Victory
You are the man who used to boast
That you'd achieve the uttermost,
Some day.
You merely wished a show,
To demonstrate how much you know
And prove the distance you can go...
Another year we've just passed through.
What new ideas came to you?
How many big things did you do?
Time...left twelce fresh months in your care
How many of them did you share
With opportunity and dare
Again where you so often missed?
We do not find you on the list of Makers Good.
Explain the fact!
Ah no, 'twas not the chance you lacked!
As usual - you failed to act!
-Herbert Kauffman
Book Review: the dip by SETH GODIN
In the beginning of another great book by Seth Godin, so all I have are a few words about it.
Basically, it's a book about knowing when to quit. Yup! QUIT. Why do we need to know when to quit? Because if you're spending all your time zeroed in on X, then you're not paying attention to Y...and Y is where you need to be focused.
It's a different concept of the idea of quitting here. There's more than one type of quitting. There's I-have-zero-pereverance quitting...there's I'm-gonna-sit-on-my-couch-and-watch-tv-for-the-rest-of-my-life quitting...and then there's the type of quitting you do when you realize that what you're presently doing with your time and energy will only and always give you mediocre results and so you drop it and move on to something that you can be awesome at.
We need to know when to quit ventures that aren't going to give us the results we want.
BIG winners are people who have developed the awareness to know what to quit and what to pursue.
Steve Jobs quit. He quit college so that he could pursue only that which interested him. He called that choice: "one of the best decisions that I've made in my life."
Michael Chriton quit a medical career to become a writer and created ER and Jurassic Park.
Sometimes you need to quit what you're okay at so that you can succeed at what you're awesome at.
We don't like quitting because we associate it with failure. Here's what J.K. Rowling has to say about failure:
Failure meant a stripping away of the inessential. I stopped pretending to myself that I was anything other than what I was, and began to direct all my energy to finishing the only work that mattered to me. Had I really succeeded at anything else, I might never have found the determination to succeed in the one area where I truly belonged. I was set free, because my greatest fear had been realized, and I was still alive, and I still had a daughter whom I adored, and I had an old typewriter, and a big idea. And so rock bottom became a solid foundation on which I rebuilt my life. – J. K. Rowling, Harvard commencement addres
Don't quit when it's hard. Don't quit because it's hard. Quit because you want to succeed at what matters to you.
OWL Assignment: Sharpen your Axe
"Twenty years ago, I read a book that changed my life. It was called The Magic of Thinking Big. I actually don't remember anything about the book at all. What I do remember is that in one quick moment, it changed the way I thought about success." - SETH GODIN
When you're reading success books, it's like you're sharpening your axe. People who don't read are chopping away with very dull axes and so they work very hard and have very little to show for it. Don't mistake motion for progress. Sometimes we have to slow down in order to speed up. Spend time every day sharpening your axe: read from a success book for at least 15 every day.
When you're reading success books, it's like you're sharpening your axe. People who don't read are chopping away with very dull axes and so they work very hard and have very little to show for it. Don't mistake motion for progress. Sometimes we have to slow down in order to speed up. Spend time every day sharpening your axe: read from a success book for at least 15 every day.
Sleeping Geniuses
When I was in kindergarten, I remember my teacher gave us the task of copying the alphabet. But I didn't want to do that; I wanted to draw a picture instead. So I did. The teacher told me to stop drawing and start copying. For some reason, I continued drawing my picture. I wasn't trying to be obstinate, I simply felt like it was perfectly okay to carry on with what I was doing. My teacher didn't share my point of view and I got paddled for disobeying. For some reason, I still remember exactly how I felt after that: pure confusion. I still didn't understand what I had done wrong.
This experience helps me remember to be wary of treating children as if they should know better when in fact oftentimes they honestly don't know if something is right or wrong. But recently my kindergarten experience flashed into my mind under another perspective: I was right and the teacher was wrong. She wasn't wrong to teach me the alphabet. She was wrong to punish me for being a child. Wrong for making me sacrifice creativity for conformity.
But it's not really her fault. This is how the system of education in schools works, unfortunately. Everyone must conform to the standard way things are done and leave a large part of their personal talents and interests at the door. I'm not saying that we need to get rid of having to learn the alphabet, mathematics, or the names of American presidents. I'm saying its wrong to give kids the impression that in order to succeed in life, they need to always color within the lines...or get an F. We're "educating" kids on the altar of what makes them creative, unique, and happy. And now we're really beginning to suffer the consequences.
And what are the consequences? The economy has made alot of things extremely clear. It's as if the fog of blatant ignorance of what has been going on for a long time already is finally stripped away. People are finding that their survival depends on their own ability to take care of themselves, to be self-reliant, to believe in their own personal abilities. Sir Ken Robinson points out that the very survival of our economy depends on innovation. And innovation depends on the creativity of individuals.
However, because our schools are actually relics of a system that was designed to support the Industrial Age, people today have been poorly equipped for far too long to handle the demands of the new era. In spite of all the "Express Yourself!" gimmickry and other efforts tried out by schools trying to satisfy students, the fact is the core of our education is still a system that was built to produce people of conformity and not creativity. This is why Sir Ken Robinson is calling not for an evolution of education, but a revolution. The school system excels at producing the type of people who are very good at being employees and that is exactly what is helping plummet the economy into a downward spiral today. We need more independent-minded people and less dependent-minded people.
