The Coach Who Changed How I Lead | A Tribute to Ola Sage
A reflection on independence, leadership, and the coach who taught me how to listen better, ask deeper questions, and build something bigger than myself.
TABLE OF CONTENTS
I Don’t Recognize America Anymore
A reflection on power, anonymity, and the quiet erosion of due process
I watched the video more than once because I could not believe what I was seeing. I kept looking for something I had missed, some detail that would make it make sense. There wasn’t one. What frightened me wasn’t just the violence, but the realization that this is what America has become. Seven agents surrounding one man. Ten shots fired. No trial. No charges. No due process. Just a body in the street, and a story afterward that “officially” told us to pretend this was something else.
What I see now looks less like law enforcement and more like coercion — force backed by the state and shielded by anonymity. When faces disappear behind masks, responsibility does too. For a country founded on the idea of inalienable rights, it feels like we’ve quietly turned our backs on them.
Equipment carries intent. Showing up at a door with suppressors mounted on your weapons means you are already prepared to shoot inside a home. Once that ending is imagined, it becomes far more likely to occur.
The feeling underneath it all is simple and chilling: What are you going to do about it? When one side carries overwhelming power and the other has none, that question doesn’t need to be spoken to be understood.
That’s what frightens me most. Not just the force itself, but the quiet certainty that comes with it — the sense that ordinary people are meant to feel small, compliant, and alone. That’s a long way from a country built on the idea that power ultimately rests with its citizens.
I served in the military because I wanted to. I proudly served through the election of our first African-American president. I remember the days after September 11, when strangers spoke to each other differently, when the word we still meant something. This feels nothing like that. What I see now — the force, the lies, the readiness for violence — doesn’t resemble the country I believed in. And I don’t know what to do with that realization except name it.
“Know what’s enough. Build what matters.”
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