Article: Failure Is Where The Riches Lay
Failure Is Where The Riches Lay
Failure Is Where The Riches Lay
By Zach Danesh
Heavy wears the crown. Whether it's as president, king, or chief of a tribe, leadership is a practice. It takes a very conscious mind in order to walk this path. We need to have many skills: communication, strength, kindness, discipline, self reliance, delegation, and sticktoitiveness. There are also many soft skills to call upon. Also, intuition is key. We cannot rely on the prefrontal mind at all times. We need to also allow for the gut to guide us.
Philosophy is the structure for our leadership ability to rest upon. It's taken me coming up on four decades to unlearn what the establishment professes to deem correct. Remember your school days. Failure on a homework assignment or project was seen as shameful. Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu showed me that this is incorrect. We cannot know what we don't know. It is only when we are tested that our ignorance can be revealed. This is the moment when opportunity arises. Now, we can lock in on areas that can become improved. My philosophy is that failure is where the riches lay. Growth only comes like a present wrapped in failure. My friend, Jerry (aka Captain America) is the only professional MMA fighter to have hit two twister submissions back to back on his opponents. He grew up in a hectic time with a single parent on the mean streets of Everett. He took all of this trauma to become the famous fighter known as Captain America. He referred to his experience in life as a young person as Post Traumatic Growth. He reframed what would be seen (or pushed on us by the likes of Oprah) as Post Traumatic Stress Disorder. This is only partly true. It only becomes this diagnosis when we don't see it for what it is, a gift.
This is where leadership is paramount. We have leaders now that push everything disarming for a human being. The bible would say, "teach a man to fish." This is leadership in a nutshell. The best and truest form of leadership is benevolence. What is more benevolent than giving a person the ability to make their own way, and become a leader themselves? A person can rule rather easily with fear. It is a far greater, and noble path to lead based on the ability to inspire. Easy is not the way. Corn Dogs, and soda pop only make your life suck, and much shorter. A clean diet, a sharp mind, pure heart, and vision make for a rich life. Failure, suffering, pain, and loss allow us to gain that Post Traumatic Growth.
Change is the only constant. We are made for it. Great leaders instill that we all have the power to alchemize lead into gold (or trauma into our power).
You can find Zach's Instagram here: @zachdanesh
