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I recently heard a story about a man who was on his deathbed. As he lay in bed, he pondered over what he had achieved in his lifetime, and he concluded he had lived his life making no mistakes.
This was by far the man’s greatest and most virtuous achievement, having worked hard his whole life to always be right and perfect. He had spent eighty years in this pursuit, as it was really all that mattered to him. The man felt a tremendous sense of relief when he saw the enormity of what he had accomplished and the power of what his life had represented. This moment of realization was absolutely the best moment of the man’s life.
These eighty years were wasted. The man had limited his experiences because, in his pursuit of perfection, he was unwilling to take chances. His life had been cautious and plodding, and he had made sure that he was always correct in every action. Think about how many experiences this man must have missed, and how much richer his life would have been, had he been willing to take risks and had he been willing to be wrong. His life would have taken on an entirely new dimension and he would have been a completely different person altogether.
Most people are programmed like this man was, to believe in “safety first” and to always try to be and do right. Being a strong person who is effective in the world, however, requires that one understands and accepts his or her true nature and all his or her strengths and limitations. The man, on his deathbed, felt a profound sense of happiness and relief when he realized he had spent his entire life trying to be right–even though it had been at the expense of living a truly fulfilling life. Would you feel the same?
There is another story about a student who comes to a Zen master and asks him to reveal the secret of enlightenment.
The Zen master tells the student that after two years, he will reveal the secret. All the student needs to do is come to work for the Zen master. For the next year, the student cooks, cleans, and works very hard for the Zen master. After two years, the student asks the Zen master to reveal the secret of enlightenment.
“In one more year I will reveal it to you,” the Zen master says.
The Zen master gives the same response the following year and the year after that.
After five years have passed, the student becomes angry one evening and demands that the Zen master tell him the secret of enlightenment. Suddenly, without warning, the Zen master pushes the student off the ledge they are both standing on. The student grabs on to a piece of rock. It is nighttime and he cannot see what is below; he is terrified that he will fall to his death. The Zen master walks away, leaving the student there clinging for his life.
Soon the sun rises. The student looks down and sees he is hanging only a couple of inches from the ground. He experiences a profound shift in consciousness and becomes enlightened. He realizes that fear is only anticipation–and nothing more. The student had been hanging onto the ledge all night, fearful because of the false anticipation that something bad would happen to him if he were to let go.
This story is like that of the man on his deathbed. The dying man had spent his entire life in fear. He had feared what would happen to him if he were wrong. This fear kept him in bondage and prevented him from living the life he wanted. Just as the student of the Zen master was trapped by a false belief, so too is the man who spends his life trying to be right all the time.
Children, by nature, are extremely vulnerable. Children will fall down numerous times and will often get hurt. They need to be watched very carefully at all times. The reason for this is that the children’s nervous systems are unclogged. However, as children grow into adults, their nervous systems become clogged. This creates numerous defenses, and people begin constantly calculating how not to get hurt. As full-grown adults, people go to therapy or yoga; they exercise excessively; they drink, use drugs, and do all sorts of things in order to unclog their nervous systems. What is the drunk person, other than someone who has intentionally unclogged his nervous system for the time being, making himself vulnerable–and perhaps less fearful of making a mistake?
The journey for you to become successful begins with an awareness of where you are, and not an obsession with where you should be. To reach your potential, you must be willing to take a chance and to be wrong, and you need to understand the nature of who you are. For example, when we look at the leaders of the world around us, we generally see that they share a couple of common characteristics:
Let us take President Obama, for example. Obama has made a decision that he is going to reform healthcare in the United States. This is a decision, love it or hate it. Making decisions like this is the president’s job. In response to Obama’s decision, over the past several weeks, various politicians have been leading “town hall meetings” around the United States to discuss Obama’s healthcare plan. As it turns out, they are being viciously attacked in these meetings by their constituents. These politicians are being leaders, though, and in the course of being leaders, they make themselves vulnerable to attack or opposition. This is a major part of their job.
If you are going to change and reach your potential in your career and in your life, it is important to know the weaknesses that prevent you from becoming the person you are capable of being. Taking control of your career and life means taking self-leadership. In deciding to take self-leadership, you will need to become vulnerable. Being vulnerable means seeing and often exposing parts of ourselves that we may not be comfortable with, and it means getting out of our shells–like the turtle.
