John Maxwell Confidence, Courage & Decision Making

as we go to g2 let's review what the first G is about 3G leaders are grounded they have a foundation that makes them solid and we've studied through the three qualities of a grounded leader our humility they have an understanding of their place in light of God and others authenticity they are comfortable in their own skin and 3 they have a calling they have a purpose that is bigger than themselves the second G is growing the great leaders are growing they have a hunger that makes them stretch stay with me in the paragraph a growing leader is a little wiser today than it was yesterday he never stops learning he never stops reflecting he's not afraid of change because he knows that growth is dependent on it he is more concerned about getting better than being perfect he is constantly looking to improve himself and the people around him so I sat down and I spent a great deal of time on this lesson because you know I quote their law 15 laws or growth I talked a lot about growth and let me give you a little bit of my thought process before I teach it today is I thought about you and how important you are to me and and I thought about the vitality that growth brings I began to ask myself what aren't the areas that a person has got to make sure that they grow it I suppose we can grow in a lot of areas but if you're going to be really good you got to get it down to a few areas where you say these are essential to my success and what are they and so I had the most wonderful day Margaret and I have a cottage up in Highlands North Carolina it's in the mountains and it just lets me get away and I took my legal pad and I asked myself for an entire day John what are the essential elements what are the essential areas that a person really needs to grow in to be successful let me give them to you number one is confidence confidence I love this humorous thought on confidence that I have next confidence is the uplifting feeling you have before you truly understand the situation hey by the way sugar hands how many of you been there before huh you just feel so confident you feel so good you know whoops whoops okay great leaders are confident in themselves they're confident in their vision and they're confident in people and the result of that confidence in themselves their vision and the people the result of that is that the people have confidence in their leader a confident leader gives people confidence in fact I'm gonna do a whole lesson on this next statement because when I had my legal pad and I was spending my day just thinking on this I realized once I made this next statement that I was on to something I've got to go tap into my mind a little bit more and pull it out we think of leaders sometimes and we think oh they're so charismatic and we think of charisma as a personality listen to me very carefully because what I'm gonna say is gonna help some of you confidence is the core of charisma when you see a person that has charisma the core of that ability to be free and open and enjoy their life the very core of that is that they are confident in themselves and I remember so well let me tell you a quick story I remember so well this would be Ohama this be in the 1970s and Margaret I were going somewhere and so I stopped at McDonald's they didn't have a drive-through that I mean it's where you got off the car and you went in and I wanted to get something to eat and I want to get a Diet Coke and so I went in and I asked for a Diet Coke and I'll never forget the girl behind the counter said we don't have Diet Coke we just have coke that's okay then I'll tell you what I don't want that just give me a cup full of ice and she looked at me said oh I don't think I could do that sir and we she's looking on her little deal and there's no place where you punch a cup of ice and oh so she said why I said I don't think I don't I don't think we could do that and I smiled real confident to her at her and I said yes you can and I'll never forget she liked you since it okay okay and she she went over and she got a cup she got an ice she's happy as a clam gave it to me and I thanked her very much and and and awful with and as I walked back to the car all of a sudden I realized what confidence does for people they she can you can do that never thought of it before I would wish for every one of you today as a coach to really become a confident person if you want a marketing plan nothing sells like confidence nothing once you're confident and you truly know that you can help people once you truly know that you can add value I can tell you I can look people right in the eye and I can say with all the integrity world trust me I can take you to a whole new level in your life I'm not BS in them I'm not delusional on drugs no and guess what they do they buy into that confidence so I begin to ask myself what are the confidence killers if we're gonna grow in it we got it nowhere to clear the weeds don't we the number one confidence killer is low self-image I don't think I can rises from a deeper I don't think I am I don't think I can rises from a deeper I don't think I am lower self-worth translates into 37% less willingness to negotiate and use of 11% fewer negotiation strategies increased self-worth correlates with a greater willingness to incur the risk of prolonged negotiation and greater adaptability this is a powerful statement on negotiation you won't even go and negotiate if you don't have the confidence in short the less confidence you have in yourself the faster you will give up trying to get what you want that's a fact when I see a person that quits quickly they have low self confidence low self-esteem that's why they quit fear is another killer of confidence you see confidence comes from not always being right but not fearing to be wrong when you render a confident person the confident person isn't always right they just don't fear being wrong I could tell you every day I'm confident about a lot of decisions now some of the decisions I'm confident about aren't the best decisions but I don't look at myself and say well what happens