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Bits and Pieces
Compiled by Azaad Iqbal
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We are all faced with great opportunities
- brilliantly disguised as impossible situations.
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Obviously, people must know their fields.
But the greatest success and financial reward will go to people who have
more: the ability to express their ideas, to assume leadership, to
arouse enthusiasm and co-operation - in short, the ability to bring out
the best in others.
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Wisdom can only be planted, nurtured and
harvested. It cannot be manufactured.
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Nothing in this world can take the place
of persistence. Talent will not; nothing is more common than
unsuccessful people with talent. Genius will not; unrewarded genius is
almost a proverb. Education will not; the world is full of educated
derelicts. Persistence and determination alone are omnipotent. The
slogan "press on" has solved and will always solve the problems of the
human race.
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The 1992 Olympics are now history, but
while they were in progress I remembered the story of Henry Pearce of
Australia, who was competing in the single scull rowing event at the
1928 Olympics. He was leading when a duck and her string of ducklings
came into view up ahead. They were on a collision course and Pearce
reckoned that his scull would cut the string in two and sink a few
ducklings in the process, so he pulled in his oars. When the ducks
passed, Pearce again bent his back to the task. There's a happy end to
the story. Pearce won. Usually, such acts of sportsmanship result in
defeat.
It happened a couple of years ago in the marathon tandem kayak racing
event at the world championships in Copenhagen. Danish paddlers were
leading when their rudder was damaged in a portage. British paddlers,
who were in second place, stopped to help the Danes fix it. The Danes
went on to defeat the British by one second in an event that lasted
nearly three hours. But there's a happy ending to this story too.
According to The Wall Street Journal, the British Kayakers won what many
people regard as the highest honour in sports. They became the winner of
the Pierre de Coubertin International Fair Play Trophy.
The trophy is named for the founder of the modern Olympic Games and it
has been awarded annually for the past 28 years to people in sports who
have demonstrated nobility of spirit. In the past, the trophy has gone
to a Hungarian tennis player who pleaded with officials to give his
opponent more time to recover
 from a cramp, and to a high school
basketball coach who forfeited the Georgia (US) state championship after
he found out that one of his players was scholastically ineligible.
The first trophy went to an Italian bobsledder named Eugenio Monti for a
gesture that exhibited a touch of class. In the two-man bobsled event at
the 1964 Innsbruck Olympics, Monti was the leader after his final run.
The only one given a chance to beat him was Tony Nash of Great Britain.
As Nash and his team-mate got ready for their final run, they discovered
that a critical bolt on their sled had snapped at the last moment. Monti
was informed of the problem and immediately took the corresponding bolt
from his own sled and sent it up to Nash. Nash fixed his sled, came
hurtling down the course to set a record and won the gold medal.
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We must view young people not as empty
bottles to be filled, but as candles to be lit.
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The most successful executives carefully
select understudies. They don't strive to do everything themselves. They
train and trust others. This leaves them foot-free, mind-free, with time
to think. They have time to receive important callers, to pay worthwhile
visits. They have time for their families. No matter how able, any
employer or executive who insists on running a one-man enterprise courts
unhappy circumstances when his powers dwindle.
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Life is like riding a bicycle. You don't
fall off unless you stop peddling.
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In the words of playwright Neil Simon:
Don't listen to those who say: "It's not done that way." Maybe it's not,
but maybe you'll do it anyway. Don't listen to those who say: "You're
taking too big a chance." Michelangelo would have painted the Sistine
floor, and it would surely be rubbed out by today. Most important, don't
listen when the little voice of fear inside you rears its ugly head and
says: "They're all smarter than you out there. They're more talented,
they're taller, blonder, prettier, luckier and they have connections.
They have a cousin who took out Meryl Streep's baby-sitter ..."
I firmly believe that if you follow a path that interests you, not to
the exclusion of love, sensitivity and co-operation with others, but
with the strength of conviction that you can move others by your own
efforts, and do not make success or failure the criteria by which you
live, the chances are you'll be a person worthy of your own respect.
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The way I see it, if you want the rainbow,
you have to put up with the rain.
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If you're feeling low, don't despair. The
sun has a sinking spell every night, but it comes up every morning.
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In 1886, Karl Benz drove his first
automobile through the streets of Munich, Germany. The car was the
forerunner of today's Mercedes Benz. The machine angered the citizens
because it was noisy and scared the children and horses. Pressured by
the citizens the local officials immediately established a speed limit
for "horseless carriages" of 3.5 miles per hour in the city limits and 7
miles per hour outside.
Benz knew he could never develop a market for his car and compete
against the horses if he had to creep along at those speeds, so he
invited the mayor of the town for a ride. The mayor accepted. Benz then
arranged for a milkman to park his horse and wagon on a certain street
and, as Benz and the mayor drove by, to whip up his old horse and pass
them - and as he did so to give a loud cheer. The plan worked. The mayor
was furious and demanded that the car overtake the milk wagon. Benz
apologised and said that because of the ridiculous speed law he was not
permitted to go any faster. Very soon after that the law was changed.
Benz proved that the art of diplomacy is getting people to see things
your way.
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At the age of forty-two, George Sand, the
famous 19th century French novelist, was a broken and a depressed human
being. (She had adopted the male pseudonym to cover the fact that her
novels were written by a woman). Her personal life at this time had
fallen apart and she was the victim of severe personal criticism from
powerful and influential people in France.
One day, feeling low and melancholy, she wandered into the woods near
her home where she had played as a child. Seated there on a boulder she
thought over the past, pondered her future, and tried to analyse her
personal situation. After some time she reached a conclusion that was to
enable her to go on and write another 50 plays and novels. That decision
was this: "Henceforth I shall accept what I am and what I am not. With
my limitations and my gifts, I shall go on using life as long as I am in
this world and afterwards. Not to use life - that alone is death."
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Nothing is interesting if you are not
interested.
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Just as most issues are seldom black or
white, so are most good solutions seldom black or white. Beware of the
solution that requires one side to be totally the loser and the other
side to be totally the winner. The reason there are two sides to begin
with usually is because neither side has all the facts. Therefore, when
the wise mediator effects a compromise, he is not acting from political
motivation. Rather, he is acting from a deep sense of respect for the
whole truth.
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After actor/director Michael Douglas had
been in five blockbuster films, his father, actor Kirk Douglas, wrote
him a note. It said: "Michael, I'm more proud of how you handle success
than I am of your success." It's a note Michael Douglas treasures.
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