When you stop growing spiritually, emotionally, financially, and otherwise, you are not far from death. You need to see yourself as you really are and to confront this self so you can grow and evolve. Once you understand who you really are, and where you are in your life, then you can begin to grow. Finding and confronting the truth of who you are will set you free, and avoiding the truth will cause you suffering.
Learning about yourself demands that you become a warrior. What makes a warrior is a willingness to confront.The warrior has ruthless authority and knows how to take charge. The warrior encompasses the characteristics of decision making and vulnerability of the leader, but also has an aggression of thought. If you want to achieve success and breakthroughs in your life, it is important that you learn to take charge of yourself and your mind, and be a warrior.
You are probably standing in the way of your own success. I know that if I spend a short time getting to know you, I could start telling you exactly what is preventing you from becoming the person you are capable of being. This may be a very arrogant thing for me to say, but I have spent most of my life studying people and thinking about careers, and I have developed a pretty good sense of what is limiting people. And what is limiting most people is an unwillingness to learn to think in new ways, and an unwillingness to learn new things about themselves and the world around them.
I was with Anthony Robbins at a small event not too long ago and there was a man there who was extremely wealthy, to the tune of hundreds of millions of dollars. We were in a room of about twenty people and Tony made the man stand up, and he started asking him questions about himself. For over the next hour or so, Tony questioned the man in depth. Tony is incredibly brilliant, and at the end of the hour it became pretty obvious why this man has had numerous relationship problems, why he has had health problems, why he has had several addiction problems, and why the man has been living an unfulfilled life. This man had spent tens of thousands of dollars to be at this meeting with Tony, having flown all the way to Fiji. The next morning, the man hired a private plane to take him off the island, and he disappeared from the rest of the intimate meetings with Tony Robbins and the group. He was simply gone and had decided not to return. The reason, I am sure, was that Tony had forced the man to confront an aspect of himself that he did not want to see.
This is what is necessary for personal growth and to become the person you are capable of becoming. You will need to confront parts of yourself that you may not want to see. You may not even realize these parts of yourself exist, until you start to look deep within yourself.
I was at an event this weekend watching an Indian spiritual leader speak. The man started talking about how we do not make the most of our careers and our lives because we do not have clear enough goals. The lack of clarity of our goals is something that holds us back. As the man kept talking about this, I began to think of my own goals. I had set very aggressive goals for myself a couple of years ago and met most of them. However, since that time I have not set any new compelling goals. The more the man talked, the more uncomfortable I became. I told myself I was tired. I told myself I was hungry. I told myself that I did not need to hear any more of what the man was saying. Within an hour of having these thoughts, I was in my truck driving home. I had left an excellent seminar, having walked out due to the fact that I was being forced to confront an aspect of myself I did not want to confront.
Most of us are seeking achievement and fulfillment; however, we get in our own way and sometimes we prevent ourselves from becoming the person we are capable of becoming. I got in the way of myself this weekend. The man I met at the Anthony Robbins meeting got in the way of himself. Most of us run away from confronting who we are because we are not leaders or, more importantly, warriors. You need to be a warrior to confront the parts of yourself that are limiting your progress.
Why is knowledge of who we are important? The reason is that without a knowledge of who we are, we cannot achieve what we are capable of, we cannot change or grow, and we cannot be fulfilled:
And this brings me to you: What sort of person are you? The sort of person you are will generally be what prevents you from understanding who you are and what your weaknesses are. While there are a variety of people out there, of course, the chances are pretty good that you are either (1) a dabbler, (2) a cynic, (3) a fanatic, or (4) a utilitarian. Whichever one of these descriptions best describes you, it is preventing you from seeing your true self, and from learning who you are.
The most common sort of person is a dabbler. One of the largest weaknesses people have that prevents them from seeing who they are is the practice of dabbling.Many people dabble in jobs, they dabble in relationships; they dabble in hobbies; they dabble in exercise—being a dabbler is a way of life that many people consistently engage in.
