Ray Dalio stated in his best-selling book, “Principles”, that he isn't one who liked to take instructions: “I’ve always had a bad rote memory and didn’t like following other people’s instructions, but I loved figuring out how things work for myself.” This is quite admirable, if you ask me.
While this may sound odd to the average or less mind, it is the beauty of a truly innovative and self-inclined mind that is inspired from within to mine the mine that is their mind. Anyone who is driven to succeed on their own terms does one thing: find their way themselves even at the cost of many mistakes and through rising and falling. They walk the path of the authentic.
Carl Gustav Jung said if the path you're walking seems so easy, you're probably walking another person's path. What does this really mean and how does it relate to self-leadership?
The concept of self-leadership is not the concept of disobedience. It may look like being disobedient to a fellow man, especially the significant adults in our lives, but, it is walking in perfect obedience to the divine script. Often, our parents or the adults in our lives try to convert us to their own way, but if we have discovered the right path through a hunch and knowing, which we may not be able to explain or even if we try to explain, then it would not make any sense.
Amadeus Wolfgang Mozart defied his father, Leopold Mozart’s, instructions to walk the path of greatness. While he wanted to compose operas that was his true voice, his father wanted him to gain prominence as a conductor and keep supporting his family. The parents, especially his father monitored and micro-managed him every inch of the way. This was contrary to the inner call and hunger in the boy. His father represented more than an obstacle to him and was deliberately trying to stifle his progress. Wolfgang had to take a step, however painful, before it was too late.
On a trip to Vienna in 1781, Wolfgang made the fateful decision to stay. He would never return to Salzburg. As if Wolfgang had broken some great taboo, his father could never forgive him for this; his son had abandoned the family. The rift between them would never be repaired. Feeling that he had lost so much time under his father’s thumb, Wolfgang composed at a furious pace, his most famous operas and compositions pouring out of him as if he were possessed. [Robert Greene: Mastery].
William Gates III left Harvard to pursue what he saw as a path which no one else saw. He did not fail out of Harvard. He decided to leave Harvard in order to pursue his life after he must have earned the self-consciousness of where the compass of his life pointed at. He had to go find himself.
Many youths misunderstand the facts about Bill Gates dropping out of Harvard. Some young people who are not doing well in school use Bill Gates as an example of a dropout. No, he didn't fail out of Harvard. He withdrew himself from the school. It's instructive to state that he scored 1590 out of 1600 in his SAT examination. The young man led himself.
Self-leadership is for those who have chosen the path of self-discovery. That path is the path of self-affliction and torture. This is so because whatever you find in that way is your own burden to bear. You chose that path through defying the instructions of the adults in your life and so you may not be able to return to them whatever happens. You take responsibility for your life.
You are the architect of your own good or ill fortunes. This means exactly what it says. You are to take full charge of your life. Whatever you see or experience through the self-leadership and guidance that you are offering yourself is yours. This is not the case with the Prodigal Son. The prodigal son went with wealth and wasted all of it. A self-leader leaves to create wealth and returns with same. They do not leave with wealth. They leave empty except with their true vision and return full; but the prodigal son is the opposite.
The motive is to actually fulfil deep-seated, innate and self-driven inclinations. And it comes with the thinking of not wanting to be a burden on others, but to be a means of bliss to others through industry, enduring of pain, embracing trials, and contending with the lack of everything; and coming out with results that will be of benefit of amazing proportions.
Locked within the object of intense self-desire is the need to find oneself. Self-leaders dig their own well. What is this well?
It is the well of treasure that lays deposited within the human psyche where the functionality of the being is activated. The task of digging is an onerous one. As with the physical well, when men dig, they come in contact with boulders, metals and indeed offensive objects. These hinder the search for the spring. Sooner or later, they encounter some oily and dirty water. Sometimes, they hit upon some stench, but they must continue. Eventually they meet the water that they seek. That is the spring of water. It is pure and safe for drinking.
The well of your being is not different. As you dig in search of your treasure deposit, you are obstructed by ideas that are contrary to the value you seek. You encounter deposits of wrong information ingested from the environment. These pieces of information cannot permit positive growth. You must breakthrough them and excavate them. You have to keep digging till you push out of you those age-long ideas that have kept the adults who raised you in the realm of averages. Those ideas that only keep you stuck, weighed down and prevent you from flying.
You have to dig through these dirty and murky water to find your treasure. It is actually the change of paradigm that causes a shift and renews you. You do not stop digging when you are tired. You stop digging when you get to your own fountain. What you then bring forth is your fountain of water. That fountain delivers healing streams. Do note that as you dig out old limiting beliefs [information], you simultaneously take in new information that would enable winning. This process is a constant and continuous one. You are actually unlearning, learning and relearning.
This is the period where the self-leader separates from the throng to work on the self. It is the period when dirty work is done, and nobody supports or cheers you. You are your own cheerleader. You drive yourself focused on your own vision and the goals you set for yourself. The beauty of this is when you have won for yourself, you gain followership. But the change begins with you. This is non-negotiable.
Anyone who is not willing to dig the well that is in them is not ready for self-leadership. A leader must discover self. Through self-discovery, a thorough process that acquaints and establishes relationship with oneself, one is able to relate with others. This is the key to emotional intelligibility that leaders must possess. The first essential key to the management of the emotional quotient is self-management. The biggest hindrance to self-development and being one’s best self is the pervasive urge to pry into the lives of others rather than focus on oneself.
One challenge of self-leadership is the ability for one to know self. One has to accept oneself, the highs and lows, the odds and even, the white and black wolf, and the all in all that one is. This acceptance is what makes one know what to leverage on, what to focus on, and what to be cautious about. It also helps one’s self-regulation and evaluation.
John Maxwell stated that his greatest leadership challenge is to lead himself, “My greatest leadership challenge is leading me!” This is the challenge of self-leadership because great leaders, masters, are not exonerated from challenge. Maxwell opines that one of the toughest tests of a leader while trying to lead himself and be an example to others, is that he falls short of his own teachings sometimes. The reason is that the standards they set for themselves are high.
At such moments, you must understand the question of motive. Your motive for falling short of your own ideals is not because of your insincerity. It is due more to your humanity. This position cannot be negotiated because it has been with man. The Apostle Paul, a wise master builder said, “For that which I do I allow not: for what I would, that I do not; but what I hate, that I do…for to will is present with me; but how to perform that which is good I find not.”
Leading others is arduous because of the obvious fact that one has to first find oneself before one can be responsible for the others that they will eventually lead. It has to be exemplary and the only great example is laid when one leads self to show the way for others.
The well of human being is the source of human’s life purpose. It is at the fountain of it that man connects to and becomes the purpose for which man is here. A self-leader finds theirs, knowing full well that what does not pain does not pay. Because you do not take the agenda that someone else has mapped out for you [John Maxwell], you have to go seeking your own agenda yourself. That is a gruelling task, the reason it has to be likened to the rigorous task of digging a well.
This path is an indeed challenging one for those who have chosen it, but the choice makes the difference and supports adaptability. While it is good to set a goal to lead yourself, it is better to attain the goal. No goal gets attained without invoking the values of self-leadership. You must take the fall, you must rise again, and through many mistakes, you find the way.
No one ever walked the path of self-leadership ended up a regret because it is the path that the masters of all time have walked. It is the path of mastery that earned the validation of no master except thyself. And the people you are leading are always the beneficiaries of the outcomes of the journey.
