Google announced today a donation of $11.5 million to help combat slavery in the world. That’s right, slavery. The announcement included the estimate of 27 million people around the world right now who live in some form of slavery.

Think our world is so much better than before? Think progress is so clear-cut from earlier generations to our own? Think you and I have cornered the market on wisdom, knowledge, and the rest?

Think again.

We’re living in and with and through stuff that has all happened before and continues to happen over and over. That’s not cause for despair or hopelessness. It’s cause for sober reflection, for a stronger understanding of reality, and for an acceptance and embrace of blending between past, present, and future.

Your leadership must be rooted every day in the unwalled mix of was, is, and will. Your leadership will improve if you take stock of the power within all three forms of time.

The River rolls ahead.