Andrew
Hunt for Greatness
Milton Kamwendo
For progress, change gears. Do not remain stuck in time, frozen in space and fixed in mindset. Unless you change gears you cannot accelerate and move forward.
Greatness demands that you shift gears. You do not have the luxury of staying in one gear and expecting change. Take the side of progress. You cannot be neutral and unconcerned about your life. Greatness requires that you engage and shift gears and keep moving towards greatness.
Nothing just happens by luck. Stop depending on luck and chance. Greatness is not a game of chance. It demands work, effort and shifts. You may not control everything, but you certainly can control your decisions. It is too early to decide to give up and let what shall just be. Take responsibility for shifting gears in your spheres of influence and concern. Good is not good-enough, therefore, shift towards greatness. Move from good to great. You are not a victim, without power or influence. You are able to make a difference. When you make a decision to “shift gears” everything starts to move and the momentum changes.
Shift your context and change the atmosphere around you. Stop complaining about mediocrity, shift to excellence. While you may not be able transform and change everyone and everything, pockets of excellence are possible. You can change the corner of the world and room that you occupy. Saturate your arena and territory with positive influence, excellence and possibilities. You have what it takes to shift your space and start a revolution of greatness.
It is not where you are that matters, but what you choose to do. Instead of joining those that mindlessly litter, choose to shift and be a street-sweeper. Dr Martin Luther King had this gear-shifting mindset when he said: “If a man is called to be a street sweeper, he should sweep streets even as Michelangelo painted, or Beethoven composed music, or Shakespeare wrote poetry. He should sweep streets so well that all the hosts of heaven and earth will pause to say, ‘Here lived a great street sweeper who did his job well’.”
Shift your attitude and your habit of thought. Until you shift in thought, you will always be in limbo.
Shift paradigms
Choose to be a paradigm-shifter and do not stay boxed in a victim-box. Where you do not see a trail that others have created, shift and become a paradigm-pioneer. Make the call and make the shift to greatness. In the way you think and see the world there lies the shift-stick.
A paradigm is a mental map or model that you hold. To change anything you have to start with changing your mental map. Do not just pull off all the leaves and forget that everything you see has a root-cause and is anchored in a mental model. Unless you change in the way you “see the world” you can never have any lasting change.
The call to greatness is a call to shining paradigms. If you feel that your life is in a rut, check your mental model and shift your paradigm.
To change your thinking shift your input. Read something that opens and stretches your thinking. Get a coach that challenges you and create new contexts of accountability. Invest in experiences that help you shift paradigm. Greatness is a learning journey and never a destination.
Dr Carol S. Dweck in her book, “Mindset” states that people could be classified into broadly two mindsets, namely a fixed or a growth mindset. With a fixed mindset you have a rigid mental map that does not change and you do not learn. You keep doing what you have always done and you rely on hope as a strategy. Greatness requires that you shift from a fixed to a growth mindset. Adopting a growth mindset is a deliberate choice to start shifting, stretching, learning and growing.
A fixed mindset causes you to plateau early. Seized with a fixed mindset you desire to look smart and think that greatness is a matter of appearances. You avoid challenges, get defensive and give up early. You see effort as fruitless and ignore all useful negative feedback. In this paradigm you feel threatened by the success of others. It is never too late to shift from a fixed to a growth mindset.
When you adopt a growth mindset you are open to learn and growth. You desire learning and shift to embrace challenges as opportunity. You persist in the face of obstacles and you are not stuck. You see effort as the path to mastering. You have the humility to keep shifting your approach and making the necessary changes. Shifting paradigms means embracing learning, experimentation and growth measures. Growth takes time, effort and is intense in mistakes. Shifting gears takes time and effort. Mindsets affect meaning and learning. In particular the meaning of failure and of effort. With a fixed mindset, failure is permanent, but with a growth paradigm failure is just work in progress and part of the growth journey.
Shift failure
Shift any setback you face into a great comeback. The old serenity prayer reads: “God grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, courage to change the things I can, and wisdom to know the difference.” This is a prayer for a shift in life. Everything can change. Shifting is possible. Shift from failure, keep pivoting and refuse to be held back by any misfortune and mishap. Life happens, but you choose your posture and shifts.
Take bold moves and shift failure and its meaning in your life. Failure does not mean that you are finished, it means shift to begin again if necessary. Shift the way you think and act. Shift your perspectives and begin again more intelligently. Keep shifting until you make it possible.
Failure is not a suggestion that you will never make it. Failure means that you have to shift time frames, reassign resources and recommit. Shift time frames and expand your horizons. The impossible is always a mirage. Failure is not fatality, it means that strategies need to shift. Set a strategy and implement it. Keep checking for its relevance and motivational power. Keep testing the goodness of fit of the strategy. Keep shifting your strategy to ensure that it is relevant and empowering your shift-moves.
Shift possibility
Shift your view of the impossible. Shift from IMPOSSIBLE to I’M POSSIBLE. Whatever has never been done, can be done. Shift from thinking impossibilities to imagining possibilities. Do not spend time with those without imagination who look at mountains and conclude they can never be climbed. Shift your horizons and burst your limitations.
Shift learning
Eric Hoffer once observed that: “In times of change learners inherit the earth; while the learned find themselves beautifully equipped to deal with a world that no longer exists.” He was right, unless you shift your learning you never grow and you are left behind. Keep upgrading and adding to what you know. Keep shifting and unlearning what no longer serves you. Keep challenging what you know and learning more. Generations are shifting, technology is shifting, models are shifting and you dare not stand still.
Shifting the learning gear and you will grow daily. Greatness happens daily but not in a day. As you shift your capacity you expand your influence and the quality of your leadership.
To shift towards greatness love learning and value it. Shift things in your programme to make time for personal growth. Read great books, then digest them and apply what you learn. Observe great leaders in action and be a learner-in-chief. See what they do well and emulate them. See what they miss and pray for them. It is never an easy job in the cockpit. Share leadership ideas with others, get inspiration, shift and sharpen your leadership capacity. Shift and grow daily.
Committed to your greatness.
Milton Kamwendo is a leading international transformational and motivational speaker, author, and a virtual, hybrid and in-person workshop facilitator. He is a cutting-edge strategy, team-building and organisation development facilitator and consultant. His life purpose is to inspire and promote greatness. He can be reached at: [email protected] and his website is: www.miltonkamwendo.com
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