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As many of you know I have written three books on business: Celebrating Success! Fourteen Ways to Create a Successful Company, The Platinum Rule for Small Business Mastery and 49 Marketing Secrets (THAT WORK) to Grow Sales. All are available on Amazon.
I tell you this because I am working on my fourth book. I have not given it a title yet but the essence of the book is that there are nine behaviors successful people do to be successful and the book describes these nine behaviors and discusses how to implement them in your life.
The first behavior drives the other eight. I call the first behaviors Selfishness, which I define as intelligent self interest. The blog post is an excerpt from this chapter. Please give it a read and email me any comments. The email should be forwarded to ron@ronfinklestein.com.
Just be warned, it is a fairly long post.
Good Reading!
“Well, I know they've always told you/
Selfishness was wrong/
Yet it was for me, not you, I came to write this song/” Neil Peart quotes (Canadian Drummer for the band Rush b.1952)
Selfishness. When I talk of selfishness many people get upset, angry and sometimes they are vehemently opposed to this concept. Before you decide this is a foolish idea, take a minute and open your mind to a new definition of selfishness and how it can help you achieve new levels of success.
Before we go much further, let me define selfishness: “Intelligent Self-Interest.”
When the word intelligent was originally introduced into the English language, its original meaning was “to understand” (The Oxford Dictionary of Word History, 2002). Knowing this, it is easy to define selfishness as “understanding your self –interest or understanding what is important to you.”
Pay attention to this concept and it will change your life. I don’t make that claim lightly. I implemented what I write about here and my life is very different then what I expected.
I am talking about the use of selfishness as it leads to success, a fulfilling life, great and loving relationships and abundance. I am talking about success. My definition of success is even easier to understand and I devote a good part of the book talking about success and how to achieve it. We will talk about success later. But first I want you to understand selfishness is a great idea that should be embraced and developed in your life.
There are three types of selfishness. The first I call “childish selfishness”. I define this as the kind of selfishness we exhibited as children where everything is mine, mine, mine. I am reminded of a cartoon called Calvin and Hobbs. Calvin is a five year (approximately) old boy and he has his friend, Hobbs, who is a stuffed tiger that shares every aspect of his world. In one particular cartoon, Calvin is making a get well card for his mother who is not feeling well. One the front of the card it says “get well soon.” When you open up the card it says “because my bed is not made, my clothes need washed and I am hungry.” This is a great example of childish selfishness and it is funny, but you can see how this type of selfishness will cause problems. This is not the type of selfishness I am discussing or promoting.
The second type of selfishness I define as “self-sacrificing selfishness.”It is placing others above yourself as a means to self-sacrifice. If you are placing others before yourself, you are doing yourself a great disservice. When I was first exploring this concept of selfishness, I sent out an article in my newsletter. (To subscribe, go to www.ronfinklestein.com). I received a very quick response from an associate who took me to task. He said “I am a Christian and I follow the teaching of Jesus. He (Jesus) was the most selfless person ever born, so selfless he gave his life for us. How can I embrace the concept of selfishness when I embrace the concept of selflessness that Jesus teaches?”
My response to him was as simple as it was direct: “Jesus was the most selfish person ever born. He knew exactly what needed to be done and he committed his every resource to achieving his goal, even alienating the most powerful men of his time, associating with tax collectors, prostitutes and others with unsavory character. He did what was required to achieve his goal. If this is not selfishness, I don’t know what is.” A short while later I got his reply. He said “I see your point. In trying to give so much of myself, I am not fully devoted to any one thing and all things are suffering. I need to get more focused and selfish.” This is not the kind of selfishness I am discussing either. When others come before your goals, nothing good gets done. You meet people who have all the right intentions but nothing gets done. Would Thomas Edison have accomplished so much if he was not clear on what he wanted? Would Henry Ford been so successful if he had not been so focused? Would Walt Disney been successful in building Disneyworld if he lacked selfishness? This is not the selfishness I am suggesting we embrace. It is not the selfishness of self-sacrifice. No, you must do well before you do good!
I find it interesting that all our lives we are told not to be selfish. Yet selfishness is our key to success. Wallace Wattles explains this quite nicely and I quote an excerpt from his book The Personal Power Course :
So you will see that it is a mistake to sacrifice yourself for others; when you sacrifice yourself, you lose the very thing which would attract others to you. Instead of sacrificing yourself for others, what you must do is to make the most of yourself for others. Those who sacrifice themselves for others may win some degree of pity and tender feeling, but they are not loved as are those who make most of themselves. Do not imagine that you can buy love by what you do; you must win it by what you are.
So, in social and neighborhood matters, BE SOMETHING. If you see the need for reform, be a reformer, but do not sacrifice yourself for any reform. You will probably not help the reform by doing so, and you will lose your own life, or all that is worthwhile in life.
The altruism which leads to continuous self-sacrifice is morbid and unhealthy; the altruism which leads one to make the most of himself for others is noble and praiseworthy and is the only kind of altruism which really helps the world. If you are a strong and loveable PERSONALITY, you will be loved by your neighbors and fellow-citizens; but if you throw yourself away for their good, they will only feel contempt for you... there is nothing more selfish than what commonly passes for self-sacrifice. The most selfishly conceited people are generally those who sincerely believe that they are making the largest sacrifices for others. Remember, what wins love is PERSONALITY, and self-sacrifice means the sacrifice of personality. Personality is not developed by the things you do without, but by the things you use constructively.”
The third type of selfishness I call “mature selfishness.” It is the selfishness I refer to throughout this book. The best way to describe this type of selfishness is with a true story. One business owner I met fell on some hard times. He thought about closing his company and filing for Chapter 11 (Chapter 11 is a form of bankruptcy.) This gentleman thought long and hard about what he wanted from life. He talked with his wife, children and employees about what was important. Knowing this gentleman personally, I knew two things about him: 1. His integrity was above reproach. 2. When he gave his word it was his bond. As he thought through what he wanted, he came to this conclusion: he “wanted to be a business owner and he wanted to delivery what he told his customer he would deliver.” He was very selfish in understanding what was important to him and he made it clear to the important people in his life and engaged their support. He risked everything to accomplish both goals. He learned new skills. He created new relationships. For two years, the only food he and his family ate was food they could purchase with a coupon. The children did not get what they wanted for Christmas. The employees worked overtime without pay. It was hard. This gentleman was focus on achieving his desired outcome of being a successful business owner and delivering on his promise to his customers. He was selfish with his time, money, and resource. He only met with people who were interested in buying his product or were potential candidates to invest in his business.
Today, the company is a thriving, successful organization. This is the good kind of selfishness I am writing about. By being selfish, he created a company that solved a need in the market and made things easier for his clients. He created a successful business that provided good jobs to his employees and he created the type of life he wanted for his highest good. By focusing on his highest good he created a very good life for his family and employees. He can now give his children all the things he could not provide in the past. His selfishness paid handsomely for everyone involved. This is my definition of selfishness. His selfishness led to action that created his success.
To your continued success,
Ron Finklestein
330-990-0788