Dabbler will only make a little progress in anything they undertake, and once whatever they are doing starts to illuminate who they are, they move on to something else. Most people do at least some dabbling. When I was growing up, I knew a couple of people through my family who were quite psychologically damaged. Therapy was recommended for them and they went. After a few sessions, they found reasons to no longer attend therapy sessions. The reason was that they were dabbling, and once the therapist started showing these people who they really were, the dabblers just moved on because they did not want to confront those parts of themselves that were difficult to accept and confront. Had these people been warriors, had they moved through the pain and the illumination process of discovering who they really were, I am confident the result would have been different for them. They would have grown through self-awareness.
A second sort of person is a cynic.A cynic is someone who believes that everyone is motivated by selfishness. For example, if the cynic sees an act of kindness, they believe there must be a hidden motive. They have a general distrust of the integrity and professed motives of others. A cynic is also habitually negative and believes nothing is possible.They tend to disagree with everything.I am sure you see many cynics out there. They are everywhere. You may be one of them.
Cynics typically find reasons why various things will not work. They look at everything as a challenge and do not believe that a proposed solution can possibly solve the challenge. Therefore, cynics never try anything. If someone suggests an idea to a cynic, the cynic will say it is not possible. Because the cynic is so negative and distrustful, he has a severe difficulty connecting with others, absorbing new ideas, and making progress. This general distrust of others keeps the cynic perpetually isolated.
A third sort of person is the fanatic. According to Winston Churchill, “A fanatic is one who can’t change his mind and won’t change the subject.” The fanatic is someone who believes everything to be wrong except what he believes.There is no openness to new ideas.It has to be the fanatic’s way or the highway.The fanatic worships her own ideas and is critical of all other ideas.A fanatic wants to convert everyone, so that they share the same ideas.You cannot learn, and therefore you cannot make progress if you are fanatic.
When you look at different political parties, you often see fanaticism. The more someone is a fanatic the more difficult it is to change. You may be a fanatic as well. If you are a fanatic and unwilling to learn, this is a serious issue.The fanatic believes that everyone else is unwise.The fanatic will do everything and anything within her power to perpetuate her idea.The behavior of the fanatic is easy to predict and to identify.
The fourth sort of person is the utilitarian. Utilitarians believe that the value of something comes down to its utility. Utilitarians are open to learning, suffering, working, and so forth–as long as it is of benefit to them.They will always ask why they should do something in order to understand how, precisely, it will benefit them (or others). Utilitarians are very self-driven, and being a utilitarian is, in many respects, akin to being a logical businessperson.
However, if we are evaluating the worth of each action, then we are not going to always be open to new ideas–because it is difficult for us to completely understand what a new idea may mean to us if we have not yet experienced it. When we are constantly analyzing, judging, and trying to make utilitarian distinctions, we are generally not making the right distinctions because we do not have all the knowledge necessary to make complete decisions.
In contrast to the utilitarian, the warrior and the leader plow through, regardless of the results they may be likely to attain. The warrior and the leader do not have complete information about what their results may be, but they persist anyway. This is the kind of bold risk taking that is needed to grow and evolve, and to experience your life and yourself fully.
Learning is the process of unlearning. In order to unlearn, you will need to understand your weaknesses, which are preventing you from discovering your true self. The chances are almost certain that you, like me, and like the man at the seminar, are running away anytime your true self is being illuminated. We all resist the people, places, and things that challenge us to look at our true selves.
You can do, be, and achieve anything you want in your life if you understand who and what you are. Do not stand in the way of your own progress.
THE LESSON
See yourself as you actually are, then confront this self so that you can grow and evolve. When you see yourself as you truly are, you will probably find that you are standing in the way of your own success. Once you identify them, confront the parts of yourself that are limiting your success. Once you accomplish this, you will no longer stand in the way of your own progress, but rather stand to achieve your goals.
About Harrison Barnes
Harrison Barnes is the Founder of BCG Attorney Search and a successful legal recruiter himself. Harrison is extremely committed to and passionate about the profession of legal placement. His firm BCG Attorney Search has placed thousands of attorneys. BCG Attorney Search works with attorneys to dramatically improve their careers by leaving no stone unturned in a search and bringing out the very best in them. Harrison has placed the leaders of the nation’s top law firms, and countless associates who have gone on to lead the nation’s top law firms. There are very few firms Harrison has not made placements with. Harrison’s writings about attorney careers and placements attract millions of reads each year. He coaches and consults with law firms about how to dramatically improve their recruiting and retention efforts. His company LawCrossing has been ranked on the Inc. 500 twice. For more information, please visit Harrison Barnes’ bio.
