While watching Carolina Panther quarterback Cam Newton perform his art on the hard driven soils of a heavily crowded field of play; I find myself laughing like a child addicted to Christmas sugar cookies and left over Thanksgiving pumpkin pie.
Like NBA legend Michael Jordon, Cam’s got a style that offers a separate journey for sports fans to follow; one that’s connected more to a test of skill rather than an expansion of ego.
Colin Powell once said, “Avoid having your ego so close to your position that when your position falls, your ego goes with it.”
Losing sight of the greater reality has led several high profile decision makers and those hired to be their support system toward destinations unspeakable. A burial ground that Rig-Veda calls the biggest enemy of humans.
Author and Martial Arts Master Richard Andrew King calls out to the ego to join him in the center of the fighting circle so that it can be defeated by the need to expand growth rather than further the human need of being accepted.
He writes: The goal of competition is to test ourselves; our skill, character and our personal development.
The most recent downsizing of the Corporate American scene has provided the current generation with too many chiefs with not enough willingness to succeed except to keep firing. If all who is left is looked upon as being the best then why isn’t anyone moving mountains?
King clearly makes a statement when describing our reasons to settle with the term power in the flock. It’s a reference to external, social power, the power that manifests itself over others. Power in the flock is false. Using such powers deludes and misguides the masses that follow out of fear.
Fear of what?
I remember in the eighth grade, within the core of the Bicentennial year Riverside Jr. High school Social Studies teacher Mr. Fox laid out a sheet of clean unused paper and asked each of us to step to the front and write down our single most powerful fear.
At fourteen my snickers and doodles were too childish for some yet he saw through it.
My exact words were, “What if tomorrow doesn’t come?”
His reply, “And if it didn’t arrive what would your actions and reactions be during the process of all things coming to an end?”
“To figure out how to warn the people without them thinking the sky wasn’t falling.”
“Wouldn’t you have to be required to hold a power in office or big company in order to reach a conclusion?”
“No sir…I’d stop the record playing on KOOK radio and remind people how great yesterday was.”
Six years later my bedroom driven pretend radio station ambitions unfolded onto the cattle stained grounds off South Billings Blvd with four giant sticks in the Montana mud that shot KOOK as far north as Norway on a clear night in midwinter. Between 1982-85 I feared living out that classroom conversation. The Soviet Union was still a force and who knew what the Middle East was up to?
My friend Brian from Philly kept my feet on the ground while reaching for the stars, “You gotta think like The Boss!”
“Dan Miller?”
“Bruce Springsteen! He’s a hero to my friends and family back home in Philly because he never lets any of his fame go to his head. Everything you say on the air should be about real people. The moment you start believing the stage lights are on you is the day you can’t prove your statement true to Mr. Fox.”
Back to Richard Andrew King…
“Power of ourselves, the concern is not in the act of dominating others but controlling our own mind, passions, ego and all the inner demons and dragons afflicting us from within. External power is the beast. Internal is the true power.
Buddha never stopped teaching, “It is better to conquer yourself than to win a thousand battles.”
Dr. Ronald Mack from Wake Forest University scared a lot of people; not because he was a man of physical power, a voice that rocked the Rockies and whose ego belittled even the strongest of desires to be named the head doctor of a hospital or medical practice. His internal willingness to walk in peace, an ego built on a foundation of tests based on skill rather than expansion of ego made him a leader within the paths that take average dreamers and turn them into healers.
Although I’ve been a student of martial arts for nine blinks in a book of 2,000 plus years…all people who venture near or around a place of study quickly recognize our greatest weakness which is the act of external power. Although I find great pleasure in watching budding egos grow from soils invited by the Master; humility must be openly shared by way of calling a spade a spade…it is the greatest strength.
Why should your business, family or circle of friends be any different? The Christmas party invitations have been handed out and just like last year and the chapter before; cliques and special favors make up the moments that’ll be held the longest. Rather than returning to work on Monday with a heavy heart and or holding too much information about those you work with…feed not Karma but rather protect the mind, body and soul with a simple exercise: when you laugh mean it. When you smile make it real. When you shake hands squeeze a little too hard so they remember more than just your name. Never create what I call shadow talk, taking over corners with a couple of your supporters, your eyes being pointers. Be a leader in life and welcome everyone with a real determination to get to know them.
I’m not a fan of NASCAR but I fricken love the way every driver thanks everyone that made today’s victory a reason to believe in the arrival of tomorrow.
arroecollins@clearchannel.com
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