A stranger visited my house recently, and marvelled at the books in my Library. He said he could tell the kind of person I was by the kind of books I read. I’d never thought about that, so after he left, I went back to look through the titles, wondering what they said about me.
I noticed a trend. The timeline of my book titles, acquired over a 15+ year period, told the story of the stages I have gone through in my pursuit of meaning and significance. I could trace three distinct phases.
Early Years – Behaviours
Two highlight titles from this period include the ‘Seven Habits of Highly Effective People‘, and ‘Atomic Habits‘, which I have re-read numerous times over the years. I discovered early in my journey that Excellence was the outcome of a series of disciplined, positive micro-actions. The challenge was to learn what constituted positive action, then build the habits needed to exercise those actions consistently. Proactivity is an example of a positive action, rooted in the Natural laws of motion. Nurturing this as a habit required a system of self motivation that got me out of the proverbial bed every day, no matter how I felt. Over time, the behaviours I nurtured, inspired by these two seminal books among others, would help deliver some of my earliest life Wins, laying the foundations for the next Phase.
Middle Years – Decisions
Once the World discovers that you have the desired Behavioral qualities, they start placing responsibilites upon your shoulders. These responsibilities call for Decision making ability. This is when I procured books such as ‘Emotional Intelligence‘ by Daniel Goleman, and ‘What Got You Here Won’t Get You There‘ by Marshall Goldsmith. When you are entrusted with Leadership roles, your success is highly linked to how you make Decisions that not only impact your own work, but the work of others as well. You are no longer being looked upon to execute tasks, but to help steer a project, a team, a Unit towards achieving desired outcomes. Your self awareness, ability to plan, to manage, to evaluate risks among others become the levers of success in this Phase.
Latter Years – Outcomes
You might be the best behaved person, who makes great decisions, but if these don’t lead to impactful, measurable outcomes, you risk stunting your growth. You will wonder why peers with whom you rose through the ranks are outpacing you towards bigger, more rewarding assignments. This Phase is where the greats are separated from the near-greats. Many don’t make it through this stage, and the few who do come to bear a cost few will ever understand. They are the ones we admire, the ones who grace the biographical books and news headlines, the ones who shape societies and marketplaces. My Library these past few years has been filled with bigraphies like ‘Pour Your Heart into it‘ and ‘Bibi‘. Thought leadership books like ‘Blue Ocean Strategy‘ and ‘The Leadership Challenge‘ have also had a huge impact on me in this Phase.
Your Behaviours, Decisions & Outcomes will determine your level of growth and impact, and ultimately the achievement of your life’s Purpose. Where do you think you are? What are you doing to make it to the next Phase?
