Ray’s Daily
May 16, 2022
Where there is no vision, the people perish.
Proverbs 29:18
My youngest daughter is in Spain this morning, about to spend a week hiking and then a few days of sightseeing. She, like so many of you. seems to think of her life as a work in process.
I have met many leaders and adventurers in my lifetime and the one thing they had in common was their commitment to doing their best every day. Here is an edited piece that reminds me of my children and so many of you. Just keep up the good work!
Five ingredients of personal growth
As any farmer knows, the growth of a crop only happens when the right ingredients are present. To harvest plentiful fields, the farmer has to begin by planting the right seed in rich topsoil where sunlight and water can help the seed to sprout, mature, and bear fruit. If any of the ingredients (seeds, topsoil, sunlight, or water) are missing, the crop won’t grow.
Growing as a leader also requires the proper ingredients. Unless the right attitudes and actions are cultivated an aspiring leader will sputter and fail rather than growing in influence. Let’s look at five basic qualities essential for growth in leadership.
1. Teachability – Arrogance crowds out room for improvement. That’s why humility is the starting point for personal growth. We can’t learn anything new until we can admit that we don’t already know everything.’
2. Sacrifice – Growth as a leader involves temporary loss. It may mean giving up familiar but limiting patterns, safe but unrewarding work, values no longer believed in, or relationships that have lost their meaning. Whatever the case, everything we gain in life comes as a result of sacrificing something else. We must give up to go up.
3. Security – To keep learning throughout life, you have to be willing, no matter what your position is, to say, ‘I don’t know.’
4. Listening – Listen, learn, and ask questions from somebody successful who has gone on before you. Borrow from their experiences so that you can avoid their mistakes and emulate their triumphs. Solicit feedback and take to heart what you’re told. The criticism of friends may seem bitter in the short-term but, when heeded; it can save you from falling victim to your blind spots.
5. Application – Knowledge has a limited shelf life. Unless used immediately or carefully preserved, it spoils and becomes worthless. Put the lessons you learn into practice so that your insights mature into understanding.
Written by John C. Maxwell
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Leadership is the capacity to translate vision into reality.
Warren Bennis
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THINGS THAT HALLMARK CARDS DON’T SAY
My tire was thumping.
I thought it was flat
When I looked at the tire…
I noticed your cat.
Sorry!
~~~
She said: While I was visiting my sister one evening, I took out a candy dispenser that was shaped like a miniature person. “How does that thing work?” she asked.
As I turned the figurine’s arm to pop candy out, my sister laughed. “I see it’s a lot like my husband,” she said. “You have to twist his arm to get anything out of him.”
~~~
Middle-aged wife to husband at computer: “Yes, honey, I think you can safely assume that a romantic e-mail from Pamela Lee Anderson is a prank.”
~~~
Nathan is talking to his lawyer. “Here’s the deal, Abe. If you’re absolutely sure I’ll win the case, I’ll give you the business.”
“OK,” replies Abe, “but before I can give you my opinion, I obviously need to know the facts.”
So Nathan goes into great detail about his failed partnership and ends up saying, “So now you’ve heard everything, do you think I can sue my partner and get my money back?”
“Well,” replies Abe, “from what I’ve just heard, it’s clear to me that you will win. It’s rare to have such an open-and-shut case.”
Nathan goes very white when he hears this.
“What’s the matter?” asks Abe.
“I told you my partner’s side of the case,” replies Nathan.
~~~
“Whatever you’re ready for is ready for you.”
Mark Victor Hansen
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He said: The computer company my wife works for distributed a corporate clothing catalogue that included a pair of cuff links. One was inscribed Ctrl (control) and the other Esc (escape), just as they look on a computer keyboard. “They would make a good present for any man,” my wife commented to a colleague, “if only to remind him of the two things he can never have.”
~~~
“If you’re being chased by a police dog, try not to go through a tunnel, then on to a little seesaw, then jump through a hoop of fire. They’re trained for that.”
Milton Jones
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When you have three boys, it’s hard to know whom to blame if something goes wrong in the house.
One father explained to a friend how he solved the problem: “I send all three to bed without letting them watch television. In the morning I go after the one with the black eye!”
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Treat each day as your last, one day you will be right.
~~~
At the urging of his doctor, John moved to Arizona.
After settling in, he met a neighbor who was also an older man.
“Say, is this really a healthy place?”
“It sure is,” the man replied.
“When I first arrived here I couldn’t say one word. I had hardly any hair on my head. I didn’t have the strength to walk across a room and I had to be lifted out of bed.”
“That’s wonderful!” said John. “How long have you been here?”
“I was born here.”
~~~
A leader is a dealer in hope.
Napoleon Bonaparte
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Management is not responsible for duplicates from previous dailies. The editor is somewhat senile.
Ray’s Daily has been sent for more than twenty years to people who want to start their day on an upbeat. If you have system overload because of our daily clutter, let me know and I will send you the information via mental telepathy. If you have not been getting our daily you can request to be added by e-mailing me at raykiwsp@comcast.net. Back issues are posted at http://rays-daily,com/ currently there are hundreds of readers from around the world.
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