The Magic Pit Of The Masters

Validate your assumptions about the effectiveness of your leadership through the influence of others on you.

In his new novel, “Aleph”, the writer Paulo Coelho tells the following story:

- A man slipped and fell into a pit. A priest was passing by, and the man asked him to help him get up. The priest blessed him, but walked away. After several hours, a doctor appeared. The man asked for his help, but the doctor contented himself with looking at his bruises for a far distance, writing him a prescription and telling him to buy drugs from the nearest pharmacy. Finally, a strange man appeared. Again, he asked for his help, and the stranger jumped into the pit.

- And what now? We are both prisoners here ! The man said.

To which the stranger replied:

- No, we are not. I am from around and know how to get up.

Is there a direct correspondence between your reaction to feeling overwhelmed by a situation (which serves to exceed your own limits of competence) and the reproach that you are not doing enough to get to know yourself better?

Certainly, attracting people to your side is the most profitable segment of leadership that, if you target directly, you will be able to increase your value. However, such an operation requires understanding people’s perceptions, knowing their motivations and behavior, the ability to identify those attributes that make your leadership a place worth “visiting”.

In order to evaluate your progress, you must segment your leadership as follows: a segment dominated by you – the influence, and a segment dominated by other people – the spirit of solidarity. Then, you must try to position yourself in an area where they are able to manifest their caring attitude and dominate it. And for that, you need to define very good your plan of attack – to turn into a prisoner and wait to be released.

Well, such a plan of attack is exactly the opposite way of thinking that prevails in leadership strategies, and that is why I do not encourage you to consider this strategy unless you are absolutely sure of it success.

Getting to know yourself better means going into more detail in the analysis of a situation that helps you evolve through the prism of what you could lose if you let yourself be defeated by it.

The binding agent that connects you to other people is the “pit” where you slip in difficult times. To manage to get out of there, you must first believe in people, and then expect those who are truly on your side to come and “visit” you – to join you and then help you get up.

Do you question their loyalty? Obtaining a substantial and lasting advantage depends on your ability to attract the (most profitable) segment dominated by people, demonstrating your skills in creating effective and lasting relationships.

Just as a photographic image is centered on a particular element to attract attention – so you must put emphasis on that segment of people who approach your leadership concepts and vision, and then bring to the same common denominator all those who have elected you to lead them. And this is sometimes very difficult to achieve if there isn’t that kindness, spiritual availability and goodness on both sides.

To reproach yourself for not knowing yourself better is to judge the role you have to play in a situation where you are not willing to assert yourself as a man of great value.

The Masters’ Magic Pit expresses that change in your leadership course. It is one of the decisive ways to optimize your leadership, which can ensure you long-term change in your performance.

Sometimes, people can help you rise higher only if you let them exercise their influence over you, only if you entrust yourself to them, which is risky because it can degenerate into manipulation. Moreover, if you show your preoccupation towards them, but you do not do any progress, then you will experience failure. Do not be afraid if you slipped into the pit, be afraid not to be left there by the people who have chosen you to lead them – but who didn’t appreciate your qualities.

Do you focus on those attributes that transform your leadership into a place worthy “visiting”? Validate your assumptions about the effectiveness of your leadership through the influence of others on you.

Conclusion: One of the leader’s skills must be to maintain himself on the highest level of the value scale and possibly climb higher, leading his team. This can only be achieved if your team is willing to climb together with the leader and it especially depends on its availability to change its way of thinking. The downside is, of course, descending on the value scale and even falling in the pit of helplessness, out of which you can rarely get out or you can remain there permanently, abandoned by your team. Very rarely will you find someone to help you get out of there.