John C. Maxwell! 15 Golden Rules of Personal Development!
Chapter 9 Ladder Principle
Personality development determines your level of personal development
“For most people, achievement is what you do…
For the greater achiever,
that’s who you are.”— Doug Firebauch
Soon after moving to Florida, I met Jerry Anderson.
We quickly became good friends.
Jerry is a wonderful person
and a very successful businessman.
But he didn’t start that way.
His story is a testament to personality growth,
a person determines his own personal growth
and how personal growth leads to personal success.
“Successful people are always looking for opportunities to help others.
Unsuccessful people are always asking,
“What’s in it for me?’” – Brian Tracy
****************
ASSISTANCE WITHOUT GUIDELINES
Jerry grew up in Ohio and after graduating from high school,
he began working in factories as a machinist and mold maker.
Although he was very good at business,
worked hard, and was successful,
it was not enough for him.
Jerry is very ambitious.
He’d rather do more with his life than spend his entire career in a secure job.
He wants to be successful in business.
So he quit his job at the factory and started a business.
His first business involved selling precision instruments made in Japan.
The product is very good,
and Jerry understands the market
but the business timing is not yet ripe.
That was in the early 1970s.
At that time, the “Made in Japan” label was not viewed positively.
Although Japanese manufacturing technology has come a long way
since World War II when the country was still producing cheap goods,
consumers in the United States have not yet recognized it,
and they do not buy the product.
As a result, Jerry’s first business failed.
Undeterred, Jerry wanted to try again.
He changed his strategy.
This time he joined a network marketing business.
Hard-working and ambitious,
he focused his efforts on new business,
but this time everyone in the organization failed
when the federal government launched an investigation
and closed the business.
Even then, Jerry was determined not to give up.
He was living in California at the time.
Jerry founded a classified newspaper
with a friend named Bernie Torrence.
He was also interested in franchising in Ohio
by publishing a weekly real estate magazine.
For three years, he traded everything he had, but still failed.
Around that time, Jerry went to see John Schrock,
a man with whom Bernie respected
and cooperated in business.
Jerry asked John how to be successful in business.
John tells him privately
that his business is based on values and principles.
“What values and principles?” Jerry asked.
“Here,” John said, taking a small homemade notebook from his coat pocket.
It stores quotes from the book of Proverbs and is organized by subject.
John always carries it with him.
“Anytime I have a business problem or question,
I seek answers from this notebook.”
John gave a small notebook to Jerry and encouraged him to use it.
You cannot have a million-dollar dream
with a minimum wage work ethic. ― Stephan C. Hogan
****************
TO SUCCESS, THINK LIKE A SUCCESSFUL PERSON
Jerry felt that if he wanted to be a successful businessman,
he needed to learn how to think like a successful businessman.
With that in mind,
he reached out to five or six other people,
and they committed to meeting once a week
for an hour to study the principles in the booklet John had given Jerry.
For the first time in his life,
he became aware of his personal growth.
Jerry’s life and business did not take long to change.
His business, which was very difficult,
turned a profit for the first time.
He expanded throughout California
and was so successful that the company was acquired.
Jerry has returned to Ohio to be near John.
He worked as a consultant for a while,
but it didn’t take long
before he wanted to continue the business.
Building on what he had learned,
he started working with another real estate magazine.
At that time,
he became the largest publisher
of real estate publications in the United States,
including real estate in other cities
from Chicago to Miami and own thousands of employees.
Finally, a company from New York bought his company.
Learning to distance yourself from all the negativity is
one of the greatest lessons
to achieve inner peace. ― Roy T. Bennett
****************
PRINCIPLES OF STARTING WIDE LAND
In the 1980s, people who had heard of John Schrock traveled
to Ohio to meet and learn from him.
John even wrote down some of his ideas
and principles to help people.
In the late 1980s,
Jerry decided to bring the principles John had shared with him to market,
and John and Bernie agreed to try it with Jerry
because they wanted to share
what they had learned with others.
They went around the states in the United States,
trying to attract business people.
There are very few people interested.
But then they met three people from Guatemala a dentist,
a company director and a home goods store owner,
who were in Virginia looking for business help.