How silly it is to wait until students are 18 years old to start taking their personal interests seriously. It is no wonder that young people are at a loss as to where their talents and abilities and desires lie when their minds have been molded into a standard way of thinking, behaving, and "doing life" from the time when they were very young and impressionable.
How sad it is that most adults in the workforce not only have no idea as to what their talents are, but most don't even believe they have any talents at all!
Albert Einstein said that everyone is a genius. I highly doubt he said this for any other reason than the fact that this is true. The problem is that we haven't allowed children to develop any of their innate interests into genius. There are so many people who get up every day and are unhappy and unfulfilled. They don't do what they love and so they don't love what they do. The tragedy is that they feel that this is normal. How many sleeping geniuses are out there? How many people have undiscovered talents, potential, and dreams withering away inside them?
When I was about 15, I discovered I had the talent for drawing. With just a couple lessons I was able to draw better than pupils who had been practicing for years. It was pretty amazing and this experience propels me to stay on the learning curve, alert for any other hidden abilities, to keep growing, learning, and acquiring more and more skills. It makes me wonder...how many people out there are living from childhood experiences of needing permission to explore a creative impulse? How many adults are out there timidly looking around like a child at a desk checking to see what everyone else is doing and feeling discouraged about doing anything that doesn't resemble the norm? How many ideas, talents, and dreams are getting buried every day? How many people are becoming lawyers, accountants, or doctors when they really want to become dancers, missionaries, or open up an ice cream shop with a hundred different flavors?
I refuse to be a sleeping genius. How about you?
P.S. In a future blog post, I'll address why following your purpose/passion does NOT equal setting yourself up to be poor or unsuccessful.
This experience helps me remember to be wary of treating children as if they should know better when in fact oftentimes they honestly don't know if something is right or wrong. But recently my kindergarten experience flashed into my mind under another perspective: I was right and the teacher was wrong. She wasn't wrong to teach me the alphabet. She was wrong to punish me for being a child. Wrong for making me sacrifice creativity for conformity.
But it's not really her fault. This is how the system of education in schools works, unfortunately. Everyone must conform to the standard way things are done and leave a large part of their personal talents and interests at the door. I'm not saying that we need to get rid of having to learn the alphabet, mathematics, or the names of American presidents. I'm saying its wrong to give kids the impression that in order to succeed in life, they need to always color within the lines...or get an F. We're "educating" kids on the altar of what makes them creative, unique, and happy. And now we're really beginning to suffer the consequences.
And what are the consequences? The economy has made alot of things extremely clear. It's as if the fog of blatant ignorance of what has been going on for a long time already is finally stripped away. People are finding that their survival depends on their own ability to take care of themselves, to be self-reliant, to believe in their own personal abilities. Sir Ken Robinson points out that the very survival of our economy depends on innovation. And innovation depends on the creativity of individuals.
However, because our schools are actually relics of a system that was designed to support the Industrial Age, people today have been poorly equipped for far too long to handle the demands of the new era. In spite of all the "Express Yourself!" gimmickry and other efforts tried out by schools trying to satisfy students, the fact is the core of our education is still a system that was built to produce people of conformity and not creativity. This is why Sir Ken Robinson is calling not for an evolution of education, but a revolution. The school system excels at producing the type of people who are very good at being employees and that is exactly what is helping plummet the economy into a downward spiral today. We need more independent-minded people and less dependent-minded people.
How silly it is to wait until students are 18 years old to start taking their personal interests seriously. It is no wonder that young people are at a loss as to where their talents and abilities and desires lie when their minds have been molded into a standard way of thinking, behaving, and "doing life" from the time when they were very young and impressionable.
How sad it is that most adults in the workforce not only have no idea as to what their talents are, but most don't even believe they have any talents at all!
Albert Einstein said that everyone is a genius. I highly doubt he said this for any other reason than the fact that this is true. The problem is that we haven't allowed children to develop any of their innate interests into genius. There are so many people who get up every day and are unhappy and unfulfilled. They don't do what they love and so they don't love what they do. The tragedy is that they feel that this is normal. How many sleeping geniuses are out there? How many people have undiscovered talents, potential, and dreams withering away inside them?
When I was about 15, I discovered I had the talent for drawing. With just a couple lessons I was able to draw better than pupils who had been practicing for years. It was pretty amazing and this experience propels me to stay on the learning curve, alert for any other hidden abilities, to keep growing, learning, and acquiring more and more skills. It makes me wonder...how many people out there are living from childhood experiences of needing permission to explore a creative impulse? How many adults are out there timidly looking around like a child at a desk checking to see what everyone else is doing and feeling discouraged about doing anything that doesn't resemble the norm? How many ideas, talents, and dreams are getting buried every day? How many people are becoming lawyers, accountants, or doctors when they really want to become dancers, missionaries, or open up an ice cream shop with a hundred different flavors?
I refuse to be a sleeping genius. How about you?
P.S. In a future blog post, I'll address why following your purpose/passion does NOT equal setting yourself up to be poor or unsuccessful.
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