This step is about humility. Something everybody seems to think they have.
The first principle he gives is that the world is full of people with outward humility. I see that as self deprecating… it seems everyone does that to some extent. But true humility would be something like what Michael Jordan had, which was not outwardly visible. Only the people closest to him observed that they never saw anyone so teachable, so willing to take direction and make it instinctually part of who he is…
on the surface he appeared to be cocky. He was that guy who was the first one there and the last one to leave.
I see that true humility is truly reflected in actions, not words… getting a mentor, showing up early to practice or training, learning from other people, reading books to learn, taking notes – all actions.
Self deprecation doesn’t seem to have anything to do with humility.
This is perfectly reflected in that parable he talks about… one son said what his dad wanted to hear but did nothing. The other said he wouldn’t, but then he acted and did out of humility.
Also in the example of Sam Walton being the one person who responded to the inquiry from the Brazilian group who was looking to learn… he treated them like family, picked them up, brought them to his home, and asked as many questions of them as they did of him, to learn. He was humble enough to consider that maybe they had some idea he hadn’t thought of, maybe there was something for him to learn.
That is definitely not something that is common. It also shows the passion he had for his business, that led him to not want to leave any stone unturned where he might learn something to improve it… he never stopped working at improving it, there seemed to never be a point where he felt like he ‘arrived’… it seems he saw it as a lifelong process, even at the billion dollar level.
Interestingly, the people Tai references who behaved similarly were the top of the top of the top of their field… .Michael Jordan, Marriott Jr., Jeff Bezos, his millionaire CEO friend who made himself flash cards to learn accounting… there’s definitely something to learn and emulate there.
When I look in my own circle of people, it’s true that the most humble of them are the wealthiest of them. I once thought I was humble, but I see I’m right there in the mix of ordinary people who self-deprecate and have it in words only… not action.
Michael Jordan said that his greatest skill was being TEACHABLE… I think there’s a principle there. A man of such tremendous skill, but it would have been the teachability that enabled him to develop it to the extent that he did.
A principle here is that everybody wants the good life, but not everybody gets it… .not unless they are humble and teachable like Sam Walton and Michael Jordan and also Jeff Bezos, who studied Sam Walton.
There’s another great principle in, the more you know, probably the less you know. WOW. This is so true. Nobody knows more than I do that cramming more and more information into the brain does not make a person know any more.
Another good one is that our success is an outgrowth of the amount of humility we have. That one is sobering… it’s so ironic that it’s the ones like me that don’t know anything that lack the humility.
Interesting that Ray Croc ended up with McDonald’s solely by acknowledging that they knew how to do something he didn’t know how to do. He didn’t copy their plan, didn’t try to build something better from scratch. He allowed himself to learn from what they were doing.
I’ve been more like the guy who sits down with Tai about a billion dollar idea, never having launched even a $1000 idea.
I think it’s also a principle that almost everyone who’s ever done anything of significance had a mentor… .that the people who change the world have mentors. My goal for the rest of these steps, is for my humility score to go up. Why is that that some people are such failures but so cocky? Here he talks about Freud’s theory that life is too hard for people, too painful & disappointing for people to deal with without some escape addiction.
So saying ‘oops I messed up’ triggers too much fear, that comes from something painful that happened in our past.
It’s interesting that in twins, one being bullied actually changed their DNA to where it was different than the other twin’s. There’s a principle in: whatever it is that we want is going to have to come from overcoming that great fear.
Interesting that we all originally came basically humble and inquisitive, and that it’s through the different traumatic experiences that it starts to go away so we can protect ourselves. There’s a great principle in, the words we say are unimportant…
it’s the hours and the dollars that we invest in learning what it takes to find the good life that are significant.
There’s also a good principle that life is short – you can’t replenish time, unfortunate for me, but I’m fortunate that there may still be some time left to accomplish something. I think it’s also a principle that we must become humility in ACTION, not words. I like the idea of looking for ONE piece of gold in each person or book.
He mentions some good things I can do to put this into action -going to to seminars, finding people doing what we want to be doing. First I will try to find what I want to be doing.
Probably the most important principle here is, we are the only ones who can make this change for our lives. If it’s to be, it’s up to me… .if I want to experience earning my own living, having a life, becoming a person, it can only come from me.
I’m glad I re-did this one, this was pretty timely for me.
Thank you,
Jodie