Encouraging Dreams

Mark Twain once said, “Keep away from those who try to belittle your ambitions. Small people always do that, but the really great make you believe that you too can become great.”  These small people are the people who have nothing going on and who jealous of your ambitions. They put people down or try to convince others that their dream is unreachable. This allows them to feel better about staying in their comfort zone and never taking any action.

Be sure that you’re not one of these people. When you see someone who has a big dream which seems impossible to achieve, don’t criticize them, uplift them. The big dreams are the ones that need the most uplifting.

Sometimes we can become dream killers and not even know it. It may be a quick comment or quick joke, but even these small short words can kill someone’s ambitions. Quick careless word’s are powerful and can easily kill someone’s ambitions. “It is with words as with sunbeams, the more they are condensed, the deeper they burn,” wrote Robert Southey. So, how do we make sure we never demotivate someone in their dreams? Remember to always uplift and never give off-handed criticism.

Personal Change

Personal change is a very long process. In fact, it’s a lifelong process. You never stop changing or growing. You never stop bettering your character. I find that there are four basic steps of the change process.

First, recognizing what you need to change. This is what guides you. This gives you the focus of what you need to improve on to grow your character. Besides asking a trusted person, thinking about what happened in you day will give you a good idea of what you need to work on. For instance, you usually know right off the bat when you realize that what you just did was pretty stupid. Any regret you might feel about your behavior will indicate something you might want to change. Also, you can recognize what you need to change by asking yourself these questions: How does the environment change when you’re participating? How do others react? Sometimes you don’t need to search hard; it might just be right in front of you. Recognizing what you need to change is extremely important to improving your character.

Second, actually wanting to change. Do you actually want to change what you’re doing than just knowing what it is and letting it go? Do you really feel that you want to do something differently?

Now here is when it gets a little tougher. Okay so, you found what you need to do differently and you actually want to fix it, what do you do now? Where do you go from here? This is the third step; this is when you need to start changing. Keep in mind, at all times, what you want to change and be alert when you might slip into the old behavior you don’t like. Immediately divert from it and begin doing the behavior you want to make a habit.

The fourth step is just a reinforcement of the third step. Keep being alert and try hard not to do it until your form a new habit. Persistence is the key. Soon, you should be able to stop doing the thing that you really don’t want to do anymore.

By following these steps, you will be able to conquer the things you want to change and keep improving yourself more and more.

A Prairie Dog Language?

Scientists have recently discovered that prairie dogs seem to have a language of their own. In their language they can tell other prairie dogs if there is a predator around, what kind of predator it is (coyote, hawk, etc), and even the color of the predator!

For 30 years, Professor Con Slobodchikoff and his colleagues have been recording the calls of the prairie dogs. They have found that prairie dogs have been confronted by so many different predators so often, that they have, over time, developed a way to accurately describe the predators. These “words” can be used to say, "tall, skinny coyote in distance, moving rapidly towards colony".

Professor Slobodchikoff and his team believe that prairie dogs can do this by slightly alternating the accents and of the call and the harmonics in the bark. This allows them to “say” a lot of information in a very short amount of time. Prof Slobodchikoff says, "Prairie dogs have the most complex natural language that has been decoded so far. They have words for different predators, they have descriptive words for describing the individual features of different predators, so it's a pretty complex language that has a lot of elements."

Five Characteristics of a Successful Leader

Being a successful leader means that you are always concerned about others well being before your own. I have laid out five main factors of what makes a leader successful:

1. Be encouraging. Don’t put down someone’s work and make yours better. Uplift them and give positive input.

2. Listen. Listen to what others say. Let them share their views and thoughts and don’t put them down.

3. Be accepting. Don’t fall for what others say about the new guy. Again, be encouraging. Respect their beliefs or views. Don’t distance yourself from them just because they’re different from you.

4. Keep a positive attitude. I mean, who wants to be around someone who is always talking about how something is so bad or has a negative air about themselves?

5. Always do the right thing. Don’t be pulled into doing something that you know that’s wrong. It might be fun at the time, but it will just end badly.

Meeting Scott McKain!

This summer I finally had the chance to meet Mr. Scott McKain! He’s a great speaker and business man and has been very supportive. You can read more about him on his web site.

Mr. McKain says that we need to focus on what really makes a difference. Anything you do gets better when you get better; and when you work as hard on yourself as you do your business. He wrote a book called, Collapse of Distinction about standing-out and not being mediocre. You create distinction by developing clarity, creativity, communication, and a customer-experience focus. You can’t be all things to all people. You can read a review of his book here.

3D Printer

Video Description: 3D printing is a form of additive manufacturing technology where a three dimensional object is created by laying down successive layers of material. 3D printers are generally faster, more affordable and easier to use than other additive manufacturing technologies. 3D printers offer product developers the ability to print parts and assemblies made of several materials with different mechanical and physical properties in a single build process. Advanced 3D printing technologies yield models that can serve as product prototypes.

Serving the Community

Serving your community doesn’t always have to be some huge project. It can be something small, like a change of attitude. Serving doesn’t just pertain to just your community, it can be your school and home too. Serving your community also means inspiring your community to do better.

Well, how do we do that? Like I said earlier, changes and improvements don’t need to be a huge ordeal. In fact sometimes, the small improvements are just as a good or even more significant than the changes that are huge. Of course, I am not saying that big events are not good; it’s just that the smallest improvements can be just as important. Leo Nikolaevich Tolstoy once said, “Everyone thinks of changing the world, but no one thinks of changing himself.”

Here are some things that you can do to improve the community that you are in. First, change your attitude or outlook on things. To do this, be positive. Take things you don't want to do and look at them in a way that's constructive and uplifting. Second, be aware of your behavior and how you come across. Don’t try to cause problems and make things difficult. This only causes tension in the community. That tension can crumble the community. Third, get to know other people that are outside of your close circle of friends. Getting to know more people connects more and different people and builds the community.

Just by doing something simple you can make a great impact on your community, school, or home.

More leadership and personal development articles like this at Leader: Me!