Good Morning,
Welcome New Recipients!
My latest read is ‘The Ant and the Elephant’ by Vincent Poscente (http://www.beinvincible.com/). This is a parable about Leadership For The Self depicting an Ant, Adir, and the elephant, Elgo, that he lives on. The elephant is two million times the size of the ant, and yet the ant can communicate with the elephant, motivate and lead him. The ant represents our conscious mind and thought, and the elephant represents our subconscious mind and thought.
I really like the concept of learning to lead yourself. There are many books on leadership and what leadership is, what leaders do, but just reading these books does not make someone a great leader. They may have a lot of knowledge, but unless they can lead themselves, others will not follow them. A leader has to be emulate being someone that others will be willing to follow. Such is the case in this book where the ant who was a failed leader in his ant colony must first learn to lead himself before he can get others to follow him.
Throughout the story, Adir, the ant learns five steps to leading himself which then helps him lead Elgo, his elephant. The five action steps to leading oneself are listed as the five ‘C’s’:
Clarity of Vision: Not only do we have to know where we want to go, we have to understand more than just basic information about our goal. What will it look like when we get there, how will it feel, what would we do when we achieve our vision? In other words, visualize our vision.
Commitment: We must focus our mind on positive thoughts to achieve our vision. When we feel down or think that we can’t, we have to change those thoughts to positive thoughts. We must catch ourselves and right ourselves with positive thoughts. We must make a commitment to ourselves that we will stay on course and work to remain positive. It does get easier over time. I can attest to this.
Consistency: This is probably the hardest part in our world of instant gratification. Sticking to it as ‘change’ does not always happen overnight, or sometimes over a year. If we are truly determined to achieve our vision, we need to make a commitment to both ourselves and to achieving our mission. It can be difficult, but the fruits often outweigh the struggles. The author uses an analogy of a large vat of water, and dropping one drop of blue dye into it each day, and keep doing it until the large vat of water is blue. At first you barely notice the blue tinge, but over time it does become blue.
Confidence: Here we have to believe in ourselves and break old patterns of behavior which hinder our success. If we easily are deterred, we need to stop and think about our vision and what it would be like when we already have achieved it. We build confidence in ourselves by removing or changing patterns in ourselves which cause us to lose confidence. Take baby steps and celebrate little successes and our confidence will improve and stand up better to the bigger challenges.
Control: Practice responses to the unknown and difficult situations. Role-play challenges to build up our skills in dealing with tough situations. Sure it is not like the real thing, but it eliminates a lot of the fear and surprise when something bad happens and we know what to do about it. Disaster Recovery Plans are made up of this, like fire drills and other drills. We practice to be prepared for the unexpected. The key, according to the author, is to think up the worst things that can happen, put them on flashcards and role-play through them.
As you can see, each of these steps helps someone in pretty much any area of their lives. The first step is becoming a leader to yourself.
I enjoyed the book and look forward to other Vincent Poscente books.
Enjoy!
http://sanfordberenberg.blogspot.com/
502-533-9336
PS: If you know others who may enjoy this message of the day, please pass this message on or invite them to receive them themselves by sending a request to me. If you wish to stop receiving these, please also let me know. Thank you!!!
Posts
No comments:
Post a Comment