On June 23, 2016, I stood on a stage at the Bahrain Society of Engineers, Bahrain, holding three white towels.

The hall was packed.  Eight speakers had gathered for a tribute event titled Muhammad Ali: The Voice of Peace and Love.  The event was curated by Y-Access, a company founded by my longtime friend and fellow international speaker, Mohamed Ali Shukri.  The Greatest had died twenty days earlier, and no one in that room was over it.  The energy filled the biggest hall in the building and more.  No one wanted to leave that night.

I held up the first towel.  I told the audience, “You can throw this one away.”  It means you gave up.

I held up the second towel.  I said, “You can pass this one to someone who needs it.”  To wipe the sweat.  To wipe the blood.

I held up the third towel.  I said: This one, I keep for myself.  For when I need it.

Three towels.  Three choices every leader faces.  And Muhammad Ali’s life illustrates all three.

Towel One: The One You Throw Away

In boxing, the white towel is the universal symbol of surrender.  When a corner throws it into the ring, the fight is over.  The fighter is done.

On April 28, 1967, the most famous athlete on the planet was asked to throw his towel.

Muhammad Ali, the reigning heavyweight champion of the world, refused to be drafted into the United States military during the Vietnam War.  He showed up at the induction center in Houston.  His name was called.  He did not step forward.  It was called again.  He stood still.  A third time.  Nothing.  An officer warned him that he was committing a felony punishable by five years in prison and a $10,000 fine.  Ali did not move.

That same day, the New York State Athletic Commission suspended his boxing license.  The World Boxing Association stripped him of his title.  He was 25 years old, at the absolute peak of his powers, and he lost everything in a single afternoon.

Think about that for a moment.  He could have complied.  He could have served quietly, returned to boxing, and resumed his career with his earnings, his title, and his reputation intact.  The easier path was right in front of him.  He chose the harder one.

Ali did not fight again for over three years.  Three and a half years of his athletic prime, gone.  Not because he lost a fight, but because he refused to abandon his principles.

Leadership Lesson # 1:  How many executives throw their towel every day without realizing it?  They compromise a value to protect a title.  They stay silent in a meeting when they know something is wrong.  They sign off on a decision they disagree with because the cost of speaking up feels too high.  Every time you say yes when your conscience says no, you are throwing the towel.  Ali’s message was simple: the towel stays in your hand until you decide to let it go.  Not your boss.  Not your board.  Not the crowd.

Towel Two: The One You Pass to Someone Else

On July 19, 1996, three billion people watched a man with trembling hands light the Olympic cauldron in Atlanta.

Ali had been diagnosed with Parkinson’s disease twelve years earlier.  The athlete who once moved faster than any heavyweight in history could barely hold the torch steady.  Swimmer Janet Evans passed him the flame, and for a few agonizing seconds, it looked like the fire might burn his arms before the mechanism caught.  The stadium held its breath.

Then the cauldron lit.  And the crowd erupted: Ali, Ali, Ali.

That moment was not about glory.  It was about service.  Ali spent the final three decades of his life passing towels.  He co-founded the Muhammad Ali Parkinson Center in Phoenix.  He traveled to Iraq in 1990 and negotiated the release of fifteen American hostages.  He became a United Nations Messenger of Peace.  He received the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 2005.  And in that stadium in Atlanta, he held a flame for the world, not for himself.

At our tribute event in Bahrain, the proceeds supported people with special needs.  That was Ali’s fingerprint, even in death.  The event was never about remembering a boxer.  It was about continuing what he started.

Leadership Lesson # 2: The best leaders are not the ones who hold on to everything.  They are the ones who pass the towel.  They mentor the person behind them.  They fund the cause that outlives them.  They share credit, knowledge, and opportunity.  When you pass your towel to someone who needs it, you do not lose anything.  You multiply.

Towel Three: The One You Keep for Yourself

In 1964, Cassius Marcellus Clay Jr. became Muhammad Ali.

The backlash was ferocious.  Sportswriters refused to use his new name for years.  The establishment mocked him.  Fans turned against him.  But Ali never wavered.  His name was not a brand exercise or a publicity stunt.  It was his identity.  His faith.  His truth.

When the court convicted him of refusing the draft, the official record read “Clay v. United States.”  They would not even grant him his name in their paperwork.  It did not matter.  The world knew who he was.  And on June 28, 1971, the Supreme Court unanimously overturned his conviction.

Ali kept one towel for himself.  His identity.  His values.  His sense of who he was, regardless of what the world demanded he become.  He never traded that towel for applause, for money, or for an easier life.

Leadership Lesson # 3: Leaders who give everything away eventually have nothing left to lead with.  You need a towel; you do not hand it over.  Your non-negotiable.  The principle you protect even when protecting it costs you.  For Ali, it was his faith and his name.  For you, it might be your integrity, your word, or the standard you refuse to lower, no matter how much pressure comes from above.  Without that towel, you are performing leadership.  You are not practicing it.

Ali visited Bahrain once, in 1972, on a stopover during his pilgrimage to Hajj.  Hundreds of fans greeted him at the airport.  Senior officials received him.  Forty-four years later, eight speakers stood in a hall in Juffair, Bahrain, and tried to put into words what he meant to the world.

I do not remember everything I said that night.  But ten years later, I still remember the three towels in my hands.  And I still remember the question I left the audience with.

It is the same question I leave you with now.

Which towel are you holding?

Mohamed Isa is a 5-Time Amazon Bestselling Author, former executive, and Leadership Keynote Speaker who shares leadership lessons from mountaineering.  He is currently pursuing his PhD at Kathmandu University.