- Values help you find your purpose.
- Values help you react in different situations.
- Values help you make decisions.
- Values help clear our clutter.
- Values help you to choose the right career.
- Values help you develop a sense of self.
- Values help increase your confidence.
- Values help your overall happiness level.
What we do for a Living Versus What we do with a Living
Hard work teaches a person the value of money. That is why it is important that parents teach their children this lesson. People who have values have no price tag and neither do they value themselves. But nowadays this younger generation who inherits money without value. Money is not that payoff for every kind of work. Parents bring up the children with no paycheck in mind.
The best and most beautiful things in the world cannot be
seen or even touched. They must be felt with the heart.
--Helen Keller
It is good to have money and the things it can buy, but in the process of acquiring money, we don't want to lose the things that money cant buy. Money can only buy what money can buy. And in fact, the most precious things are those that money just can't buy.
What money won't buy
We learn from the above paragraph that money just can't buy. People with character, integrity, and the right values are not for sale. Money will buy:
- Amusements but not happiness.
- A bed but not sleep.
- Books but not wisdom.
- A clock but not more time.
- Companions bot not friends.
- Finery but not beauty.
- Food but not appetite.
- A house but not a home.
- Medicine but not health.
- A ring but not health.
- A ring but not a marriage.
The MIDAS touch
We all know the story of the greedy king named Midas. He had a lot of gold and the more
he had the more he wanted. He stored
all the gold in his vaults and used to spend time every day counting it.
One day while he was counting a stranger came from nowhere and said he would grant
him a wish. The king was delighted and said, "I would like everything I touch to turn to
gold." The stranger asked the king, Are you sure?" The king replied, "Yes." So the
stranger said, "Starting tomorrow morning with the sun rays you will get the golden
touch."
The king thought he must be dreaming, this couldn't be true. But the next day when he
woke up, he touched the bed, his clothes, and everything turned to gold. He looked out of
the window and saw his daughter playing in the garden. He decided to give her a
surprise and thought she would be happy. But before he went to the garden he decided
to read a book. The moment he touched it, it turned into gold and he couldn't read it.
Then he sat to have breakfast and the moment he touched the fruit and the glass of
water, they turned to gold. He was getting hungry and he said to himself, "I can't eat and drink gold." Just about that time his daughter came running and he hugged her and she
turned into a gold statue. There were no more smiles left.
The king bowed his head and started crying. The stranger who gave the wish came again
and asked the king if he was happy with his golden touch. The king said he was the most
miserable man. The stranger asked, "What would you rather have, your food and loving
daughter or lumps of gold and her golden statue?" The king cried and asked for
forgiveness. He said, "I will give up all my gold. Please give me my daughter back
because without her I have lost everything worth having." The stranger said to the king,
"You have become wiser than before" and he reversed the spell. He got his daughter
back in his arms and the king learned a lesson that he never forget for the rest of his life.
What is the moral of the story?
DIstorted values lead to tragedy.
Sometimes getting what you want may be a bigger tragedy than not getting what you want.
Unlike the game of soccer where players can be substituted, the game of life allows no substitutions or replays. We may not get a second chance to reserve our tragedies, as the king did.
Is your life worth saving?
A boy was drowning in a river and he shouted for help. A man passing by jumped in the
river and saved the boy's life. As the man was leaving the boy said, Thank-you.'' The
man asked, "For what?" The boy replied, "For saving my life." The man looked into the
boy's eyes and said, Upon, make sure when you grow up that your life was worth
saving."
It is time to think. This is a wake-up call.
Success without fulfillment is meaningless. Unless there is a sense of meaning and
purpose, life is empty and unhappy regardless of how much prestige, money or degrees
a person has.
Success begins with developing your personal success philosophy, about your health,
money, family, society, and values. Without a clearly defined purpose and a philosophy to
guide you, life is guided by fantasies. If people have not defined a philosophy of success,
they have actually defined a philosophy of failure by default.
Sometimes we overlook the things that ought not to be overlooked and don't overlook the
things that ought to be overlooked.
An integral part of a good value system is a commitment.
Commitment
To make commitments upon our dream we have to clear our decision an value.
Example; You can't make a commitment to your country by selling secrets to the enemy.
You can't keep a friend by revealing to others what he told you in confidence. You can't
keep a commitment to a job by trying to do as little as possible.
