Self Leadership and
The New Leadership Playbook
Blog by Andrew Bryant

Tough times don't last but tough people do, is a quote that has often inspired me to keep going. Recent global disruptions are frustrating, disorientating, and very sad, and yes, it’s OK to feel the emotions that come with these upheavals. For those who have a roof over their head and food in their belly, it's a time to discover what’s really important and what you are made of.

In my 2012 book on Self-leadership with Dr. Ana Kazan, we described Self-leadership as:

"the practice of intentionally influencing your thinking, feeling and actions towards your objectives”

Right now we need to be practicing self-leadership and one way of 're-framing' how we think about things is through quotes. I'm sure you have your favorite quote that you turn to, to get you through tough times, but to get you started:

15 Self-leadership Quotes

1.    “Mastering others is strength; mastering oneself is true power” - Lao Tsu

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A definition of resilience can be found in any dictionary, but for a living breathing definition of resilience, you will discover it etched in the faces of those that have faced difficulties head-on, and refused to be defeated.

You might see resilience looking back at you in the bathroom mirror, or in the face of your spouse as they prepare for another day of work, or in the dogged determination of a co-worker or employee. Resilience can be an in-built quality or a choice, but either way it is not revealed in calm waters but in tough times.

Resilience Definition – Bounce Back or Bounce Forward?

For humans the dictionary defines resilience as:

“the capacity to recover quickly from difficulties, toughness.”

For substances it is the ability to spring back into shape, elasticity.

The paradox, for me, is that with these definitions’ resilience is about recovery (getting back what you have lost) or springing back to an original shape, as if nothing had happened....

Personal Mastery has many definitions but what is most important to understand is that it is not a destination or a definitive state, but a process. The idea that mastery is a process was described by Peter Senge, in his book ‘The Fifth Discipline.’

People with a high level of personal mastery live in a continual learning mode. They never “arrive.” (Peter Senge)

The application of personal mastery is key to living an effective life and having a successful career. This has never been truer than at this time in history.

In this post we explore, what is Personal Mastery, why it is important and, how to develop it.

Personal Mastery Definition

I define Personal Mastery as follows:

"Personal Mastery is the process of living and working purposefully towards a vision, in alignment with one’s values and in a state of constant learning about oneself and the reality in which one exists."

Personal Mastery and Self-leadership can be considered synonymous. They...

“Get out of your comfort zone.”

We have all heard this advice, whether as a cliché from a Motivational Speaker or in a Social Media meme. But is this B.S? And by B.S. I mean a Belief System!

The belief system (B.S.) in this advice is that we employ the courage to try new things and as such is sound; but how much is too much? Consider the following:

• The human body has very specific comfort zones for things like temperature, blood glucose, and atmospheric oxygen. For example, humans can survive for periods in double-digit zero degrees centigrade and although our cells start to die at 41c, people can survive a day trip to Death Valley which reaches highs of 55c.
• On waking this morning, your fasting blood sugar should be under 100 mg/dl, but if you have just had a good breakfast or lunch it’s likely to be around 140 mg/dl. If you are not a diabetic, your body has a sophisticated method for keeping your blood sugar in a ‘comfort zone’. Too high...

If you have ever tortured yourself over a setback or failure, or ever wondered if successful people do something different, then have I got news for you.

"Set-backs and failures are part of life, and if you are an entrepreneur or leader, how you handle set-backs and failures will determine your long-term success."

With 20 years of experience as an Executive Coach,  I have learned the power of questions, and in this post, I will share with you some self-coaching questions you ask yourself.

Read on, or Watch the Video

Quality Controlling your Questions will determine the quantity of your Control. I have been guilty, in the past, of the self-indulgence of asking,

“Why me?”

When the world appeared to conspire against me. Or the self-recriminating question of.

“What did I do wrong?”

When things did not go as planned. Perhaps you have caught yourself asking the same questions, but did you know there are better questions?

Questions that move you...

I clicked on the link in the email and the video from a motivational speaker began to play; it revealed a surprising truth.

This well-known ‘Success Coach’ starts by telling us that he works with billionaires with big houses, cars, and expensive watches, BUT these people are empty and insecure on the inside. In guru-like fashion he tells me that:

“The door to success doesn’t open outward, but inward”

He goes on to expand on the virtue of working on our mental, emotional, spiritual, and physical selves.

So far, so good. As a Self-leadership author and Motivational Speaker, myself, I’m fully aligned with the message. But then, comes the twist.

In the next part of his pitch, he tells us that if we do all this ‘inner work’, we can have houses, cars, and expensive watches. That my external wealth will be in direct proportion to my inner growth!

"WHAT THE BLEEP!"

Did he not just tell us that all the people with the big houses, cars, and...

In 2010, a shy Spanish-speaking South American woman, leaves her home and family to start a challenging new job in Singapore.

I asked her, what she was thinking and feeling at that time. “I was very afraid,” she said. “But I thought I would be good because I was invited to be part of a big project.”

Then, what was she afraid of? “Of meeting people better than me”, she said.

Does this resonate? Do you compare yourself with others, and give them more credibility than you give yourself?

I asked Victoria (not her real name, not her photo) what she thought she brought to the job, and what strengths she had that would enable her to be good.

“I am very focused and understand the complexity of projects, I can work with different people from different cultures and build trust.”

I asked her, “How many people in the world can do what you do, the way you do it?” And her answer was, “Not very many”. So, I asked why she...

In our 2012 book 'Self-leadership' my co-author, Ana Kazan Ph.D. and I make the following statement:

"There are no fairy godmothers - If you want to be transformed, to be free, you must do the work; you are the hero, you are your own savior."

It is a truism that life is not fair. We are not all born with parents who validate our self-esteem and provide opportunities for us to learn and grow; sometimes circumstances are downright cruel. But success is measured not by what you have but by how much you have grown inside, and this comes by motivating yourself to overcome obstacles and live with purpose.

In fact, those that have ‘moved the dial’ or ‘achieved the delta’ by going from a D grade to a C, and a C to a B are much more resilient than those who have always gotten A’s.

The Hero’s Journey

Mythologist Joseph Campbell tracked the hero's journey, a common theme in all cultures (and Hollywood), which is the process by which...

I’m often asked, how I got started as a Motivational Speaker and Self-leadership champion, and so I’m sharing this interview by Success Resources, Singapore, which answers these questions for you.

Could you share your story of how you began your journey to becoming one of the best Motivational Speakers in Singapore, and achieving the success that you have today?

Sure, I started my career as a Physiotherapist in the U.K. in the early 80’s. I was working with sports teams and athletes and soon realized that success was as much mental as physical. I studied psychology, NLP, hypnosis, meditation, and even Chinese medicine to help my clients get a competitive edge. When I moved to Australia, I continued to coach athletes but kept getting asked to coach business people to use their minds to be successful. Because of the impact, I was having on performance on and off the field I began to coach and speak about my approach and my Self-leadership Methodology.

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