Why are very few people leaders? Many people are
followers in general and in most all aspects of life. Many
seem to follow others, much like all the mice that fall in line
to follow behind the Pied Piper.
I believe many people are too shy to lead, in whatever
situation they are in. The average person, when entering
a department store, will follow the person who previously
entered the store. People will follow other people through
the same exact door, no matter that other doors are more
accessible. People tend to follow the path of a predecessor.
People do the same thing because it’s easier that way. It takes
more commitment, work, and determination to find and to
independently accomplish something new and better.
In a casino, if there is an empty roulette or blackjack
table, people will usually walk right by it. But as soon as
one person sits down at the table, it’s amazing how the table
fills up with new people following the lead of the person
who first sat down. Why? Maybe people think that they
would miss out on something good, so they join the lone
player.
It has been known that in the former Soviet Union,
people were so used to standing on line that, once a line
formed, other people automatically joined on the long line.
They didn’t want to miss out on whatever was for sale.
Who can be the leader of the pack? Anyone. With just
a little imagination and determination, anyone can come up
with new ideas to lead the way.
Remember, many people we know will be the followers,
and will expect us to follow the followers also. I’m in no way
saying this to degrade or make fun of people, but merely to
bring out a point of truth. The average person is often not
aware of the strong urge to “follow the crowd.”
self improvement
self improvement
Be unique. Be different. Stop following the crowd.
Listen for the sound of that distant drum. The successful
person and the average person approach life differently.
The average person, it seems to me, likes to take the easy
way out. It’s almost as if the average person wants to get
through work just to rush home to do very little, or nothing
at all.
Television is often a thief of your time and can easily be
the source of your losing 15 minutes a day that could be used
to accomplish more worthwhile goals. Perhaps watching
one less television show will create better opportunities for
yourself. Why watch other people become successful when
you can apply yourself to those extra 15 minutes every
day?
People can too often fail because they do not “stay
focused.” Remember that staying focused on the small
goals is the way you accomplish the final goal. Think for
a moment about a movie camera. Until the lens focuses
on a particular object, everything is blurry. Although you
may want to accomplish many different things in unrelated
fields, you may be dabbling in many fields at the same time
and not putting enough energy into one goal.
Instead, remain focused, as if you are trying to line up
a photo of a rose, capturing it in sharp detail. The camera
lens has to stay focused or everything becomes blurry.
You must stay focused and not try to do everything at
once. To hit a home run in baseball, you must have the bat
make contact with the baseball at precisely the right part
of the bat, hitting the right part of the ball exactly with the
right force of the swing. Any deviation from these elements
can result in a complete miss or a pop-up. It takes minute
differences to hit the ball just right for a home run.
Focus. You may find it hard to stay focused at first.
Remember this rule: a new habit takes about three weeks
to form.
In a 1985 monthly publication of Insight, there is an
article about Andrew Carnegie, the great steel maker, who
was asked by a reporter, “How is it possible to have 43
millionaires working for you at the same time?”
Mr. Carnegie answered, “They weren’t millionaires
when they started working for me.” The reporter asked,
“Well, what happened?” Mr. Carnegie replied, “We believe
in rewarding excellence in performance, and these men have
developed themselves to the degree that they have become
millionaires.”
The reporter asked, “How do you develop so many
people?”
Andrew Carnegie replied this way: “I develop men
exactly the same way you mine gold. In order to get an
ounce of gold, you move tons and tons of dirt. But you don’t
go looking for the dirt; you go looking for the gold.”
When interviewed by Success Magazine in 1898
Thomas Edison was asked, “What’s the first requisite for
success?” And Edison answered this way: “The ability to
apply your physical and mental energies to one problem
incessantly without growing weary. You do something all
day long, don’t you? Everyone does. If you get up at 7 A.M.
and go to bed at 11 P.M., you have put in 16 good hours,
and it is certain with most men that they have been doing
something all the time. The only trouble is that they do it
about a great many things and I do it about one. If they took
the time in question and applied it in one direction, to one
object they would succeed.”
self improvement
self improvement
To accomplish more of your personal goals, whether
writing, reading, painting, participating in sports, or
exercising, you can start by thinking of giving yourself
more time in small amounts and forgetting about trying to
give the world all your time.
Consider the importance of a 15-minute block of time
a day to do something meaningful for yourself. Those
“extra” 15 minutes a day would amount to 105 minutes, or
1 3/4 hours a week. If you continue squeezing out those 15
minutes a day, they would equal more than 7 hours a month
and more than 91 hours a year. What could you accomplish
with your “extra” 91 hours per year?
You could have jogged approximately 350 miles in that
year, read approximately 10 new books, or taken a course.
You could have prepared for an entirely new field of work
or a great new hobby.
It’s a lot easier than you think to capture these valuable
15 minutes a day. How you use your time determines what
you accomplish in life.
If you allow eight hours sleeping, you are left with 16
hours for working and thinking. And of these 16 hours,
you have to allow time for travel, eating, and socializing.
If budgeted properly, you can squeeze out that extra 15
minutes a day that you can call “your time.”
Suppose you have been given a $10,000.00 fee as a “time
consultant” whose job it is to find those extra 15 minutes
every day that can be your time. For the $10,000.00, you
can start to write down the wasted minutes. Where are the
wasted minutes every day?
Here are some ideas: Can you take a more direct route
to work that would give you extra time? Can you take 15
minutes less for lunch? Can you get up 15 minutes earlier to
accomplish something? Can you have a lighter dinner that
would free up those 15 extra minutes at night?
Once you figure out how to capture that little block of
time, you can write the findings down and make 10 copies
of how you will always give yourself an extra 15 minutes
per day. You can be persistent in finding those extra 15
minutes, so you can keep reminding yourself that these are
your “new” minutes for you to accomplish something new.
The second step requires that you write down what you
want to accomplish in those 15 minutes.
A good habit will take approximately 20 days to
form. Your new block of time will change your life, if you
accomplish something greater in those 15 minutes!
If a man does not keep pace with his
companions, perhaps it is because he
hears a different drummer.
Let him step to the music which he hears, however
measured or far away.
–Henry David Thoreau
Author/Naturalist
(1817-1862)
self improvement
self improvement