When they saw the material that Jerry
and his team had developed,
they rejoiced and invited Jerry’s organization,
eventually named La Red,
to come to Guatemala and help them.
Jerry’s organization visited Guatemala City,
and they succeeded in launching roundtable groups very similar
to the one Jerry started in California many years ago.
Teams are encouraged to set aside time
to meet each other each week;
discuss a principle,
along with its characteristics and benefits;
assess the position of the principle in their field;
and commit to taking concrete action
for change and improvement.
In the following week,
they will take responsibility for their commitments
and then discuss the next principle.
Over the course of a year,
they will tackle the following topics:
Their success with businessmen was well known,
and La Red was invited by the dean at a large university in Guatemala
to teach values to faculty members
who were known for being bribery and score trading.
The values imparted have begun
to change the culture of the university,
so the school administration has required all new students
to take a course on these values.
Today, between 12,000-15,000 students take that course each year.
Not long after La Red was founded in Guatemala,
Jerry and his team were invited to Bogota,
Colombia, to teach values.
They planned to debut at a place
where only about 50 people were expected to show up.
Instead hundreds of people were present
and they had to move the meeting to a nearby city park.
As word spread from Colombia,
representatives of national governments asked La Red
to teach the same principles to 11,500 government employees.
Jerry happily accepted.
He later discovered that the staff were actually guards at the prisons.
That is very scary,
Colombian prisons are notorious for violence and corruption.
Incarcerated drug lords
and rebel leaders have made their own suits in prison
and have run the operation ever since.
Murders happen every day.
Wardens and guards at prisons are either corrupt or killed.
But the prisons were being overseen by a retired general.
A man of integrity, General Cifuentes,
wants to change the culture in prisons,
and he is determined to fight corruption.
That determination took his son’s life,
because the assassin thought it was him.
And while other assassination attempts continued,
the general was safe.
He is the driving force to bring Jerry to the prison.
La Red introduced character development
and values in 143 prisons
with a total of 75,000 inmates,
and the culture at the prisons began to change.
A year and a half later,
the murder rate has dropped dramatically.
And there are reports that some inmates say
they want to be like prison guards.
Sure, prisons can’t be comfortable places,
but they have changed.
And that prompted the Colombian military
to ask La Red to begin character development training for soldiers.
La Red continues to bring values
and personality disciplines to businesses,
governments,
educational institutions
and churches around the globe.
They are currently helping people in 44 countries.
They estimate that more than a million people have been trained
with a foundation of value-based principles.
And that’s very important,
because personality development determines your level
of personal development.
And without personal growth,
you can never reach your potential.
Life is short.
Focus on what really matters most.
You have to change your priorities over time. ― Roy T. Bennett
****************
VALUES OF THEIR PERSONALITY
Professors James Kouzes and Barry Posner have spent more than 25 years
surveying leaders in nearly every organization,
asking the question:
“What values, personal characteristics,
or personality traits do you look for?
seek and admire in a leader?”
During those years, they took a survey questionnaire called “Personality of Admired Leaders”
and sent it to more than 70,000 people on six continents:
Africa, North America,
South America, Asia, Europe and Australia.
“The results,” they report,
“are striking by their regularity over the years,
and they have not changed significantly due to demographic differences,
organization or culture.”
And what traits are most admired in leaders?
The answer is honesty.
As Kouzes and Posner explain,
honesty is at the core of a good personality,
the quality that can enhance
or damage an individual’s reputation the most.
They wrote:
In most of the surveys that have been done,
honesty is chosen more often than any other personality trait of the leader;
Overall, it emerges as the most important element of the relationships
that make up a leader.
The percentages have changed,
but the final ranking result remains the same.
From the first time we did our research,
honesty has been at the top of the list.2
Not surprisingly,
people want
to follow leaders with good character.
No one likes to work with unreliable people.
But before you or I work with anyone else
or follow any other leader,
who are we to count on every day?
We are ourselves!
That’s why personality is so important.
If you can’t trust yourself,
you can never grow.
A good character,
with honesty
and integrity at its core,
is a fundamental factor for success in any area of life.
Without it, you’re just building things out of sand.
“In most of the surveys that have been done,
honesty is chosen more often than any other trait of a leader.”– James Kouzes and Barry Posner
Bill Thrall asserts that people often focus on their professional abilities
without developing their personality,
and that in the end almost always costs them.
