The Stuff That Really Matters Most: Character

Have you ever read To Kill A Mocking Bird by Harper Lee? One teacher I've met uses this book to teach character to his students. As you may recall, one of the main characters in the book, the father, Atticus Finch, is a lawyer and must defend a black man accused of raping a white girl. Everyone in town, including his children, constantly ask him why he would do this. And his answer is the simple, "Because its the right thing to do." When his son finally understands this, that his father has a code of conduct that he lives by, no matter what the situation, the son runs down the street shouting, "Atticus Finch is a gentleman, and so am I."

That code of conduct is what I look for in character, a personal code of behavior that you follow under any set of circumstances.

Lawrence Kohlberg describes Six Levels of Moral Development:

Level I: I Don’t Want to Get in Trouble

Level II: I Want a Reward

Level III: I Want to Please Somebody

Level IV: I Follow the Rules

Level V: I Am Considerate of Others

Level VI: I Have a Personal Code of Behavior and I Follow It (Atticus Finch Behavior)

Where are you on these six levels? Have you developed a  personal code of behavior? We all have something. Is it one that you really want? Do you follow it always?

Something to think about. Somewhere to go.

The Stuff That Really Matters Most: Attitude

Attitude remains the most powerful tool in the world. You can change your world by changing your attitude. So, be the change you want to see in the world. Change your attitude and the world changes.

Here are a collection of quotes on attitude that really move me.

"People can alter their lives by altering their attitudes. " William James

"I have come to the frightening conclusion that I am the decisive element. It is my personal approach that creates the climate. It is my daily mood that makes the weather. I possess tremendous power to make life miserable or joyous. I can be a tool of torture or an instrument of inspiration, I can humiliate or humor, hurt or heal. In all situations, it is my response that decides whether a crisis is escalated or de-escalated, and a person is humanized or de-humanized. If we treat people as they are, we make them worse. If we treat people as they ought to be, we help them become what they are capable of becoming.” ― Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

“The last and ultimate freedom is to choose your attitude under any circumstances” – Victor Frankl

“Any fact facing us is not as important as our attitude toward it, for that determines our success or failure.” ~Norman Vincent Peale

“Why should we worry about what others think of us, do we have more confidence in their opinions than we do our own?” ~Brigham Young

“Could we change our attitude, we should not only see life differently, but life itself would come to be different.” ~Katherine Mansfield

"A pound of pluck is worth a ton of luck." - James A. Garfield

"If the wind will not serve, take to the oars."  "Destitutus ventis, remos adhibe" - Latin Proverb

“The key to success is to determine what it is that you most enjoy doing, and then find a way to make a good living doing it.” ~Napoleon Hill

‎"Ability is what you're capable of doing. Motivation determines what you do. Attitude determines how well you do it." ~Lou Holtz

“Heaven on earth is a choice you must make, not a place we must find.” ~Wayne Dyer

“Never tell me the sky's the limit when there are footprints on the moon.” Joshua Hatch

  

“If you think you are too small to make a difference, try sleeping with a mosquito.” ~African Proverb

“Out of clutter, find simplicity. From discord, find harmony. In the middle of difficulty lies opportunity.” ~Albert Einstein

The Stuff That Really Matters Most: Talents, Skills, Gifts

Talent is God's gift to you. What you do with your talent is your gift to God. -- Leo Buscalia

We're all trying to fix our weaknesses. Instead take care of your weaknesses, mitigate them, and then use and build on your strengths. Use your strengths. But how do I know I know what my strengths, talents and skills are? Make a list of everything you've ever done that:

• Is so easy that you take it for granted

• You have a hard time accepting compliments because it’s so easy

• You experience joy and satisfaction when doing it

• Everyone respects you for it naturally

• You don’t understand when others have a hard time doing it

These things are your talents, your strengths and your gifts. Run with them. Use them. Focus on them, not on your weaknesses.

Identify your talents today and use them everyday. See if that makes a huge difference in what you accomplish and how you feel about yourself and those around you.

