The habits of character and leadership

 Aristotle “The beauty of the soul shines out when a man bears with composure one heavy mischance after another, not because he does not feel them, but because he is a man of high and heroic temper.”

The ultimate aim of human life and activity is the development of character, according to Aristotle. “The most important goal that you accomplish in the course of your life is to become an excellent person, in every respect. Your purpose should be to develop the kind of personality and character that earns you the respect, esteem and affection of the important people in your world.”

Brian Tracy believes that people of great character are those who have developed the habits of thinking and behaving that are consistent with the fine qualities that they wish to be known for. They discipline themselves to do the right thing in every situation. “By working on themselves, and by steady effort, great people in our world, living and dead, have behaved in certain ways, whether they felt like it or not.”

The education of the young

Aristotle also wrote that, “All improvement in society begins with the education of the young.” One of the primary responsibilities for those in charge of educating young people is to instill in them the importance of virtue, character and good behaviour. Children are inordinately influenced by the people around them when they are growing up. This is the time when young people are most capable of incorporating the finest qualities into their characters.

But what if you have reached adulthood without the virtues and qualities that you most admire and aspire to? What can you do? Well, fortunately all virtues and values are merely habits of thinking and acting. You can learn any habit that you consider to be either desirable or necessary. You can learn a virtue or value of character and leadership the same way you develop a physical skill or habit, by practice and repetition.

Develop your own character

Aristotle, probably the greatest philosopher and thinker of all time, said that, if you wish to learn a virtue later in life the method is simple. Simply practice the virtue in every situation where that virtue is required. In other words, if you wish to develop the quality of courage, act courageously even when you feel afraid. If you wish to develop the quality of generosity, be generous on every occasion, even if your feel stingy. As you practice and repeat the virtue, it becomes more and more a part of your personality. It soon becomes automatic and easy. Eventually, you will reach the point where you cannot imagine acting in any other way.

Decide today to become a “do-it-to-yourself” project. Establish a series of goals and a work schedule for the development of your own character and personality. Set high standards for yourself, and resolve to develop the habits of excellent behavior practiced by the men and women who you most admire.

Imagine your ideal self

The greater clarity you have about the qualities that you most admire, and desire to incorporate into your personality, the easier it is for you to engage in the behaviours that are consistent with those virtues and values. The more repeatedly you engage in those behaviours, the more you internalize those qualities, until they become a permanent part of you.

The starting point of character development is for you to develop the habit of long-term thinking in your work and in your personal life. If you could fulfill your potential, and become the very best person that it is possible for you to become, how would people think about you, talk about you and describe you to others? What words would they use? What virtues, values and qualities would they ascribe to you? How would you be remembered, and for what reasons?

Acting as if you were already that person

As you develop greater clarity about how you want to be remembered in the hearts and minds of other people, you will become more clear about those values and qualities that are most important to you. You can then set those qualities as goals for yourself, and make plans for their accomplishment. From that point forward, you “act as if” you already had those qualities whenever they are called for.

This habit of projecting yourself forward into the distant future, and then looking back to the present for guidance on the steps that you should be taking each day can have a profound impact on your life. Many years ago, the brother of Alfred Nobel died in Stockholm. But the newspapers got the name wrong and instead concluded that it was Alfred Nobel himself who had died. They then wrote his obituary, which he read the next day. In his obituary, the primary accomplishment for which he was remembered was for the invention of gunpowder, which had been responsible for the death of countless human beings in wars and conflicts around the world.

Change your destiny

This obituary had such a shocking effect on Nobel that he immediately began rearranging his entire life to change his legacy and to assure that his obituary, when it was written, would be completely different. To this end, he established the Nobel Prizes, based on his great fortune, which are today the highest awards that can be attained in the worlds of literature, medicine, science, economics, peace and chemistry. By thinking clearly about the legacy he wanted to leave, he transformed both his present actions, and his ultimate memory. He rewrote his own obituary.

To become a person of great quality and value, you should develop the habit of reading about and studying about other men and women who have started with little or nothing and who have gone on to accomplish wonderful things with their lives. It seems that many men and women who achieve greatness as adults spend many hours as children reading the biographies and autobiographies of successful people. Because young people are so susceptible to the suggestive influences of others, as they read, they began to envision and imagine themselves having the same qualities when they grew up as the people that they were reading about. And that is exactly what happened in many cases.

Aspire to leadership

It is not easy to rise to a position of leadership in any organization or in any society. The competition for leadership is fierce. Only the people who are the very best equipped to acquire leadership positions, and then to hold onto those positions against all others who desire them, rise to the top in any area.

Different areas of endeavour require different qualities of leadership to be successful. The qualities of leadership necessary to direct an army at war are very different from the qualities of leadership that are necessary to direct a large university. The qualities of leadership necessary to start and build a successful entrepreneurial business are very different from the leadership qualities necessary to run a large organization.

Whatever it takes

In a way, leadership is “situational.” What is necessary for success in a leadership position is determined by many factors, including the people to be led, the objectives to be accomplished by the organisation, the competition for resources, the social, cultural, political and economic environment, and the situation that the leader finds himself in at the moment. If you change any one of these factors, the qualities of leadership necessary for success will change as well.

There have been several thousands of studies of leadership conducted over the years. They have discovered so many different qualities that leaders have or develop over time. Of those qualities, there are a few that seem to be consistent in almost every case where leaders accomplish great things and earn the undying respect, esteem and loyalty of other people, even long after they have passed from the scene. The one quality that all these studies on leadership held in common was the quality of “vision.” Leaders have vision; ordinary people do not.

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