They pay the price with their personal
and often professional relationships.
He compared it to climbing a long,
unstable ladder.
The higher a person climbs,
the more wobbly and unstable the ladder becomes,
eventually falling down.
Norman Schwarzkopf, a retired general,
asserted: “99% of leadership failures are failures of character.”
99% of all other failures too.
Most people focus too much on ability and too little on character.
How many times has a person missed a deadline
because they didn’t persevere when it was necessary to do so?
How many times did people get lower scores on tests
when they could have done better simply
because they didn’t do as much research as was required?
How often do people fail to want to grow not
because they don’t have time to read useful books
but because they have chosen to spend their time
and money on something less valuable?
All those shortcomings are the result of personality,
not of ability.
Personality development determines your level of personal development.
That is the Ladder Principle.
“99% of leadership failures are character failures.”- Norman Schwarzkopf
***********************
MY CHARACTERISTICS LEVEL
Climbing the personality ladder is something I always do on purpose.
It didn’t just happen to me.
It may also not just happen to you.
It took me a few decades to develop the right mindset
and learn how to put the “ladders”
in order that helped me improve my situation.
These are the steps on the personality ladder
that have empowered me to climb even higher.
Perhaps they will also help you to rise.
Live the life of your dreams:
Be brave enough to live the life of your dreams according to your vision
and purpose instead of the expectations
and opinions of others. ― Roy T. Bennett
******************
1. I will focus on being a good person rather than a good person – Personality is important
I believe that it is a normal desire for people
to care about their own appearance.
There’s nothing wrong with that.
What can get us into trouble is worrying about our appearance rather
than who we really are.
Our reputation comes
from what others believe about our appearance.
Representative personality the people inside us.
And the good news is
that if you focus on perfecting your personality rather than your looks,
over time your appearance will also improve.
Why do I say that?
It takes sunshine and rain to make a rainbow.
There would be no rainbows without sunshine and rain. ― Roy T. Bennett
*******************
The Mind of Life
More than 2,500 years ago,
the aphorismatic author said,
what we think in our hearts,
we become.
That ancient idea has been repeated by other wise writers
and confirmed and determined by modern science.
Coaches teach about the importance of visualizing victory.
Psychologists point to the power of self-awareness on human behavior.
Doctors note the impact of a positive attitude and hope on a cure.
What we believe in is really powerful.
We reap what we sow.
The things we do or don’t do in our daily lives shape who we are.
If you don’t take care of your heart, mind and soul,
it will change who you are on the outside as well as the inside.
Internal victories come before outer victories
If you do what needs to be done
when it is needed most,
one day you can do what you want
when you want to.
In other words, before you can do it,
you have to think you can.
If you do what needs to be done
when it is needed most,
one day you can do what you want
when you want to.
I often observe people
who seem to be doing all the right things on the surface,
yet they still can’t succeed.
When that happens,
I often conclude that something is wrong internally
and needs to be changed.
The right actions on the outside combined
with the wrong motives
inside will not bring lasting progress.
The right way of talking outside with the wrong thinking
inside will not bring lasting success.
Showing concern on the outside with a heart of hatred
or contempt within will not bring lasting peace.
Continuous growth and long-term success are the result of a balance
between the internal and external factors of our lives.
And must have right thinking first plus solid character traits,
we have the foundation for growth.
Inner development is completely within our control
We often cannot decide what happens to us,
but we can always decide what happens inside of us. Jim Rohn says:
Personality is a quality that manifests many important traits
such as integrity,
courage,
perseverance,
confidence,
and wisdom.
Unlike fingerprints that are born at birth
and cannot be changed,
personality is something you create
within yourself and are responsible for changing.
When we fail to make the right choices about our personalities,
we deny ourselves ownership.
We belong to others – whoever gains control over us.
And that puts us in a bad position.
How can you reach your potential
and become the person
of your dreams if others make these choices for you?
The “stairs” on my personality ladder are the result
of difficult personal choices.
They were not easy to implement and not easy to manage.
Every day is an external battle for me,
forcing me to compromise or surrender to them.
Unfortunately, at one point I gave up.