if I fail what happens if I'm wrong I it just doesn't bother me I don't fear that failure there's a popular cliche that says you don't know what you can do until you try I like that you never try until you know what you can do confidence releases the risk confidence releases the risk all my life I've tried to share my confidence with others all my life I've tried to bring people that were maybe had a little bit more timidity about decision-making in life and go alongside of them who arm around him and say hey I'll loan you my confidence for a while let's go let's go do it the third confidence killer the first one okay this is good is low self-image and then there's fear the third confidence killer is other people's opinion of you that will suck confidence out of your body if you worry about what people think of you it's because you have more confidence in their opinion than you have of your own and I see people all the time say well wonder what they're going to think well what will they think who gives a crap listen to me my name's John I'm your friend since when since when did you always feel so low in your self-image that you lowered your opinion yourself so much that you let somebody else walk in your life and trample all over it they don't have that right and yet I see people do it all the time when you get confidence you won't let people walk all over you you won't let people take advantage of you you won't let people all the time manipulate you you won't become a victim of everybody else in and kind of well I'd this is kind of the way it is you're going to meet the most wonderful person in the world tomorrow morning when you meet my father I respect my father more than any human being in this world he's truly the greatest man I know I love him more than life itself and when you see him and you hear him tomorrow you're gonna fall in love with him because who he is is greater than what he says he's an amazing person and I was in an organization that was hurting my growth how is it an organization where negativity reigned and it was full of dysfunction and I was a young kid who really wanted to make a difference and every time I tried to make a difference it's this number you know what I'm saying that I'd raise up and get I get pounded back down and I would pull away and I try again because it's all I knew it's where I got educated it's where all my friends were and my father was the most influential person in that organization he wasn't like those people I grew up in an amazing environment but in that little environment I grew up all around me was poison and I can remember at 33 deciding I had to leave that organization it wasn't hard to leave the organization but that meant I had to go to my father and tell him that I was gonna leave what he loved and what he knew and what he had hoped for me because I was the kid everybody said would follow my father's footsteps and I had to go walk into my father's life and say dad I'm not following your footsteps here I'm leaving this organization now I wanted his blessing but I can still remember telling Margaret I pray for his blessing but if I don't get it I'm going anyway that day is as clear as if it was yesterday it was a half a life ago I was 66 I was 33 then I made appointment with my dad at his office and I sat down for three hours and I wept like a baby and I said goodbye to the people I knew and to the school I knew and to the church I knew and to the culture I knew and I looked at my father I said dad I'm going you can't talk me out of it can I have your blessing now fortunately for me he loved me and gave me his blessing but let me tell you what I did to my dad my father for the next six months had to explain his son to all of those people there are some of you in this room you'll never rise to your potential until you get rid of the people in your life are you hearing me you had better get some courage or you're going to suck around and live in a leper colony and wonder why you never get home if I could do anything for you I would walk into your life and I would breathe courage into your life and courage is a result of confidence you have never seen a courageous person that didn't have confidence it is not the difficulties that defeatist is the lack of confidence in ourselves the defeatist confidence is the cornerstone of leadership Clarence Randall said the leader must know must know that he knows and must be able to make it abundantly clear to those around him that he knows I was privileged when the Soviet Union was about to fall I was invited to come and speak in the Kremlin I was one of the first maybe the first but within question one of the first two or three people to get a go into the palace inside the Kremlin and speak words of freedom and liberty to a country that had 70 years of dictatorship and oppression our guide was a girl named Anna and Margaret and I and our two children were there for about five or six days and Anna stayed with us the whole time and she was a delightful young lady and she was so proud because if you'll remember when the tanks came in when the tanks came in to try to settle that whole dispute and and it came to a kind of a crisis point in the Kremlin if you remember Boris Yeltsin went out and here's the story when those tanks came in from the army they were under the order to arrest Boris Yeltsin and Boris Yeltsin walked out climbed on that first tank open the hatch and shook the guy's hand and said I want to thank you for coming over on our side and helping us free the people and the commander said his confidence caught us unaware and when he left we talked among ourselves and decided to help him it's one of the great confidence stories that has ever been done and told in the history of mankind now that's what confidence will do for you confidence will allow you to go on top of a tank open the hatch and thank the guy that was there to shoot you for joining your side I love that story every time and Anna are my little Anna guy she would just cry and she said she said I was there I was in the square the day that it happened and I love that confidence stimulates