Leading By Example
Example may be the best method of education, but setting an example in an honest, correct, and proper manner is very difficult to do.
However, it is definitely worth it and can make sense of our existence.
As Stephen Covey said: “Your actions always speak louder and more clearly than your words”.
Facts are ways of making what we say happen. Saying something and doing another is a very quick way of discrediting yourself.
If you don’t really internalize what you’re saying, you’ll never be living in touch with the real.
Know what you want to be and what you want to do
First of all, we have to be convinced of what we want to be and what we want to do, if we are to be able to pass it on to others. Without this transcendental prerequisite, it will be impossible for us to be able to lead by example.
The brain and heart dichotomy, the alliance between reason and feelings, is essential to move in this direction.
Our whole being is not just thoughts, rationality and knowledge, or emotions and feelings. We need courage, understanding, but also sensitivity and a lot of love to achieve this.
If you are responsible, you will get there
People tend to be more receptive when they meet someone who is in charge.
When they perceive in a certain way the coherence between what she thinks, what she says and what she does, all is well.
We all need facts, rather than words, actions rather than just rhetoric.
We think and we think, we read and we read, but we do nothing. A lot of ideas seem interesting to us, but they are worthless until we implement them.
From talk to deed, there is a gap that can be huge. Preaching something without taking action will get you nowhere.
Don’t ask for what you don’t give
Undoubtedly, we need people who are convinced by what they do, people who take risks, and who are focused on developing their lives on many levels.
A father who wishes to instill the value of respect in his children, but who treats his own wife badly, is likely to fail in his educational goal.
When someone lies to us but asks for honesty from us, they are moving in the wrong direction.
It is not good to ask for something that you cannot give.
No one can teach others what they don’t know and don’t apply
Obviously, people who are examples of life are able to change the environment around them, the one in which they thrive.
They are anonymous leaders of existence, who thrive in what they do and who also allow others to grow.
The real example must show us how to do it and make us want to do it.
It contaminates us, like a disease, and then cleanses us. It makes us stronger and more resistant to the ups and downs of existence.
Unfortunately, when a person becomes an example to others, they become very demanding of him.
The smallest negative detail can tarnish its image and its good deeds. We are all more inclined to see flaws rather than good qualities, even if the person we are looking at is a role model of virtue.
We can see many parents who seek to educate their children without having educated themselves first.
They are trying to convey something that they have not really received or learned. They fail in great widths to instill in their children things that they do not know.
In fact, we all have a master and an apprentice within us. We are exemplary in some aspects of our life, but we also suffer from shortcomings, contradictions and voids.
Any process takes time
It is certain that there are exceptional beings who manage to achieve great coherence, and who make of their life a constant demonstration of the application of a very precise doctrine.
Gandhi became a true model of life and fought to the end for his convictions, to the point of turning the history of a nation upside down.
It is precisely Gandhi that this story deals with:
We cannot have everything right away in our existence. We cannot reach a goal without having gone through a certain trajectory.
Nothing we do to mature is in vain. It is transcendental work that no one will do for us. The choice is ours and belongs to no one else.
Images by Lisa Fallon, Art Dk