Unkept commitments result in dishonest behavior. I wonder how any relationship,
regardless of whether personal or professional, would work if people said something to
the effect.
¨ I will try but I can't commit.
¨ I will do it but don't count on me.
¨ I will be there if I can, but don't get your hopes up.
¨ I will be there, so long as you do well.
¨ I will be there so long as you are in good health.
¨ I will stick with you till I find something better.
Our strongest relationships are tied together with the invisible something called commitment. Lack of commitment would destabilize relationships and lead to insecurity. No one would know where they stand with each other.
Commitment implies:
- Dependability
- Reliability
- Predictability
- Consistency
- Caring
- Empathy
- A sense of duty
- Sincerity
- Character
- Integrity
- Loyalty
If one of those ingredients is missing, commitment loses strength. When a person makes a commitment to someone, he is really saying, "You can count on
me no matter what," and "I will be there when you need me." Which increases the value of that person who gives commitment.
Regardless of the uncertainty, commitment says "You can count on me." A person who
makes a commitment is willing to give up a lot. For what? The answer is pretty clear. The
rewards can be priceless.
Commitment says:
- I am willing to sacrifice because I care.
- I am a person of integrity and you can trust me.
- I will not let you down.
- Despite the pain, I will still be there.
- I will not let you down in good times or in bad times.
Remember and keep in mind, needs are stronger than wants. Commitments act as a
glue that bonds relationships. Commitment implies sacrificing fun and willingness to
accept sorrow. Commitment is a sign of maturity. Commitment means not quitting at the first option or sign of problems. Individuals with strong commitments build strong communities.
Many people are not willing to make commitments because they feel they are not ready for it. However, in the meantime, for years they keep sharing and using anything and everything of one another. Relationships don't last because of passion and love but because of commitments and empathy. A commitment implies putting the other person's needs ahead of one's own.
Commitment to Values
Loyalty cannot be bought, they are earned. When a person makes a commitment of loyalty to either ab individual or an organization what really he saying? He is saying "I stand by you because I believe in what you believe in." What if the person I am committed to, be it a leader, spouse, employer, employee
becomes a spy for an enemy country? Do I continue my support because I committed
earlier? Absolutely not. I am not committed to support unethical and illegal behavior.
Unkept commitments lead to:
¨ Broken homes
¨ Abandoned children
¨ Poor relationships
¨ High-stress levels
¨ Guilt
¨ Unfulfilled life
¨ Loss of business
¨ Isolation
¨ Depression
Make a commitment and stay committed!
Ethics
Bad circumstances are not excuses for making bad choices and leading poor lives.
Values and ethics are not just designed for good times, but also to prevent bad times.
They are like the laws of the land which you need when people are good and you need
even more to protect them from the bad. Ethical choices reflect objectivity between
right and wrong.
That is why our conscience hurts when making an unethical choice and does not hurt
when making a wrong personal choice. Choices are personal because the person makes
it, but the rightness or wrongness does not change from person to person.
Just like in a math test.
Those who believe that ethics cannot be generalized but vary with every situation, come
up with justification and keep changing their ethics from situation to situation, and person
to person. This is called situational ethics. This is the ethics of conveniences rather than
conviction.
Purpose of Life
There are many kinds of desire. Desire for success, desire to do one's duty even at the
cost of pleasure. Desire for purpose. Something worth dying for which gives meaning to
life. A purposeless life is a living death What is the purpose? Do you have one?
Purpose brings passion. Find or create a purpose and then pursue it with passion and perseverance. Every day we need to ask ourselves the question:
"Am I getting any closer to my purpose
in life?
Am I making this a better place to live?"
If the answer is no, then I have just
wasted a day of my life.
The earlier we find a purpose in life, the better it is. It appears that the greatest challenge
comes in the unending search for the purpose of life. Not only as an individual but for our
families, organizations, and country. Once our purpose and values are clear, conflicts
between self-interest and social obligations find a moral balance between themselves.
We become aware of when to take a stand. That is the time we start making the right
decisions for long-term gain rather than making the wrong decisions for short-term gain.
Wisdom and maturity lead to a greater understanding of major issues.
Study as if you were to live forever. Live as if you were to die tomorrow.
-- Mahatma Gandhi
Living with a Purpose
All of us are put on this planet for a purpose. We are part of a big picture. But very few
people discover their purpose in life. Most of us just exist and keep counting our days
rather than making our days count.