creativity that discovers answers confidence will stimulate a creativity that will discover the answer Teddy Roosevelt said whenever you're asked if you can do a job tell them certainly I can and then get busy and find out how to do it I've done this all my life there's never been a week go by in my life I haven't told somebody yes and smiled and shook their hand then and walked away and said now I got to figure out what to do good energy gosh I just said yes wonder how I do this the second thing that you need to grow in confidence will just confidence will change your life the second area is courage and I would like to cook you to consider these thoughts about courage today courage is the willingness to let go of the familiar what you have no one and what you have done hinders you from being what you could become life expands or shrinks in proportion to your courage stay with me in your notes now many many great things have begun with a single act of courage throughout history and today a person steps out and makes one courageous decision and that one domino starts many other dominoes following Stanley said this is my friend Andy we have to step out and take the first step and we may never know the ripple effect that that one courageous decision catalyst leaders your decision is to do something courageous and it may result in something greater than you ever imagined step out courage is not waiting for your fear to go away we know this we know this at the gut level but many times fear still holds us back fear in leadership usually is connected to the uncertainty about the future but uncertainty about the future is never going to go away I tell leaders all the time uncertainty is why they are leaders uncertainty gives you job security whenever there's uncertainty there will always be a need for leaders which means always stepping out in the unknown which always requires courage I love this statement courage was like moving the Domino's and I read people hear this and well I'm not certain about kennys leaders are always uncertain we're never sure but that doesn't eliminate courage its courage that gets people to move not certainty courage is living one's convictions in the face of fear fear it can be a speed bump but it shouldn't be a stop sign the Bible never says the courage and fear are mutually exclusive in fact the most courageous acts take place despite fear the book of Hebrews expresses this quite graphically stand firm on your shaky legs I love that huh those who follow will become strong in San Diego every year I would take my staff on a retreat and every year I would do this exercise with them new staff members that had come on during that year I would give them the plaque and the plaque would say I don't have to survive and I would tell new staff members you're on staff not to play it safe you don't have to survive here you don't even have to live but be courageous in Acts chapter 20 here's what Paul said I feel compelled to go Jerusalem I'm completely in the dark about what will happen when I get there I do know it won't be any picnic for the Holy Spirit is let me know repeatedly and clearly that there are hard times and imprisonment and ahead here's your phrase but that matters little what matters most to me is to finish what God started the job that master Jesus gave me and letting everyone know that I meet that know about this incredible extravagant generosity of God I was shared in one of my Q&A is yesterday that we have fear and we have faith and the stronger emotion will always win if my faith is stronger than my fear which is positive then I'll do the things that faith requires if my fear is stronger than my faith I'll always do the things that fear require you got to feed your faith you got a star of your fear this is one of my favorite leadership quotes by Nelson Mandela this was given before he went to prison in 1964 Nelson Mandela said during my lifetime I've dedicated my life to the struggle of the African people I have fought against white domination and I fought against black domination I've cherished the ideal of a democratic and free society in which all people live together in harmony and have equal opportunities it's an ideal which I hope to live for and to see realized but my Lord he's talking to the judge if it needs me it's an idea which I am prepared to die courage is the door that can only be opened from the inside someone on the outside can't do this for you you gotta open it from the inside this means only you can do it and you can do it this was difficult for me because I was so relationally driven in my early years I just wanted everybody to love me I just wanted everybody to like me and I could tell you a story after story of bad leadership decisions I made in my early years because I just wanted peace I just wanted everyone to think well of me I just wanted everybody to smile and I can tell you stories of compromises I made stupid decisions I made because I just wanted approval that was so relationship-driven that I just you know it's just I just couldn't make a hard decision because what would somebody feel or what would somebody do what would somebody think now you see me at this age you have no idea how easy it is for me to look you in the eye and tell you the truth and not flinch nor care I didn't get this way overnight but I did get this way because there came a day in my life that I decided that I wanted to be a leader not a clown and my my job was to help people not make him happy there came a day in my life when I quit doing Disneyland with people okay courage is the most important of all virtues because without it you can't practice any other virtue with consistency people don't follow titles they follow courage boy do I love that quote in that beautiful number three one more the third area of growth that I would like you to grow in confidence courage number three decision-making decision-making is so essential to success and the reason I guess I'm pressing on that a little bit is because they're just now in Atlanta building the John Maxwell Leadership Center they don't talk about that very much just