About BCG Attorney Search
BCG Attorney Search matches attorneys and law firms with unparalleled expertise and drive that gets results. Known globally for its success in locating and placing attorneys in law firms of all sizes, BCG Attorney Search has placed thousands of attorneys in law firms in thousands of different law firms around the country. Unlike other legal placement firms, BCG Attorney Search brings massive resources of over 150 employees to its placement efforts locating positions and opportunities that its competitors simply cannot. Every legal recruiter at BCG Attorney Search is a former successful attorney who attended a top law school, worked in top law firms and brought massive drive and commitment to their work. BCG Attorney Search legal recruiters take your legal career seriously and understand attorneys. For more information, please visit www.BCGSearch.com.
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Tagged: apply for a job, attorney search, career advice, job blog | a harrison barnes, job search, legal career, legal jobs, legal profession, life progress, new jobs, personal achievement, personal growth
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The ability to fit into your work environment is among the most important parts of obtaining and retaining a job, even more so than your skill level. Fitting in means nothing more than being comfortable in one’s work environment, and making others similarly comfortable. Employers want to hire people who will embrace their approach to business and the world on physical and moral levels, so you must strive to fit in with their worldview.
Focus on what you are doing, not what others around you are doing. There are people to take action towards their goals, and then there people who sit on the sidelines and comment on the first group of people. People who are mostly interested in gossip and watching others usually lack the confidence and determination to take action themselves. The most successful people go account and accomplish things rather than sit back and watch others make things happen.
In this article, Harrison advises you to live the lives you wish to have, do the jobs you want to do, and basically live your dreams to your best possible ability. Life is fleeting and no one knows what tomorrow holds. So Harrison puts forward certain questions – when are you going to start living the life you want and when are you going to take charge of your life. The time to have the career you want is right now, not tomorrow, and not later. You need to take charge of your career and life and no one else is going to do it for you. Your entire life and the quality of it is a product of your decisions. You can have, do, or be anything you want. Do not create alibis for making comprises in life. What separates the best and the happiest people is the ability to stop to making excuses and Harrison wants you to be this person.
Anyone can be up when things are going well, but the real challenge comes when things are not. Do not look at problems, which are inevitable for any person or business, in a negative light; think of them instead as challenges, lessons, or opportunities. There is a silver lining to be found in every problem, and finding that silver lining will enable you to grow.
Understanding what you do for a living is very important for your career. You should understand the generality of your specific profession. You and your career are a product. You need to know where and how to market yourself in the best way possible. You need to be relevant and understand the skills you are offering. Being a relevant product is essential for your success. It’s easy to be relevant when you understand what you are doing and what purpose you serve. Being relevant is more than just getting a job. Being relevant also relates to serving the employers with the skills they need. You need to understand your market and what your customers want. This is the way to stay employed, and it is also the means to continual improvement.
Things will not always go the way that you want them to go, so you must not be discouraged by adversity in your job hunt. When you persist and consistently put forth your best effort, things are much more likely to go in your favor. Also, you must resist others’ efforts to undermine your efforts and potential; focus instead on doing everything in your power to fight on and complete the task at hand.
Having a goal or vision will propel you towards greater career success and happiness. Without a purpose, you will find yourself depressed and ultimately fail to achieve your goals. Do not subscribe to the unrealistic problem that you should never have problems, but instead regard problems as part of your overall growth strategy.
Don’t ever give up, and make the most of the tools at your disposal. Take chances and invest in your best skills, and persist in the face of unfortunate events. Have faith in your considerable work and capabilities, and use them to create value for others.
In this article Harrison discusses what a good hiring manager should look for. Many people who make hiring decisions really do not know what they are doing. In fact, they often make mistakes when hiring. They put too much emphasis on skills and experience. But the single most important aspect of hiring is evaluating the person’s unique outlook on the world. If the person does not have a positive outlook on the world, he/she will bring down the morale of the other workers. The person will harm the company through the negative outlook. The key to success is having the power to stick it out in jobs and finding happiness wherever you are. Hiring people who do good work and are always able to find happiness should be the number one objective of hiring managers.
