A Success Building BLOG (part VI.d)

BLOG postings: (link to Achieving Success BLOG for all posts and PDF downloads)

Discipline to Success:

The Components of Well-Roundness

So they committed themselves to the will of God and resolved to proceed.
William Bradford of Plymouth Plantation, 1620.

continuation from BLOG post: part VI.c

Our character has five distinct character attributes or disciplines: physical, physical temperance, education, social and spiritual. These attributes make up our individual personality.

Last week:

We talk about the amount of energy required to make a character change. Our illustration of this concept used the goal to increase our physical strength. We measured the amount of energy – both internal and external.

We can see from the scale (this is for illustration only) that Susan will expend more internal energy than external energy. Most of the forces necessary to complete this goal are internal — it’s dependent on Susan’s willpower to jog each morning at the designated time. By totaling the two energies, Susan will expend a low to moderate amount of total energy to achieve her physical development goal.

This week, continue discussion:

Now let’s compare this example with a different character development goal. This time, Susan wants to improve her social skills and develop more of a leading role around associates. She will therefore develop her social character by being more friendly around people and gaining their trust. Let’s approximate the amount of energy she will need to accomplish this goal.

Internal Energy Forces:
Factors you control — the how, when, and where.

1) Susan will need to say hello to everyone she meets. She will need to introduce herself to strangers and take a personal interest in them.

2) Susan will need to smile more. She must learn to laugh at her mistakes and maintain, as possible, a sense of humor.

3) Susan will need to schedule social events and invite her friends and co-workers into her life.

External Energy Forces:
Factors controlled by other people or outside influences.

1) Susan must work to make people feel comfortable. She must read their actions and change her tactics quickly if necessary when they feel uncomfortable by her approaches.

2) Susan must work to build the social trust that invites others into her life.

3) Susan convince people to respect her.

Let’s now approximate the internal and external energy required to develop Susan’s social attribute goal and plot the amount on the model below:

Internal Energy —
Saying Hello: Little to Moderate Energy Required
Smile: Little to Moderate Energy Required
Learn to Laugh: Moderate to High Amount of Energy Required
Organizing Social Events: Moderate Amount of Energy Required

External Energy —
Making People Feel Comfortable: High Amount of Energy Required
Building Trust: High Amount of Energy Required
Increasing Respect Among Peers: High Amount of Energy Required

Total Required Energy: High Amount of Total Energy.
(internal and external)

You can see using the model that the total energy to change your social character is greater than changing your physical character. It doesn’t matter how other people respond when you change your physical character. You can jog, exercise, lose weight or do whatever to change your physical goals without impacting anyone. On the other hand, to change your social character, you will impact and involve many people and expend more external energy to change. That is why changing your social character will — in most cases — require more total energy than changing your physical character.