Reply to Dimmer LED's on gamepad?

hi, short question.
i had two 10k pots wired up to my gamepad and attached a LED between the middle leg and first leg to have them dimmer, i also had to take a ground cable to the first leg to have them shine bright. problem is, when i wire up both of them the same way the gamepad flips out for some reason, it's like it's overpwered or something. is there anyway to have the leds dimmer without having them attached to the data legs of the pots? i mean with external 5v power.
could someone sketch me something up?

thanks, jimmie