But whenever something happens,
I work hard to get them back to their respectable orbit…
inside of me.
Doug Firebaugh, author and multi-level marketing expert, says:
“Winning in life isn’t just about money,
it’s about winning on the inside,
and knowing you’ve played the game of life with everything you’ve got.”
If you want to be successful,
you must prioritize building your inner foundation
before your outward appearance.
A few years ago, teen millionaire phenomenon Farrah Gray
wrote a book called Reallionaire.
He coined the term to describe
“one who has discovered that there are things more valuable
than the possession of money.
One who understands that success is not just about ‘heavy wallet’;
you must also be rich on the inside.”
Still very young,
but he realized that money
without a solid personality foundation cannot lead
to success but can lead to downfall.
If in doubt, look at the number of famous young actors,
and young pop star has fallen or withered.
Their stories are often sad
because they have focused on the outer part of their lives
instead of building the inner strength
to build a solid foundation
when fame and fortune come along.
We need to work hard to avoid that kind of fate,
by focusing on improving character more than looks.
If you don’t know who you truly are,
you’ll never know what you really want. ― Roy T. Bennett
**********************
2. I will follow the Golden Rule – Other people matter
A few years ago when I was asked to write a book on business ethics,
the result was Ethics 101, based on the Golden Rule.
If you could only choose one guide for your life,
you couldn’t do better than this:
“Here’s a simple, easy-to-use guide:
Ask yourself what you want people to do for yourself,
then take the idea and do it for them.”
“Here’s a simple, easy-to-use guide:
Ask yourself what you would like people to do for you,
then take the idea and do it for them.”– The message
Following the Golden Rule is a great character builder.
It reminds you to focus on others.
It makes you empathetic.
It encourages you to take the better path.
And if you do especially during difficult times you
become the type of person that others want to be around.
After all, in all of our relationships,
we are either the minuses or the pluses in the lives of others.
The Golden Rule helps us always a plus.
You don’t have time and money
because you don’t invest time and money. — Grant Cardone
******************
3. I will only teach what I believe in – Passion is important
Early in their careers, most speakers have been asked
to speak on a variety of topics.
Or they come from a particular organization
where it is expected that they focus on certain topics from a certain perspective.
For example, motivational speakers are often expected to declare,
“If you believe, you can achieve.”
When I first started my career,
there were very few things I believed in absolutely.
I’m not talking about things that are clearly right or wrong.
I’m talking about subjective things,
about opinion.
But as soon as I talked about them,
I regretted it.
You know what they call a speaker
who shares what he or she doesn’t believe in?
A hypocrite! So from the beginning of my career,
I vowed to teach only what I believed.
And that works in my favor,
not just in terms of integrity
but also in terms of passion.
Borrowed faith has no passion,
therefore no power.
Some of the things I was passionate about 30 years ago,
such as the effects of real learning relationships,
attitudes and leadership.
I am still very passionate about today.
And if there’s something I’m more passionate about than before,
it’s the statement that “success and failure rest on the foundation of leadership.”
Borrowed faith has no passion,
therefore no power.
Individuals who lack discipline and passion become dull people.
I never wanted to be one of those people.
I bet you are too.
I’m a great believer in luck,
and I find the harder I work the more I have of it. — Thomas Jefferson
***************
4. I will value humility above all virtues – Vision is very important
Writer and author J. M. Barrie admits:
“Every man’s life is a diary in which instead
of writing one story he writes another;
and the most humbling moments are when he compares the work
as it is to what he hopes to write.”
I think anyone who is honest with himself realizes
where he can and should go in life.
Unlike what Tom Hanks said in his role as Forrest Gump,
life is not a box of chocolates.
It’s more like a jar of jalapeño peppers.
What we do today can burn us tomorrow!
“Every man’s life is a diary in which
instead of writing one story he writes another;
and his most humble moments are
when he compares the work
as it is to what he hopes to write.” – J. M. Barrie
We don’t mean to make mistakes and fail, but we are.
We are all just one small step away from stupidity.
My author, pastor, and friend Andy Stanley says,
“I know that while no one intends to mess up their lives,
the problem is that very few of us plan not to.
That means we cannot put in place the necessary safeguards
to ensure a happy ending.”
So how do we do that?
