Einstein and the Alignment Principle

It’s well known that Albert Einstein developed the Theory of Relativity, which every physics student reduces to E=mc^2.
What is not as well known is that Einstein also foreshadowed the Alignment Principle.
The circumstances are these: Israel’s first president, Chaim Weizmann died in 1952. The position of president of Israel, like that of the Governor General in Canada, is mostly symbolic and ceremonial, and in the early days at least, mostly above politics. So upon Weizmann’s death, the Israeli government set out to find a candidate of high stature and world recognition to act as official head of state of the young country.
The selection committee quickly turned to Einstein, by now world famous not just for his brilliance, but for the force of his character and his lovely disposition. They offered him immediate citizenship so that he could qualify. In the opinion of the committee, he would have been the perfect choice.
But Albert Einstein knew better. Deeply touched and honoured, he nevertheless turned down the offer. “I am deeply moved by the offer from our State of Israel,” he wrote, “and at once saddened and ashamed that I cannot accept it. All my life I have dealt with objective matters, hence I lack both the natural aptitude and the experience to deal properly with people and to exercise official functions.”
Put simply, Einstein said, “I’m a numbers guy, not a people person.” While he may well have been too modest, he essentially expressed the Alignment Principle in reverse. He understood that you do your best work when you are in the place where you can fully apply your innate aptitudes, which have been shaped by experience and honed by training.
He understood that the reverse is true. No matter how clever you may be, if you don’t possess the Giftedness for the task at hand, you and everyone will be disappointed. Leave it for someone who does possess it. He turned down a great honour for which he felt he had no qualification.
In his refusal, Einstein said in essence, “I’m not your guy, because that’s not who I am.” Interestingly enough, he spoke of two of the three elements of Giftedness in the Alignment Principle– natural aptitude and experience.
Perhaps because we’re not as clever as Einstein, many of us today continue to struggle in our professional lives, enduring an unsatisfying grind and accepting results far less than those we should enjoy. And at the same time, our clients, our families, and our world are not receiving the benefit and the blessing which we were meant to shower upon them.
Why? Because we aren’t living within the Alignment Principle, the concept that we become everything we were meant to be when we live within our Giftedness, that is, the living out of our unique innate attributes, shaped by experience, and honed by training.
When you play the right game on the wrong field, you lose. When you play the right game on the right field, you win.