Ethics & Launching Leaders

MOVING FORWARD

    This week I was able to finish the book Mastery by George Leonard, in this book I was constantly reminded of the movie The Karate Kid. My mind was constantly drawn to the part where the main character Daniel LaRusso is being mentored by Mr. Miyagi, and he has to paint the fence and wax the car. Daniel is wondering why he has to do all this repetitive work, because he just wants to know when he's going to learn how to defend himself from the schools bullies. He want's to learn Karate! Well to learn the art of Karate it takes hours, months and years of practice.

    In the world we live in we want it now, whatever it is, we don't care or even comprehend how many hours somebody puts into become great at their sport, we want it now. Like right now! Daniel LaRusso wanted it now, but through patience and learning the basics he was able to become great at Karate and beat the school bully at a Karate tournament.

    In this book Mastery by George Leonard talks about us being on these plateaus where we're putting in hours and hours of hard work and practice and it seems like we're getting nowhere. However, through long hours, month's and years of practice we finally make a break-through where we make a short climb upward where we end on another plateau and do the same thing over and over again until we reach the mastery level. There are 5 keys that you need to use to become a master, and due to lack of time, I'll let you read the book for yourself to discover how YOU need to unlock the doors of mastery using the 5 keys.

    Part of the process of becoming a master is the process of moving forward. This week I learned that part of that process includes using the 7 Habits of Highly Effective People, made famous by Stephen Covey. One habit I want to talk about that will keep me (and possibly you) moving forward is Habit 2. That habit is called Begin With The End In Mind. Why do I want to begin with the end in mind? Why would this keep a guy like me moving forward? The reason why you want to begin with the end in mind is so you know what target your trying to hit. You need to know what the ultimate goal will be, so you know where your going. If you were to get in your car and go for a "drive" you could end up anywhere, but because most of us get in our car with an end destination in our minds, that's where we end up. Sure we might have minor detours to get fuel, or pay some bills, but we ultimately end up at our ultimate destination. The same thing is true for our journey's we need to begin with the end in mind, in our personal and professional lives. The reason this keeps a guy moving forward is because although we have the end in mind, we also need to set smaller targets on our way to the big target. The reason we do this is to refocus if we get off course, have a back up plan to get to our ultimate destination so if we get thrown off course we don't just give up and go home. 

    A couple of years ago I had a day off work and my wife invited me to go to the pool with her during open lap swim. I hadn't swam laps for years but I thought sure, I'll do that! I got in the pool confidently in a lane beside my wife (who was a state swimming competitor and for our purposes here is the master) and before I knew it she was more than half way across the pool and I hadn't even launched away from the pool. I started "swimming" and I thought I had to be getting close to the other side of the pool and I looked over and I was not even moving I hadn't made it 10 feet from the side of the pool. My wife passed me up five times before I made it to the other side of the pool choking on water. The life guard came up to me and said there were paddle boards and flippers to use if I wanted them. I took her up on the paddle board but declined the flippers. I jumped in the pool and I launched off the side of the pool with excitement that I was going to be across the pool in to time at all, However, I looked over and I was in the middle of the pool and I was barely moving at all but kicking with all my might. When I reached the end of the pool, I jumped out, and went and got the flippers on and kept the paddle board. I jumped back in the pool and I was finally going places. I wasn't keeping up with my wife, which by now had probably swam 50 laps, but I was actually moving at a noticeable pace, I was finally moving forward. My point of telling you this, is that I had to take some side detours to get tooled up to get where I wanted to be at a good pace so I wasn't just treading water. So I had my small victories in this case more public that personal because they were all probably saying "that poor old man" or just laughing, but the lifeguard offered me tools which I took, slowly but surely. So don't let the detours get you down and know where you are aiming for. Don't tread water because your too prideful to use the tools available to you to get where your going and know your destination.

If we don't hit pause every now and to look at what we've learned and where we are, to make sure we're progressing and not just treading water, and thank Heavenly Father and those around us we could be completely off course if we don't have those small personal and sometimes public victories on our way to our ending target.

So the main lessons I want you to take with you this week is to become a master, but don't forget it's going to take practice, lots and lots of practice to become a master. Michael Jordan was cut from his High School Basketball team, but he didn't give up, he practiced day in and day out to become a master. Also remember to begin with the end in mind, keep your eye on the target and if the target moves you need to move as well so you can hit that target. If you continue to do just these two simple things you'll continue moving forward.