Some strengths are planted for the future and lie unused until hard times call for them. They are not meant to flower while things are going well and enough supports are already in place, but 'when the people are troubled and it is most needed.' A community's renewal can depend on resources set aside long before anyone knew they would be needed.
When a role may pass only to one kind of heir, the community can end up with no heir at all while a capable successor stands unnoticed. The keeper of the rule, set on finding the 'right' successor, cannot see the one already in front of him. Clinging to the form of a tradition can be the very thing that threatens its survival.
A person shut out by the rules can win the role by doing what the crisis demands when the official candidates fail. Proof given at the moment of greatest need settles the question of who should lead in a way no rule of succession can. Acting to save others is what turns a would-be leader into an accepted one.
When one leader regains hope and purpose, the feeling spreads outward and lifts the whole group that depends on him. A people's ties to their land, their animals and their ancestors are bound up together, so mending the leader's link helps mend the whole community. The fate of the leader and the fate of the followers rise and fall together.