Do you want to live a life of significance and make a difference in the world?
Do you want to become a person of influence in your community?
Do you want to improve your relationships with your friends, family, and co-workers?
Do you desire to improve your leadership skills or abilities?
If you answered yes to any or all of these questions, then you might be ready to begin your leadership journey.
But as you start your path, ask yourself these simple but essential questions: Are you willing to roll up your sleeves, get involved and do the work?
Are you willing to sacrifice the time and effort it takes to grow as a leader?
Now, more than ever, our world needs real leaders. And not just more leaders but better leaders. The world needs better leaders in our organizations or jobs, in our communities. in the economic, social, and political arena.
Most importantly, we need better leaders to lead our families, as I believe community starts in the home. What do I mean by better? I mean more leaders who will positively influence change and not just think about themselves and their inner circle of friends, family, business, and political connections.
We need more leaders like you. The great thing is that there are great leaders everywhere. They teach our children every day. They coach our kids. They hold positions on boards and non-profit foundations. They volunteer for after-school programs and serve the homeless and the poor. They take care of your family. The problem is that we need more leaders like these who want to help.
Leadership isn’t necessarily about the leader. It’s about the people they serve. Leadership is also about the leader’s vision and the people who help them carry out it. Unfortunately, we spend so much time looking at the leader’s personality, charisma, and influence in front; we forget the many other unnoticed and unknown leaders who get the work done.
Remember this. As you begin your leadership path, you’re only as good as the people around you. You cannot do it all. At least not effectively enough to achieve anything of significance. It takes a team of people traveling on the same airplane traveling to the same destination. But the leader or the pilot must have a flight plan and purpose for the trip.
And here are the questions you must answer during your preflight checklist for your leadership journey.
- Where do I want to go as a leader?
- What do I want to achieve as a leader?
- Where do I see myself in the future as a leader?
- What are my plans to achieve my goals?
- What should I say “Yes” to achieve my goals?
- What should I say “No” to achieve my goals?
- Who should I associate with to achieve my goals?
After you begin answering these questions, you’re ready to embark on your leadership journey? Are you up for the challenge? The world needs you…NOW
Leadership Discovery
What do Bill Gates, Steve Jobs, Robert Johnson, Elon Musk, Richard Branson all have in common? They didn’t pursue leadership. They discovered their gifts and talents first.
Leadership isn’t necessarily a position or the job title that you hold. Leleadershipisn’t necessarily something you pursue. You should discover your talent or gift first and then your community, and eventually, the world pursues you. To be exact, the world pursues your gift.
Gates (Microsoft) and Jobs (Apple) discovered their abilities or opportunities in computer technology. Johnson found his gift or opportunity in the cable television industry (Black Entertainment Television). Musk is well known for being the CEO and product architect for Tesla. Branson is well known as the owner of Virgin Airlines and Virgin Records.
These business people discovered and pursued their passion for business and investing early in life. And it was their gifts or passion in their prospective fields that drew millions of customers worldwide to their leadership and companies.
Beginning of Your Vision
Until you’ve shared your vision with others or have written your vision down on paper, you don’t have a vision. You don’t believe in your vision unless you’ve openly shared it with someone or you’ve written it down.
The first step to developing or creating your vision is convincing yourself that you have a vision. Many times, what we think is a vision is merely ideas. Once you believe in your vision, your vision takes over your life, forcing you to change your mindset.
You no longer see success, failure, friends, time or opportunities, or priorities the same. Everything you say or do becomes part of your vision.
But your vision starts with your faith and belief in yourself and your vision.
Seven Ways Vision Changes Your Life
- Changes Your Friends – A friend is anyone willing, committed, and can help you succeed. Your friends should stimulate your dreams. Your friends should encourage you to work toward your vision.
- Changes Your Free Time – One of the most significant changes in your vision is that you must sacrifice your free time. Your vision will demand more of your time.
- Changes Your Priorities – Your priorities change when you focus on your vision. Your vision forces you to spend or save your money differently. You will invest your energy into books, videos, and people who align with your vision.
- Changes Your Future – Your vision determines your life’s path because your vision directs the school(s) you attend, your training, the places you go, and where you live. Your vision leads your path and the people you meet along the way, and the places you go.
- Changes Your Attitude – Your vision forces you to change how you think about how you approach your life. Your vision can force you to do things, go places and associate with people you would never have. For example, if you’re an introvert, your vision may force you to speak in front of large crowds, sell yourself and products to strangers or write even if you don’t think you’re a good writer, speaker, or salesperson. Your vision will change your attitude because you will be forced out of your comfort zone. As a result, you will be forced to grow beyond your fears.
- Changes How You Invest Your Money – Your vision will change you from spending money on frivolous things like shoes, clothes, jewelry, electronics to forcing you to invest in yourself and your business. Your vision will force you to spend money on books, courses, seminars, masterminds, or whatever it takes to be successful in your vision.
- Changes How You Use Your Energy – Your vision will change you because you will spend less time on hobbies like golfing, going out eating, going to the movies, or just hanging with your friends to reading, research, and preparing for meeting with people in your business.
Having a vision can seem like a blessing or a curse. It’s a blessing in that it can positively change your life. It can be a curse because it forces you to change in ways you didn’t realize you needed to change.
Leadership: It Starts With You
Whatever your reasons for becoming a leader or improving as a leader, it all starts with you. It begins with your desire to change how you think about yourself and how you want to impact the world around you.
Most leaders don’t set out to be leaders. Leaders discover themselves first. They become great at something they like to do or want to do. Or they decide to fulfill a need that’s not currently being offered. They first discover their purpose or gift, and then their communities and the world are drawn to them. They don’t purposely seek followers.
Leaders discover themselves first, but they also work on themselves first. They determine their strengths and weaknesses. They improve their resilience and operate in their area of giftedness. And as a leader, you need to be able to accept that you have weaknesses and flaws. And you will fail at some point.
The biggest thing to understand about leadership is that leaders aren’t necessarily the smartest or the most qualified, but leaders have the attitude to get things done no matter what it takes. So it’s your attitude that will separate leaders from everyone else. And it is also your attitude that will determine your success as you begin your leadership journey.
Your experiences, stories, success, failures, and challenges along the way determine your journey and help you to become the person you are destined to be.