because I don't talk about that very much but if you go up 85 and Atlanta getting into the Sugarloaf winnette area where the Quinet Convention Center is if you look off to the left there's a big building being built right now that will be completed by the end of this year it'll be at the John Maxwell Leadership Center it's a twenty seven million dollar building that other people raise money for I didn't raise a dime for it it's going to be the state-of-the-art as far as communication the box that they have built for me is holds 250 people is gonna do all the recording all the sound all the major technology the box itself cost 10 million dollars state-of-the-art and in the John Maxwell leadership Cerner they're going to have a boardroom and so the people around me said John we would like for you in the boardroom since you have discussions and make decisions we would like you to put the most important decisions that you've ever made in your life and we'd like to put it around the boardroom so when people go in and have meetings they would be able to read and say oh my gosh that was an important decision in his life so I'm going to give you the five decisions that have formed my life this in itself could be a two hour lesson I'll just give them to you okay the first category is what I call ministry decision at the age of 23 this was the quote that I kind of accepted for my life and ministry I will attempt things so big that if they're complicate the credit and throughout my life I've tried to make decisions that were so big that when they happened only God would get the credit I'm in one right now as you know because you're helping me with Guatemala my gosh a whole country president on down teaching and learning leadership values and working on becoming transformational leaders instead of giving you the examples I want to read you this paragraph there are times when I feel obligated to lead further than I have walked let me stop there for a moment have you ever been there you got a lead for things that haven't even walked there yet there are times when I feel obligated to lead further than I have walked I don't feel holy enough faithful enough strong enough gracious enough competent enough or qualified enough it is at that time that allow my weaknesses to bring me to God who is more than enough the second group of vital decisions I have made in my life that have formed me our personal growth decisions and at the age of 26 I said to myself I will intentionally grow every day and I will develop my strengths let me take you again not two examples of it don't have time for that let me just take you to the paragraph my growth journey from here to there has been often lonely the reason is that I'm willing to admit wrong because of my desire to grow and change stay with these words they are powerful growth is a result of bad habit strong wrong priorities changed and new ways of thinking embraced here we go here we go the people who do not grow are unwilling to leave what they have known and practiced they're not willing to admit wrong so they can discover what is right therefore they cling to right and their lives turn out wrong how sad surrender of being right is a prerequisite to finding right you can feast your mind on that for about a week thirdly is partnership decisions at the age of 30 I basically said this I will first help others get what they want and what they need then they will help me get what I need my wonderful friend Zig taught me that and partnership has been absolutely huge in my life and I'm grateful the John Maxwell team is a classic example of partnership again let me read just the statements the paragraph early in my life I had a decision to make would I be a ladder climber or a ladder builder in the beginning I made the wrong decision I chose to be a ladder climber I viewed all of my colleagues and ministry as competitors and I worked hard to climb the ladder faster than them as I started to succeed I felt lonely and unfulfilled I changed and became a ladder builder I began to complete others instead of compete with them I discovered that helping others succeed with me is more rewarding than my personal success the fourth area of decisions that are key I believe in growth is relationship decisions at the age of 33 I said I will live in such a way that those who are closest to me Belov and respect me the most my best friends are people who've known me the longest and are the closest to me here we go success creates a gap between myself and others it's my responsibility to close that gap I don't want fans I want friends I don't want to be above the crowd I want to walk slowly through the crowd however for many that gap is still wide they see me on stage they read my books and they use my resources they know about me but they don't know me but my family my inner circle my longtime friends they know me very well they know my weaknesses and often are recipients of my shortcomings to be unconditionally loved by those who know me well is my greatest joy I am NOT a self-made man I am Who I am because of those who cared enough about me to touch my soul leadership decisions at age 48 I will add value to leaders who will multiply of value to others read one more paragraph in 1976 I was called to Train leaders over the years that Colin has evolved and taking shape resourcing leaders became an early commitment of mine and then the hatchet committee determined that my speaking schedule should give priority to the number of leaders that would we would have in the audience then my publisher Thomas Nelson discovered the 60% of my reading audience was in the secular community and immediately since God directed me to focus on that market had to be salt and light in the business community often people ask me about my legacy it is in the hands of leaders we have trained those hands will live beyond me and reach people that I could not have reached and I close with this look me in the eye it is in your hands did I give my legacy thank you very much

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Length: 35min 18sec (2118 seconds)

Published: Thu May 10 2018