Last year about this time I walked in the house from my early morning workout and there was my thirteen-year-old son smiling ear to ear. He also had an important question for me: “can you pick up the PS5 I just bought?”
If you don’t have kids at this stage of life or like me have definitely outgrown the video game stage of life let me explain. These could not be found last year! Unknown to my wife and I my son had created a Twitter account for the sole purpose of watching when PS5 orders had been dropped. He was on the lookout daily and that was where he learned one was available.
After picking up his PS5 at Target I reflected on a few leadership lessons any leader or entrepreneur could gain from his approach.
Discipline
For about three weeks my son was obsessed with getting a PS5. He had saved up the hundreds of dollars he needed to purchase it. Each day he demonstrated the discipline to check his social sources, online, and even call some stores.
In the classic book Think and Grow Rich Napoleon Hill had studied the lives of many successful people of his time. He tells the story of a man who desired to work with Thomas Edison. Hill concludes:
“He stood by his desire until it became the dominating obsession of his life and finally a fact.”
My son was obsessed with getting this PS5 to the point it became a dominating obsession. (As Dad I must confess I was getting a little concerned.) As leaders we must have the type of desire that gives us the discipline to accomplish the vision.
Faith
I am going to suggest for this conversation faith is the ability to see something we do not have and know we will have it. This could be an object, vision, relationship, or something else. If you have ever pursued something you wanted and refused to quit then you know it required faith.
At times my son got really frustrated, but he continued his discipline, maintained his desire, and believed he would get it. This was even amidst reports only a few were available at a time. As leaders we must cling to faith that the vision we have will come to pass.
Self-Control and Persistence
Allow me to remind you this was my thirteen-year-old son. You can look up the cost of a PS5 and you will see it required self-control for him to save all that money. Like most of us there are plenty of other things he likes to spend his money on, but he desired this so much that he controlled himself to save. Of all that my son did the greatest leadership less is what he combined this self-control with: persistence.
Napoleon Hill states in Think and Grow Rich:
“Lack of persistence is one of the major causes of failure.”
Like I mentioned earlier, my son checked daily. He checked often and was persistent about asking my wife and I to take him to various stores to see if they had one. He had the discipline, faith, self-control, and persistence to get up first thing in the morning and see the tweet three minutes after it was made so he could purchase it immediately.
What about you? With the burning vision you have for what you are leading do you have the discipline, self-control, faith and persistence my son demonstrated? If not, which of these areas do you need to grow in? Maybe your desire is waning. What will reignite you? Go out in the next week and reignite your desire. Maybe you simply need to keep persisting with faith that you will get the breakthrough.
Do not give up on your vision my friend. Keep climbing the hill knowing your vision is worthwhile. Need someone to think into your vision with? Contact me for a thirty-minute thinking partner session at no cost to you. Lead Well.
© 2021 Wheeler Coaching Systems, All Rights Reserved