Leadership - our responsability

Welcome back!

leadership-missing-piece-2-red Dear Readers,

A few weeks have now passed since the new year began. Probably – like many others – you have resolved to do some things in 2009. In the meantime the daily grind has caught up with you again. Let us take the opportunity together to think about what has become of your resolutions. For this purpose I would like to ask you some specific questions. Questions that I ask myself again and again. Before we come to that I invite you to consider some fundamental ideas.

Our lives

You will probably agree with me that an important purpose of our lives is to leave the world a little bit better than we found it. For this and other tasks we have through the social revolutions of the last 30 years received an unimaginable abundance of new liberties. For some of us this new freedom is exciting; for others it means dreadful insecurity. I believe that the great losers of the new unbelievable liberties on offer are particularly those who misuse their freedom to avoid responsibility and a sense of duty. And so our world has not in every aspect become better as a result of freedom. In addition for many it does not appears to have become easier to find their own way. Max Frisch said: “We can now do what we want, and the only question is what do we want? Many people have neither the knowledge nor the initiative nor the will to answer this question.”

These days we speak a lot about Immanuel Kant. The philosopher was one of the decisive forerunners of our current systems. We should not forget that he repeatedly pointed to a certain connection between what we can expect (freedom, to choose our life sense) and what is expected of us (as part of society). This balance postulated by Kant is in my opinion in danger of being forgotten as a result of Siegmund Freud. Essentially Freud maintained that today we are what we have become. And that we can now change only very little in this situation. This way of thinking means, when translated for our lives: “If you do not feel responsibility for others and for society you need not feel guilty. Relax because you are just what you are. You have no other choice.“

The danger of determinism

I am neither competent nor qualified to discuss Freud‘s theory in detail. But allow me just one remark: I believe that this determinism is dangerous. This way of thinking can too easily be misinterpreted become a free ticket for a dangerous form of selfishness and thus a recipe for an immoral society. In this I prefer to follow Jean Jacques Rousseau, who once said: “There is one quality which distinguishes human beings from one another: this is the faculty of selfimprovement.” I would hold that life is quite unimportant if it were not for our ability to influence out development and that of others. I also simply want to believe that I can change the world a little, at least on the small scale.

My experience

In the years after I graduated from secondary school I spent my time being somebody other than who I really am. I wanted to be so many things, to move great things and involved myself in many different fields… In fact it always became very quickly clear that although I had a certain ability it would never be sufficient to be really successful in this field and, above all, to make myself happy. However, that did not stop me from continuing to try. In this way disappointment was inevitable. The problem here: by trying to become somebody else failed to concentrate on the person I can really be. In retrospect I was only hiding myself from myself. I was a slave of the system instead of being master of my own life.

Learning from experience…

Now it is easy to look back on this from my present situation. When you are in the situation yourself things are usually not so clear. We probably have to jump in before we can learn to swim.. Perhaps I simply had to try out certain things… but we do not have to do that all our lives. Because we have the ability to learn. From a certain age we simply have the experience of the past years. We cannot always act as if we are just 20. Increasingly life becomes an opportunity to make the best of ourselves. The opportunity lies in the fact that we increasingly come to know who we really are. And so we can become the person we could be!

Just imagine you could meet the person you could once have become. How much would this person be like you? What differences would there be? What course can you set differently today to become more like this person? Even if I am not very religious one part of the Bible has fascinated me. It is a text from the Book of Revelation: “To him that overcometh… I… will give him a white stone, and in that stone a new name written…” For me this means: If we overcome the temptation to be somebody other than we really are, if we do not fall into the trap of wanting to be successful in the eyes of others, then we can discover our real selves.

The White Stone

Life is a search for the White Stone. The new name stands for our real (new) identity. Rachel Lindsey said: “The tragedy is not death. The tragedy is to die with commitments undefined, with convictions undeclared and with service unfulfilled.” These three concepts are for me the embodiment of the White Stone:

1. Entering commitments

2. Defining and representing convictions

3. Providing services for others

All that assumes that we know ourselves, our talents, values and tasks. The Aborigines in Australia say: “You must become the change you would like to see in the world.” I believe, in this sense, there are no limits to our personal growth – while we are searching for our White Stone.

