As parents, teachers, leaders, or mentors, one of our most important and powerful tools we have at our disposal is the object lesson.
If we are able to point to and extract from a specific incident, a lesson or principle that applies to a variety of situations or circumstances, and if we are able to communicate that lesson or principle to the person or persons we are attempting to help in a way that is heard, understood, and, most importantly, felt, we empower them to make better decisions in the future.
It is difficult to do this if we are caught up in the immediacy of the moment, however. In order to find the greater lesson or principle in a specific incident, we must be able to step back, to distance ourselves psychologically and emotionally from what is happening, to look at the situation objectively, and to consider what single shift in mentality or behavior would either prevent or replicate this occurrence en masse in the future relative to our desired outcome.
Object lessons are a means of pointing out and communicating repeatable patterns, whether good, bad, or neutral, in a way that these patterns become predictable and controllable. In other words, object lessons are a way to teach causality so that it can be used to one’s advantage, ideally in an ethical, productive, and socially contributive way. Simply put, object lessons empower us to see beyond the specifics to the fundamental.
Holistic Budo: As it is in budo, so too it is in life. As it is in life, so too it is in budo.
Robert Van Valkenburgh is co-founder of Taikyoku Mind & Bodyand Kogen Dojo where he teaches Taikyoku Budo and Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu.
All photos by Robert Van Valkenburgh unless otherwise noted.
It takes a lot of planning and preparation for things to be easy.
There is a lot of effort and hard work that goes into things running smoothly. It does not just happen on its own. We need to plan, prepare, and set up the conditions for things to go well.
Things still may not go the way we want. We cannot plan for every contingency and every possible variable. We can, however, try to do so.
We can educate and train ourselves and our teams. We can communicate clearly and consistently. We can evaluate and mitigate whatever potential risks may exist to the best of our ability.
We can work harder, prepare more, and be more disciplined than is perceived as necessary so that, when it matters, even if something changes or even goes terribly wrong, it is neither surprising nor derailing because something going wrong was part of our plan from the beginning.
Holistic Budo: As it is in budo, so too it is in life. As it is in life, so too it is in budo.
Robert Van Valkenburgh is co-founder of Taikyoku Mind & Bodyand Kogen Dojo where he teaches Taikyoku Budo and Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu.
All photos by Robert Van Valkenburgh unless otherwise noted.
Demands, threats, and force may help us accomplish our immediate goals, but dictatorship is not leadership. True leadership requires that others follow us consciously, voluntarily, and willingly. This requires a shared perspective.
In order for others to follow us by choice, of their own informed free-will, they need perspective. They need to see and understand why they should trust us, why they should follow us, and why they should do so enthusiastically.
They need to see how and why our mission is in their best interest, how it relates to their life, their goals, and their purpose.
Before we can expect others to see things from this perspective, however, we must first see things from theirs. If we do not understand who they are and where they are coming from, we may be able to push them to where we are trying to go, but we can not expect to lead them there.
If we want others to care about what we want, they must first know that we care about them.
Once it is clear to those we wish to lead that we not only understand their perspective, but that we actually care about them, their lives, their needs, and their goals, it is much easier for them to care about us and what we want or need from them.
In this place of shared perspective, the leader-follower dynamic is transcended and the team begins to form.
Holistic Budo: As it is in budo, so too it is in life. As it is in life, so too it is in budo.
Robert Van Valkenburgh is co-founder of Taikyoku Mind & Bodyand Kogen Dojo where he teaches Taikyoku Budo and Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu.
All photos by Robert Van Valkenburgh unless otherwise noted.
Leadership, by definition, is an unpopular opinion.
It is impossible to take the lead by conforming to public opinion, by acquiescing to a perceived consensus, or by trying to be popular instead of right.
Leadership requires that we break away from what has already been done, what is being done, or what is obvious to everyone else as the next, most obvious step in what needs to be done.
Leadership is an inherently rebellious act. It is not merely the road less taken, but the road not yet seen, not yet imagined, and not yet cleared of the brush and the bramble.
Leadership is a new idea, stance, position, or direction, not for its own sake, but for the sake of all who would benefit. Leadership is never selfish.
New does not necessarily mean better, however. In fact, in order to have an idea that is both new and good, we must first have a lot of ideas that are new and bad.
A lot of failure goes into one single success, but therein lies the inherent risk of leadership.
Leadership is the willingness to fail at something new with the hope that it is also better, but with the honesty and humility to accept when it is not and then to start over.
New and popular are not necessarily mutually exclusive, but, when they are the same, it is all but guaranteed that new came first.
Holistic Budo: As it is in budo, so too it is in life. As it is in life, so too it is in budo.
Robert Van Valkenburgh is co-founder of Taikyoku Mind & Bodyand Kogen Dojo where he teaches Taikyoku Budo and Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu.
All photos by Robert Van Valkenburgh unless otherwise noted.
Meditations on God 