04:24
Faizan
When Nike exhorted us to Just Do It, it stated in just a few words one of the key lessons for most (if not all) of us.
Whether it's what we should eat, the importance of exercise, how to succeed in business, making money on the share market, and so on, people, for the most part, know what to do. Encouraging them to do it, however, is the real challenge.
Consider, for example, helping people to realize their potential. The bookstores' and libraries' shelves are laden with the essential know-how about motivation, leadership, overcoming procrastination, improving performance, time management, and so on-and on-and on.
The challenge, however, remains. Doing it!
But the challenge is not new. The Bhagavad Gita, which historians variously date at approximately 2000 BCE, carries the message that it is one thing to intend to do something and quite another to do it. As Jack Hawley explains in his translation, 'As waves of change roll through, the setting alters and your mood turns, deflecting you to another place. What seemed crystalline in one situation becomes foggy in another. Then you forget, you lose your bearings and your strength seeps away'.
In the Gita, Arjana was fired-up to heed Krishna's words of wisdom-knowing that he (Arjana) had God on his side-but even then, Arjana stalled at the final jump.
Know-how is important-vital, in fact. And know-how is more than just knowledge. But how do you get people to take the relevant actions?
You could, of course, create a Kuhnian-crisis (as the saying goes: the one sure way to quit smoking is to get cancer). But who wants to be a crisis-creator, full-time?
There are two things that we must do. First, source the necessary know-how-that essential how-to information. Second, heed our own advice. The one behavior we stand the best chance of controlling is our own, so just do it!
Whether it's what we should eat, the importance of exercise, how to succeed in business, making money on the share market, and so on, people, for the most part, know what to do. Encouraging them to do it, however, is the real challenge.
Consider, for example, helping people to realize their potential. The bookstores' and libraries' shelves are laden with the essential know-how about motivation, leadership, overcoming procrastination, improving performance, time management, and so on-and on-and on.
The challenge, however, remains. Doing it!
But the challenge is not new. The Bhagavad Gita, which historians variously date at approximately 2000 BCE, carries the message that it is one thing to intend to do something and quite another to do it. As Jack Hawley explains in his translation, 'As waves of change roll through, the setting alters and your mood turns, deflecting you to another place. What seemed crystalline in one situation becomes foggy in another. Then you forget, you lose your bearings and your strength seeps away'.
In the Gita, Arjana was fired-up to heed Krishna's words of wisdom-knowing that he (Arjana) had God on his side-but even then, Arjana stalled at the final jump.
Know-how is important-vital, in fact. And know-how is more than just knowledge. But how do you get people to take the relevant actions?
You could, of course, create a Kuhnian-crisis (as the saying goes: the one sure way to quit smoking is to get cancer). But who wants to be a crisis-creator, full-time?
There are two things that we must do. First, source the necessary know-how-that essential how-to information. Second, heed our own advice. The one behavior we stand the best chance of controlling is our own, so just do it!
Posted in: business
