Do you find yourself trying to stifle a (periodic) urge to speak/act with self-confidence regarding your abilities – possibly for fear of being called “arrogant” by some who may “dislike” you?
If YES, this article offers ideas you can use to LIBERATE yourself from THAT mental prison!
Let’s begin with this popular quote:
“…It is our light, not our darkness that most frightens us. We ask ourselves, ‘Who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented, fabulous?’ Actually, who are you not to be? You are a child of God. Your playing small does not serve the world. There is nothing enlightened about shrinking so that other people won’t feel insecure around you. We are all meant to shine, as children do. We were born to make manifest the glory of God that is within us. It’s not just in some of us; it’s in everyone. And as we let our own light shine, we unconsciously give other people permission to do the same. As we are liberated from our own fear, our presence automatically liberates others.” – Marianne Williamson, A Return to Love: Reflections on the Principles of “A Course in Miracles”
What would you do if anyone tries to put you down?
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Tayo Solagbade’s
Performance Improvement IDEAS
(PI Squared) Newsletter
Monday 11th July 2016
NB: This PI Squared newsletter will be published weekly, on Mondays, in place of the Speaking/Web Marketing IDEAS newsletter, starting from today – 15th February 2016. I’m reinventing my Monday newsletter content and theme, to accommodate my vision of serving the growing audience of serious minded individuals and organizations reaching out to me, with information, education. news and research findings designed to help them do what they do better.
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PII 022: To Succeed, You Need to Ignore Detractors and RELENTLESSLY Speak/Act With Self-Belief!
Do you find yourself trying to stifle a (periodic) urge to speak/act with self-confidence regarding your abilities – possibly for fear of being called “arrogant” by some who may “dislike” you?
If YES, this article offers ideas you can use to LIBERATE yourself from THAT mental prison!
Let’s begin with this popular quote:
“…It is our light, not our darkness that most frightens us. We ask ourselves, ‘Who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented, fabulous?’ Actually, who are you not to be? You are a child of God. Your playing small does not serve the world. There is nothing enlightened about shrinking so that other people won’t feel insecure around you. We are all meant to shine, as children do. We were born to make manifest the glory of God that is within us. It’s not just in some of us; it’s in everyone. And as we let our own light shine, we unconsciously give other people permission to do the same. As we are liberated from our own fear, our presence automatically liberates others.” – Marianne Williamson, A Return to Love: Reflections on the Principles of “A Course in Miracles”
What would you do if anyone tries to put you down?
I’ll tell you one thing: that’s NOT the time to “try and get along”!
Instead you’ll need to ASSERT yourself – without being combative – by speaking/acting with self-belief, effectively resisting his/her attempt to belittle you, or your achievement(s).
Now, it’s possible that when you do the above, such persons could turn around and label you “arrogant”.
In reality however, the truth is only INSECURE personalities would interprete your display of self-belief as arrogance!
Study great achievers the world over, from all walks of life, and you will notice they exhibit(ed) self-belief without apology – even as they readily acknowledge others – even bitter rivals – who exhibit the same trait.
It is my considered opinion therefore, that if anyone accuses you of being arrogant, when all you did was act or speak based on honest conviction about your abilities, the likely reason is that s/he suffers from a LACK of self-belief, which makes him/her feel inadequate or threatened by those who do not have such difficulty.
Simply put, s/he needs help building his/her self-esteem, so as to make the most of him/herself!
Here’s a good example I’ve used in a similarly themed article in the past:
As a young boxer Muhammad Ali (then called Cassius Clay) was bold, and unapologetic in the way he spoke about what he could do, AND who he could/would do it to e.g he habitually predicted who he would knockout and what round he would do it in!
That attitude got him booed a lot by boxing spectators in the arena during his fights. Yep. Check the records. Ali used to get booed despite being good – and he got called names too for his “talkative” nature e.g The Louisville Lip”.
But Ali believed too much in himself to take any serious notice. Instead he proved he was right by winning.
Time and time again over the course of his career he got quoted using taunting, provocative language designed to “mess” with his opponents minds.
Most importantly, Muhammad Ali repeatedly, defiantly, relentlessly, loudly and unapologetically called himself “The Greatest” right from when he won Olympic Gold at the age of 18, until he retired.
What the whole world calls him today is what he began calling himself decades before I.e “The Greatest Of All Time”!
Some (indeed many) of those who began by calling him arrogant over time saw that Ali was simply speaking the truth about his abilities as he saw it – and his performances PROVED he was right: he WAS the best!
This truth illustrated in Ali’s story, applies to Nigeria’s Fela Anikulapo Kuti.
Fela’s uncompromising demonstration of unapologetic self-belief – as a musical inventor and rights activist – is what propelled him to international stardom and now earned him legendary status in the global music industry.
It goes without saying that this same truth applies to every single authentic ahiever anywhere in the world – including YOU(if you work for it)!
Self-belief will make you unafraid to announce your strengths and achievements to others
“People don’t realise what they had until it’s gone. Like President Kennedy, nobody like him. Like The Beatles, there will never be anything like them. Like my man, Elvis Presley. I was the Elvis of boxing.” – Muhammad Ali
That’s self-belief right there in that quote!
if you have it, you won’t hesitate to make statements of fact about yourself and your abilities/accomplishments.
