership. Whether you’re new to it or revisiting wisdom from Proverbs or Dr. Seuss, they guide you on the right path.

Explore this handy guide. Let it inspire you to be a leader and a high roader with great character.

John C. Maxwell is a well-known leadership expert. He is a speaker, coach, and author. So far, he has sold over 19 million books.

Maxwell founded EQUIP and the John Maxwell Company. These organizations have trained over 5 million leaders around the globe. Every year, he speaks to Fortune 500 companies, international government leaders, and organizations as diverse as the United States Military Academy at West Point, the National Football League, and the United Nations.

Maxwell is a best-selling author, with three books selling over a million copies each.

His popular titles include:

• High Road Leadership
• The 21 Irrefutable Laws of Leadership
• Developing the Leader Within You
• The 21 Indispensable Qualities of a Leader

You can find him at JohnMaxwell.com and follow him at Twitter.com/JohnCMaxwell.

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