Remember the big picture
I think the first thing to do is remind yourself of the big picture.
It is said that President John F. Kennedy kept a small card
in the White House that read:
“Oh my God, your sea is too big and my boat is too small.”
If the man known as the leader
of a free world knows his true place in the world,
so should we.
Being grateful does not mean that everything is necessarily good.
It just means that you can accept it as a gift. ― Roy T. Bennett
***************
Acknowledge that everyone has weaknesses
Rick Warren offers great advice on how to stay humble.
He suggests acknowledging your own weaknesses,
being patient with the weaknesses of others,
and being willing to correct them.
Of those three,
I have to admit that I only do one of them well.
I don’t find it difficult to admit my weaknesses maybe
because I have a lot of them.
I had a hard time being patient with others.
I constantly have to remind myself
to be more generous with others.
And in order to be more open to correction,
I never assumed that I wouldn’t make mistakes,
I developed relationships with good people
who would tell me the truth,
and established a good network with accountability in your life.
The road to success is always under construction. — Aysa Angel
***************
Always begging
I love being around people who have a beginner’s mind.
They think of themselves as apprentices instead of experts,
and so on, always looking forward.
They try to see things through other people’s tombs.
They are open to new ideas.
They crave knowledge.
They ask questions and listen.
And they gather as much information
as they can before making a decision.
I admire such people and try to learn from them.
Wealth consists not in having great possessions,
but in having few wants. — Epictetus
***********
Ready to serve others
There is not much that is more conducive to cultivating character
and cultivating humility than serving others.
Put others before your ego and personal opinion.
(If you are a leader, you especially need to remember this
because you may get used to being served
by others and think you have that privilege.)
In the book Winning: The Answers,
Jack and Suzy Welch describe people who are “conceited”
because of their success and thus form the wrong attitude towards those
who are not other.
They wrote:
The conceited person possesses all kinds of unattractive behavior.
They are arrogant,
especially towards colleagues and subordinates.
They take credit for and despise the efforts of others,
don’t share ideas except to brag,
and don’t listen to, nearly everything.
Bosses can detect harmful behaviors to the team from afar,
and so it’s no surprise that those with power
and authority around you are constantly turning against you.
You can be very smart and deliver excellent results at work,
but your cocky personality sabotages work morale in any organization a
nd can end up really ruining work results.
How does a person accustomed to victory remind himself
that he is not the navel of the universe?
By serving others.
For me, serving begins with Margaret and my family.
Also starting in 1997,
each year I select a small number of individuals
to serve without receiving anything in return.
And I also look for ways to serve my team,
as they work so hard to serve me and our vision every day.
Always deliver more than expected. — Larry Page
*****************
Be grateful
I am very aware of the fact
that I am a very fortunate person and do not deserve
what I have received in life.
I am indebted to God and others,
and for that,
I always try to maintain an attitude of gratitude.
That is not always easy.
Consultant Fred Smith,
who has been my mentor for many years,
helped me with this.
“We’re not grateful that it puts us in debt,
and we don’t want to be in debt,” he said.
The biblical phrase ‘sacrifice of thanksgiving’ was a puzzle to me
until I realized gratitude is acknowledging the merits of someone doing something
for me that I could not do on my own.
Gratitude demonstrates our vulnerability,
our dependence on others.”
There is a Chinese proverb that says ”
when you drink water,
remember the source”.
Everything we do,
every achievement we achieve,
every milestone we pass has a part in the efforts of others.
No one can do everything on their own.
If we can remember that,
we can be grateful.
And if we’re grateful,
we’re more likely to develop our character
when we’re not.
You just have to pay attention to what people need
and what has not been done. — Russell Simmons
*****************
PROVERB: When you drink water, remember the source.
Confucius said,
“Humility is the solid foundation of all good character.”
In other words,
it paves the way for personality development.
And that helps us to grow personally.
These are cleverly connected.
“I discovered that wealth is a kind of perception
and that anyone can perceive it
by thinking like a rich person.”– Andrew Young
********************
5. I will try to end well – Loyalty is also important
The final “stair” on my personality ladder is my determination
to build my character
and live up to the highest standards
until the day I die.
I’m trying to do that
by doing the right thing and becoming a better person every day.