Dr. Albert Einstein was once asked, "Why are we here?" He replied, "If the universe is an
accident, we are accidents. But if there is meaning in the universe, there is meaning in us
also." And he added, "The more I study physics, the more I am drawn towards
metaphysics."
I would rather fail in a cause that will ultimately succeed than succeed in a cause that
would ultimately fail.
--Wood row Wilson
We learn our values from our parents and teachers. If we do not learn values from our parents and teachers, who do we learn them from?
And when they don't teach us values, we pick them up by default from television and
other such undesirable sources. No wonder society gets messed up. The teacher such
as in the example above is not only irresponsible with distorted values but does not
deserve to be teaching our kids.
Winning versus Winners
What is the difference between winning and being a winner? Winning is an event. Being
a winner is a spirit. Winners have kept winning in perspective based on their value
system. Winners are gracious. They never brag about themselves, they respect and appreciate their team members and opponents. Many people know how to succeed. Very few know how to handle success. And there is always something about success that displeases some other people.
The reality is that life is a competition and we have to compete. In fact, competition makes competitive people grow. The objective is to win, no question hut to win fairly, squarely, decently, and by the rules.
Try not to be a man of success but rather try to be a man of value.
--Albert Einstein
What is Goodness?
If we took a survey, asking people one question, "Are you good?" most people would
respond, "Yes!" Ask them, "What makes you good?" Responses will be:
¨ I don't cheat so I'm good.
¨ I don't lie so that makes me good.
¨ I don't steal, so I'm good.
If you analyze the above rationales, there is not much substance in them. Just think of
the person who says, "I don't cheat." Well, that only means that he is not a cheat. And the
persons who say they don't lie and steal, only mean that they are not liars and thieves.
But that doesn't make them good. A person becomes good when he actually does good
rather than not doing wrong. A person of values would be one who has qualities such as
fairness, compassion, courage, integrity, empathy, humility, loyalty, and courtesy. What
Page 174 of 175
makes a person with these qualities a good person? It is because these are the kind of
people who are dependable, stand up for justice, help the needy, make life better for
themselves and those around them. To recognize goodness in all its forms, we need
benchmarks and standards. Benchmarks can be ethical, or legal, or both. Ethical ones
deal with right and wrong and all the gray areas that are in between leading to what is
good and better and what is bad and worse.
How high are Ethical Standards?
What would you do in the following situations?
- You know the taxi fare from your home to the airport is $64. You have paid it before,
you know it is the correct fare. This time the taxi driver asks for $3
- What would you
do?
2. You are dining in a restaurant and you ordered four dishes and the waiter brought all
four but by mistake, billed you for only three. What would you do?
- Your best friend is terminally ill and you are a life assurance salesman. They needed
$100,000 worth of insurance. No one knows and no one can find out that your friend is
dying. Would you write the policy?
You cannot legislate ethics. What advice would you give to your children under the same
circumstances? Is your behavior conforming with the advice you would give your children
in the same situation? We start learning ethics right after birth and all through our lives.
Can we change ethical behavior? Yes, we need ethical training.
Ethics in Business
When we cheat the people around us, most of all we are cheating ourselves. We are
preparing ourselves to be cheated. Prosperity brings responsibility. We cannot build
industry and infrastructure while destroying the moral and social fiber.
The consequences of not following ethical behavior are the same as not following legal
behavior. Some people will never be ethical. They think they are taking the easy way. In reality it is the tougher way. Could you face yourself if you didn't do the right thing for
your client? Could you brag to your kids and be proud and feel good? If you can't, then
that behavior is unethical.
A sense of humor and pride in oneself keeps a person on course.
Vision
Why don't people achieve excellence? The big reason is the lack of vision or limited
vision. We need to dream beyond what is possible. Everything that we see today was a
dream before it became a reality. Live with enthusiasm, direction, and with a sense of
purpose. Do you have a dream? What is your dream? Every day that you live, are you
getting closer to your purpose? Get your advice from successful people and not from
living failures who will tell you how to succeed.
Where the vision is one year, cultivate flowers.
Where the vision is ten years, cultivate trees.
Where the vision is eternity, cultivate people.
Remember, winners don't do different things, they do things differently!
********
So guys this all summary about YOU CAN WIN book.
What should be our next book? Please comment below,...!!
Take care guys, We will meet in our next book summary.
Thank You, guys..!!!
Comments
Post a Comment
dilipkumarsahuu67@gmail.com