Why we should lead with love and inspiration
How finding your why can help you have a bigger impact on the world
Inspiration or manipulation, which do you choose?
To get people to do what we want them to do, we have two options; we can inspire them, or we can manipulate them. And unfortunately the majority of the world continues to use manipulation as their means to get people to do what they want them to do.
To buy their products, to vote for them, to act in a relationships; to do anything where you are trying to exert influence over another individual or group of people. We have grown up with manipulation as the default because it is what we were taught. But it doesn’t have to be this way.
In Simon Sinek’s book “Start with Why” he claims that there are very few leaders in the world who choose to inspire rather than manipulate people. But these individuals or organizations who choose inspiration all communicate in exactly the same way; which is the complete opposite of everybody else.
Simon calls it The Golden Circle; it’s the concept that we should always start with why we do the things we do, then how we do them, and then what we do.
“The Golden Circle finds order and predictability in human behavior. Put simply, it helps us understand why we do what we do. The Golden Circle provides compelling evidence of how much more we can achieve if we remind ourselves to start everything we do by first asking WHY” — Simon Sinek
So my question to you today is “Why do you do what you do?” Why do you have a coaching business, why are you an engineer, why do you love being an entrepreneur or a digital nomad? Or why do you like working at the company you are working for?
It all starts with why, and if we don’t know our why, we can’t get people onboard with what we do and how we do it. We might be able to manipulate our audience for a period of time, but it won’t be long lasting, it will feel inauthentic, and it will never be nearly as effective as choosing inspiration.
When we choose inspiration, we create raving fans. We create influence out of love because we believe in our hearts that what we are doing is the right thing to do. And that inspiration radiates out to our communities, our countries, and the rest of the world.
The reason I do what I do is I believe I have skills that the world needs. I’ve been given opportunities to create software, to go to conferences, to learn how leadership should really work in the world, and to make sure I’m living a life that I love.
It’s the concept of Ikagai that my friend Skip Kelly recently posted about. We all need to find something in this world that we love to do, that we are good at, that the world needs, and that we can make money from.
And now that I have found mine, my why is that I believe I have a responsibility to share those skills with the world. Whether it is through blog posts, instagram posts, software that I have created, meetups that I’ve organized, or whatever it may be. One of my why’s is that I want to help all of you find your why.
And from that I believe we can also help my much larger why of helping to heal our sick planet. The planet that gives us life every day. But we can’t do that if we don’t take care of ourselves first.
So tell me in the comments below “What is your why?” and tag two friends to tell them about it.
If you are looking for more daily inspiration and a community that wants to lead with love, be sure to join my Facebook Community, Those That Inspire.
Originally published at http://thegingernomad.com on January 31, 2020.