Day-to-day business

These and similar thoughts appear repeatedly from time to time on the surface of our everyday life. Too often they are suppressed by so-called necessity. Can it be that in this way we also at the same time suppress our own happiness? Many companies have gone over to having their mission statements (what the company stands for) written by so-called strategy consultants. In my opinion that cannot work. There are things a company has to do itself. And there are also things a person must do himself. For example, we cannot ask others what our White Stone might look like. That would COLUMN be a bit like asking a psycho-analyst to tell us who we are.

No, we should neither suppress the essential questions of life nor should we allow others to answer them for us. In general when we are searching for the White Stone we should not look at others too much. On of the greatest traps of day-to-day business is the desire to compare yourself with others. Ultimately human beings also compare their “being” with that of others. At the same time it is never a matter in life of comparing ourselves with others, but only of comparing ourselves with the people we could be. Here I like the image of a marathon: Everybody who completes the run is a winner. The runners in a marathon only ever run against themselves. They improve the standard they have set for themselves.

If you have some time think unhurriedly about the following questions for a while:

Do I really live true freedom? (Or am I trying to be somebody that is not really me; am trying to please others – which is something that can never really succeed?)
Am I aware that I can fell good at any time? That problems have advantages. That phases of weakness are only overdue phases of rest?
Do I experience life as a game? A game in which I do not take myself too seriously. In which I do not demand respect and fairness from others and thus make my well-being dependent on others?
Am I giving my best to every task (Only in this way can I really have fun)? Do In think periodically about Pareto‘s 20:80 Rule?
How often do I really leave my comfort zone? Do I play so as not to lose or do I play to win?
What about my sustaining delusions? Am I aware that everything either brings my goals nearer of takes me further away from them? What conclusions do I draw from this?
Do I really have to do everything that I do myself at the moment? What was the last thing I did myself?
Have I scheduled enough time for breaks, holidays, magic moments, people I love, the search for the White Stone, projects that are not urgent but are important to fulfill dreams, to just do nothing at all for once (without feeling guilty)?
Do the people I meet regularly inspire me? Do they give me energy or are they energy leeches? How can I surround myself even more with people who inspire me and from whom I can learn?
How susceptible am I to criticism? How much do I give other people power over my life?
Do I take the freedom to carry out mental simulations? Am I aware that I am not of necessity welded to one single activity? When did I last sketch a completely new life in my thoughts?
How helpful am I to others? Do I propagate good humor? Do I strengthen others? Do I give others joy?
Do I wish the very best for the people round me and bless them in my thoughts?
Am I aware that with all my noble resolutions and while searching for the White Stone I could also earn ten times as much without feeling guilty? Am I innovative and flexible enough to think of ways that would increase my income tenfold? Do I believe that I can also perform a quantum leap professionally in my life?
What does my personal growth really look like? Am I reading enough books, am I writing diaries, do I meet wise people periodically? (Or do I still own a television remote control that I still use to much from time to time?)
Do I love what I am doing? In my job can I bring in every day at least 80% of what I can bring in at my best?
Am I behaving wisely? Do I get into negativity? Am I able to respond to criticism with praise? Do I treat other people respectfully because I see in them the person they could be?

Certainly we could deal with a whole lot of other groups of questions. I have at present 78 questions I ask my self periodically – as required. These questions are my taskmaster, coach, critical observer, living admonisher and helper. Perhaps you wish to understand and use them in this sense, too.

Really impossible?

All the ideas we are considering together in this article can find their conclusion in one single word: the word “impossible.” Every notional freedom comes to an abrupt end with this word. Every step forward is immediately buried. Every opportunity for growth is immediately smothered. Mohammed Ali said again and again: “Impossible is nothing.” And this slogan was adopted by his daughter as her own. She wanted to be a boxer, although there was no real market for it. Against the Advice of her father. Against the arguments of her friends. I would like quote what Mohammed Ali‘s daughter Laila said about the word “impossible.” Not because I want to defend women‘s boxing, but because I think that hardly anybody has dealt with the word “impossible” so well: “Impossible is a big word thrown around by small men who find it easier to live in the world they‘ve been given than to explore the power they have to change it. Impossible is not a fact. It‘s an opinion. Impossible is not a declaration. It‘s a dare. Impossible is potential. Impossible is temporary. Impossible is nothing.” In this spirit I would like to end this article. Everything in your life is possible as long as you believe it is possible. I wish you every fulfillment, happiness and peace in your search for your White Stone.

Kindest regards,

Your Coach Nuno F. Assis