To do it right, I don’t wait to feel like it.
I realize that emotions follow actions.
Do the right thing and you will feel right.
Do the wrong thing, you will feel bad.
If you control your behavior,
your emotions will be in order.
Opportunity is missed by most people
because it is dressed in overalls and looks like work. — Thomas Edisongreat
********************
If you control your behavior, your emotions will be in order.
Pastor and broadcaster Tony Evans said,
“If you want a better world,
including better countries,
with better states,
better provinces,
better cities from better neighborhoods,
illuminated by better churches,
with better families,
you’ll have to start by being a better person.”
That is always the starting point with me,
with you.
If we focus on our own personality,
we will create a better world.
If we do that all our lives,
we’ve done the best we can to improve our world.
A wise person should have money in their head,
but not in their heart. — Jonathan Swift
****************
THE STRONGER YOUR PERSONALITY,
THE BIGGER YOUR DEVELOPMENT POTENTIAL
Pulitzer Prize-winning author Alexander Solzhenitsyn spent eight years in prison
during the Soviet era for criticizing Joseph Stalin.
He entered prison as an atheist and exited as a believer.
The experience helped him to form his faith and strengthen his character.
Looking back, he said:
“Thank you, prison,
Thank you for being in my life,
by lying on the prison straw,
I have learned that the purpose of life is not prosperity
as I believed growing up,
but maturity of the soul.”
If we want to grow and reach our potential,
we must pay more attention to our character than to our own success.
We must realize that personal development means much more
than opening our minds and learning more skills.
That means increasing our capabilities as humans.
It means maintaining core integrity,
even when vulnerable.
It means becoming who we should be,
not just getting where we want to be.
It is meant to nourish our souls.
Doctor and researcher Orison Swett Marden once described
a successful person as follows:
“He was born in the mud and then lay down on the marble.
This gives us an interesting metaphor for looking at different lives.
Some people are born in mud, die in mud…
Sadly, some people are born in brocade but die in mud;
some are born in the mud,
dream of marble,
but still bury their feet in the mud.
But many people of noble character were born
in the mud and lay down on the marble.”
Isn’t that a great idea?
I hope that when I lie down,
I will be remembered too,
and I hope you are too.
Formal education will make you a living;
self-education will make you a fortune. — Jim Rohn
****************
APPLICATION OF THE LAW PRINCIPLE TO LIFE
1. See where you are most focused so far in your life.
Is it focused on internal or external improvement?
Here are a few ways you can apply:
Compare how much you’ve spent over the past 12 months on clothes,
jewelry, accessories,
and more versus how much you’ve spent on books,
conferences,
Compare the time you spent on personal
and spiritual development in the past month versus your appearance-related activities.
If you exercise regularly,
check out the benefits you’re striving for:
Are they related to mental or physical health?
If your assessment shows
that the focus is on the outside rather than on the inside,
shift your focus by spending more time,
money,
and attention on things that will help you grow even
if they does not exist.
Empty pockets never held anyone back.
Only empty heads and empty hearts can do that. — Norman Vincent Peale
2. Plan to spend time in the coming months regularly serving others.
Putting your schedule aside
and putting others first will help you develop humility,
character,
and a mind of others.
Another idea is to dedicate
at least an hour a week to volunteering.
Make a plan,
and then focus your whole mind during that time.
“Habit is the daily battleground of personality.”– Dan Coats
******************
3. US Senator Dan Coats said:
“Personality cannot be called out in a time of crisis
if it is wasted by years of compromise and rationalization.
The only testing ground for the hero is the world.
The only preparation
for a profound decision that can change a life,
or even a country,
is hundreds of decisions that are not sobering,
and seemingly emotionally unclear.
Habit is the daily battleground of personality.”
What are you doing every day
to form the habit of personality development?
Do you pay attention to your soul?
Are you doing difficult or unpleasant tasks?
Do you practice the Golden Rule and motivate others?
Your personality is not fixed.
You can improve it.
It’s never too late.
You can change who you are and your overall potential
by becoming a better person…
Annual income twenty pounds,
annual expenditure nineteen six, result happiness.
Annual income twenty pounds,
annual expenditure twenty pound ought and six,
result misery. — Charles Dickens