What’s more, you’d do it without worrying about what others might think or say.
Why?
Because you’d know it to be the truth!
Self-belief will also make you willing to take a stand on issues that matter
Muhammad Ali said he should be rememebered “As a man who never sold out his people. But if that’s too much, then just a good boxer”
Everyone knows how Ali famously refused to be drafted to fight in the Vietnam war, and how he later won a Supreme Court victory as a Religious Conscientious Objector.
After that he continued using his fame and fortune to challenge discrimination against black people.
He did not have to do all that, yet he did it – without bothering whose Ox was gored.
It takes tremendous self-belief to take a stand on serious issues in life
Ali had bucket loads of self-belief. So did Fela!
Little wonder that they lived the way they did – challenging the status quo. No wonder they are legends even in death today.
When next you worry about speaking your mind, about what you can do, remember Ali, Fela and others like them. They did not stifle the urge to speak truths they knew. Even when it cost them in terms of money, pain, loss of freedom etc – they kept speaking/acting with self-belief.
Follow their example and you will not go wrong.
And if fear grips your heart, read Marianne Williamson’s words (above) again, and be inspired!
SDN Blog™
New posts from last week*
Monday:
[Tuesday]:
[Wednesday]:
[Thursday]:
[Friday]:
[Spontaneous Coaching™] Practical Strategies you need to Achieve Your Goals at Will: The Secret to Becoming Super Productive!
[Saturday]:
Protected: Two Books You Need to Become a Highly Paid Professional Spreadsheet Software Developer
[Sunday]:
Protected: THE FARM CEO (Issue 53): Chlorophyll Meters for Nitrogen Fertilizer Management, Satellite Driven Tractor That Downloads Soil/Crop Data, Sensors, Food, Automation & Engineering
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Tayo K. Solagbade* Self-Development/Performance Improvement Specialist *Best Practice Farm Business Support Specialist & Founder of the MS Excel Heaven Visual Basic Automation Club and Competition Mobile: +234-803-302-1263 (in Nigeria) or +229-66-122-136 (in Benin Republic) Tayo K. Solagbade is a Location Independent Performance Improvement Specialist and Multipreneur (i.e. a highly versatile/multi-skilled entrepreneur), with a bias for delivering Best Practice solutions to Farm Businesses and others. Since 2002, he has earned multiple streams of income providing individuals and organizations with personal development training and coaching, custom MS Excel-VB solutions, web marketing systems/web hosting, freelance writing services, and best practice extension support services (for farm business owners). Tayo is the author of the Self-Development (SD) Bible™ and the popular Livestock Feed Formulation Handbook. He is also the developer of its accompanying Excel-VB driven Ration Formulator™ and the Poultry Farm Manager™ software. He has delivered talks/papers to audiences in various groups and organizations, including the Centre for Management Development, University of Lagos, Christ Baptist Church, Volunteer Corps, Tantalisers Fast Foods and others. In May 2012 he was the Guest Speaker at the Centre for Entrepreneurship Development’s Annual Semester Entrepreneurial Lecture at Yaba College of Technology in Lagos. On 1st April 2013, Tayo (who reads, write and speaks the French language) relocated to Cotonou, Benin Republic to begin slowly traveling across the West African region. His key purpose is to deliver talks, seminars and workshops on his key areas of focus and interest to interested audiences (Email tayo at tksola dot com for details). In a previous life, before leaving to become self-employed, Tayo served for seven years (October 1994 to December 2001) as a high performing manager in Guinness Nigeria. He rose from Shift Brewer to Training & Technical Development Manager, and later acted in senior roles as Production Manager and Technical Manager. In addition to constantly challenging the status quo and influencing positive work changes, he built a reputation for using self-taught spreadsheet programming skills (starting with Lotus 1-2-3, and later moving to Excel Visual Basic) – in his spare time – to develop Automated Spreadsheet Applications to computerize manual report generation processes in the departments he worked. Over four(4) of his applications were adopted for brewery level reporting. Tayo holds a B.Sc degree in Agricultural Extension Services from the University of Ibadan, Nigeria, having graduated top of his class – with Second Class Upper Division honors – in 1992. He is an Associate Member of the UK Institute & Guild of Brewing, a 1997 National Finalist of the Nigerian Institute of Management’s(NIM) Young Managers’ competition, a Certified Psychometric Test Administrator for Psytech UK, innovator of Spontaneous Coaching for Self-Development™ (SCfS-D™), and Founder of the Self-Development Academy (SDAc). When he’s not amazing clients with his superhuman skills (wink), Tayo works as the creative force behind his Daily Self-Development Nuggets blog – on which he also publishes The Farm CEO Weekly Newspaper (sent via email to paid subscribers) and his Weekly Performance Improvement IDEAS newsletter. You can connect with him on Twitter @tksola.com and Facebook. Visit Tayo Solagbade Dot Com, to download over over 10 performance improvement resources to boost your personal and work related productivity. ====
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