To reach the goals to which you aspire, you must compare yourself with people superior to you for motivation. Most people prefer to look at life the way they wish it to be, rather than as it truly is. Move out of your comfort zones and face reality. Don’t seek out or compare yourself with the average people around you, as doing so will only mire you in mediocrity rather than push you forward.
You can better market yourself by taking a stand against something. Peoples’ personal beliefs, including the things with which they do not agree, define who they are as people. Standing against something differentiates you from the crowd; when done in the correct manner, without disrespecting others’ opinions, such a stance can help you land your dream job.
Maintaining a routine in both life and work is important to success. Not only do you need to establish a routine, you must make that routine demanding and push yourself to the limit. Budget a certain amount of time each week for networking, applying to jobs, brushing up your interview skills, and following up with employers. Such consistent effort on a daily basis will make a huge difference to your career success.
A recommendation from a powerful person can make a huge difference in your job search; a reference from an influential person makes a tremendous difference to a prospective employer, and thus can be a major advantage for you. When an important person whom the company trusts recommends you, you instantly qualify for positions that may previously have been unattainable. Make the absolute most of your connections with the powerful people in your life, because doing so can instantaneously change your career and life.
You must plant seeds in the minds of others, so that they will be more likely than otherwise to think of you when a future need arises. In planting seeds, you are making people aware of what you have to offer; you must make sure that you are ever present in the minds of your potential employers. Planting seeds is the most effective way to generate top-of-mind awareness, and ensure that the right people remember you at the appropriate time.
Recent immigrants exemplify the benefits of willpower, passion, and excitement in the way that they work so much harder for their goals than the people who have been here for most or all of their lives. Like most Americans, you need to rekindle the spirit of your immigrant ancestors and become hungry for what you want. The entrepreneurial spirit that brought people to America has often faded over time; adopt the fire and work ethic of new immigrants in order to achieve your goals.
Determine whether you are a global or specific person. Most people are either too general or too specific in the way they treat information, and overly detail-oriented people risk losing sight of the bigger picture. General people are more comfortable in managerial positions, while detail-oriented people prefer everything to conform to a logical sequence. Understand which sort of person you are, and seek work that best harnesses your natural inclination.
In this article Harrison talks about releasing the lack that you feel, in order to reach your full potential. If a sense of lack dominates your thinking, it will affect your interaction with the world and how the world sees you. There are many areas of your life where you are coming from a position of lack. Your ability to release this lack and go forward with your life can create a tremendous sense of peace and more natural accomplishments in your world. The amount of lack that people see out there is profound and it has a massive impact on their lives. According to Harrison, the most successful people in the world see the world as a place of opportunity and not lack.
When faced with difficult times, you must develop the ability to transcend the trouble around you instead of giving up or assuming that nothing can be done about your situation. Keep your wits about you and take charge of the situation, and you will find yourself on track for constant improvement and career success.
It is extremely important that you enjoy your job. Most people find themselves in jobs that they resent, and eventually make this resentment known by appearing disinterested and distracted. Success comes from being engaged in and grateful for your work. You can define your job according to your own vision; you can either choose to engage with your work, or avoid and despise what you do. People recognize and appreciate those who are enthusiastic about their work.
Your résumé is an extremely important document. There are entire books written about how to craft them. I have written at least one myself. There are scores of résumé consultants, companies, and others that will work on your résumé for a fee. Hiring one of these services can be useful and can improve your résumé. Nevertheless, most résumés can improve dramatically by following the below advice.
In this article Harrison explains how you can do better in your career by selling. The most successful people are absolute masters at sales. Selling is among the most important career skills you can have. When you know how to sell something you can do exceptionally well wherever you go. Knowing how to sell something is a key to survival, advancement, fame, and fortune. Everything we do is about making a sale. Selling yourself is about showing others the value you can bring them. So package yourself to the best of your ability, always be at your best and sell yourself. Develop your sales skills and do not be afraid to sell anything. Whatever your goal in life, becoming an effective salesman will help you achieve it.