The Stuff That Really Matters Most: Knowledge

Have you ever met a genius? 

You know, that girl who assigned herself homework over the summer break; the kid in high school who read the encyclopedia for fun; that nerd in college who read physics textbooks like they were novels; that business owner who always came up with cool new innovative products.

Let me tell you about a genius. She’s a world-class gymnast. She learned a new language and speaks the local dialect with a perfect accent. She’s an accomplished experimental scientist in both physics and chemistry. She’s a skilled mathematician with great skills in logic. She’s a powerful, influential negotiator, psychologist, and strategist.

Does this sound familiar? That describes each of you. Think about all of the things that you learned as a small child. Did you know who had the biggest bowl of ice cream or the most cookies? Did you experiment with gravity and the chemistry of food from your high chair, much to your parent’s chagrin? Did you know how to influence people to get what you wanted? Did you successfully learn to play games with complex strategies? If you think learning how to walk is easy, just talk with someone who lost that ability and is working on relearning it.

Psychologists tell us that you learned 90% of what you know before the age of six. And then we sent you to school to make sure it never happened again. And most of us never recover from this school induced coma.

We are all born geniuses, we've been de-genius-ized by school and by life. So go out and rediscover your genius today!

The Stuff That Really Matters Most: Relationships

We can all quote the proverb, "It’s not what you know, it’s who you know and who knows you."

Stephen R Covey in his Seven Habits book teaches how to develop these relationships with Habit 5, "Seek to understand, then to be understood.

In To Kill a Mockingbird Harper Lee uses the character Atticus Finch to share a great truth about relationships, "You never really understand a person until you consider things from his point of view ... until you climb inside his skin and walk around in it."

Dale Carnegie in How to Win Friends and Influence People describes some simple yet tools to help build relationships. Give honest and sincere appreciation. Become genuinely interested in other people. Be a good listener. Remember and use their name.

These simple ideas produce powerful results. Its all about personal relationships, at home, at work and in your community.

The Stuff That Really Matters Most: Time

"Time is the coin of your life. It is the only coin you have, and only you can determine how it will be spent. Be careful lest you let other people spend it for you." - Carl Sandburg

We all have the same 525,600 minutes each year. But you choose what you do with those minutes. Do you chose to spend them staring at a screen while someone else decides what you see and can easily dish you up a plate full of garbage? Or do you choose to use your time profitably? For something awesome? Making a change in the world?

Simply ask yourself, "What is the best use of my time, right now?" Then act accordingly.

As Gandolf said in Lord of the Rings, "What you have to do is decide what you are going to do with the time you have been given."

The Stuff That Really Matters Most

Too soon old, too late smart. I'm writing here today to share an atom of wisdom, gleaned from nearly three score years of living. Someone told me that we learn the most from our mistakes.

A foolish man never learns from his mistakes.
A smart man learns from his mistakes.
A wise man learns from others mistakes.

Henry Ford explains that "Those who never make mistakes work for those of us who do."

We learn best from our mistakes. But we don't have time to make every mistake, so please learn from mine and from those people much wiser than I.

Success leaves clues, according to Tony Robbins. Have you ever noticed that many counterfeits of success litter our way? I found a fabulous tool to help me. Take the counterfeit and find the real gem it seeks to imitate.

The world today will tell you that its all about money. "Show me the money."
"You can buy anything with money." That is the counterfeit.

The truth is that money can't buy ... . You fill in the blank. This became a shining clue to me. The things that really matter most are things that money cannot buy.

So, I ask you this question, "What do you want in life? What do you really want?" A very wise man said, "Man is that he might have joy."

So, how do we get joy? Using the clue "money can't buy ..." I identified seven things that you will find bring the greatest joy.

Here they are:

• Time
• Relationships
• Knowledge & Wisdom
• Talents, Skills & Gifts
• Attitude
• Character
• Unalienable Rights

In the blogs to follow I will write more about each one of these most important things, the stuff that really matters most.