It is absolutely vital to be in control of your life and career. When you fail to control your life, someone else will step in to do so and fit your life into their plans. Understand that it is in others’ interests to establish control over your life and work, and instead exert control yourself over your life and the events around you.
Do not be a dabbler, or someone who turns away in the face of stress; the secret to long-term happiness is to instead confront and push through these stress factors. Do not be discouraged by difficulties, but find ways to persist and deal with the stress. Confronting problems head-on is the key to improvement, and will take you much further than the dabblers who fail to approach their careers with commitment.
In this article Harrison discusses how persistent pursuit of something you believe in, against all obstacles, is one of the most important keys to success. So many of us just decide at some point not to push through and not to keep going even when a little bit of extra effort would push us through. The secret to being incredibly good at everything is pushing through and getting better and better when others around you are quitting. Even while hiring, employers want experts and people who are the best at what they are doing–they do not want dabblers. They want to hire the person who is incredibly committed to a job and has persisted against odds in one direction when others have given up.
In this article Harrison suggests that you actually may be safer getting a job without the help of family or friends. It is exceedingly rare that a friend or family member will ever be able to get you a position. They may not even want to help you get a job for various reasons. Their involvement in your job search may actually hurt you. The organization may actually look upon you negatively if you try to use a friend or family member to get a job. So going through a close contact is often counterproductive to your job search. Even if you get a position through a friend or family member, you could harm your relationship with that person in the process. Your friend or family member’s act of kindness may ultimately unbalance your relationship. The risks involved in this kind of job far outweigh the potential rewards.
A powerful sense of self will make all the difference in your life. You must understand that your sense of yourself and your capabilities come from inside of you, not from the external forces that have brought you to your current place in life. What you feel internally might be completely different from what the world is telling you, and you must learn to focus on the former rather than the latter.
In this article, Harrison explains the importance of making an effort in your job which is way above what is expected of you. When you have been given certain responsibilities, it means that someone is dependent on you for certain things. When you fulfill these duties far more efficiently, put in a lot more time and effort, and even stay back on weekends and holidays to complete or do extra work, your employers get the message that you are sharing their burden of pressures with them and begin to place tremendous trust in you. This is what paves the path to your promotion and growth in the company. Harrison believes that you need to develop the correct attitude and possess an extraordinary work ethic to thrive in the job you do.
In this article Harrison discusses how resisting change and not taking necessary and relevant action can be the biggest obstacles to a better career and better life. Resistance is something that prevents most people from ever changing. Resisting change can be highly damaging to your growth in your career and life. Instead of allowing your life to be controlled by external circumstances, choose to take action and bring about a change. Conduct a brutal self analysis if needed, to clear the blocks you have in your mind and to bring about change that is necessary. Most people give up. They do not persist. You need strategies and beliefs that will allow you to persist and persevere, so that you can change. The best strategy is to be focused, and this focus will help you overcome the resistance you face whenever you make an effort to begin changing.
Adopting a positive attitude will always bring you closer to success, as nobody wants to be associated with a losing side. Everyone wants to associate with and hire winners, and avoids losers. Nothing is more important than maintaining a positive attitude, as many employers hire people based primarily on attitude; with the right attitude, everything else will fall into place. You must look like you are on the winning team, even if times are tough; nobody wants to hire a loser.
The past does not dictate the future, so you should not use inductive reasoning to make conclusions about your life or career. Recognize when you are making incorrect conclusions based on past events, and switch to deductive reasoning in which you are not limited by the past. You will find your conclusions to be much more accurate, and you will succeed as a result.
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the article “Do Not Stand in the Way of Your Own Progress” we can learn many things which we do not know by this article, the is really a very good one.
I’ve really thought over this article and I offer two points. (1) If you spend too much time learning about yourself, you may find out you are less than what you thought you were; and (2) in this regard, we should learn from the bumblebee:
“Aerodynamically the bumblebee shouldn’t be able to fly, but the bumblebee doesn’t know that so it goes on flying anyway.” Mary Kay Ash
My Bottome Line: GO OUT, DO YOUR VERY BEST AND DON’T WORRY ABOUT WHO YOU ARE. JUST FLY!
Thanks for the message that “fear is only anticipation.” I have been trying to explain that sensation all of my life!
Ya learn smoetnhig new everyday. It’s true I guess!