Here's HOW To Develop Yourself! | John Maxwell | Top 10 Rules

So when they ask me, are leaders born? I know what they're not really asking. Are they born? What they're really asking is, are there some people when they're born, they got it? Getting started is absolutely the key to life. Dreams are free, but the journey isn't.

Hello, Believe Nation. I'm Evan Carmichael. My one word is believe, and I believe that entrepreneurs are going to solve all of the world's major problems. So to help you on your journey today, we're going to learn from leadership guru John Maxwell and my take on his top 10 Rules for Success Volume 2. Rule number 5 is my personal favorite, and I'd love to know which one you guys like the best. And as always, as you're listening, if something really resonates with you, if there's a message that really holds true to you, please leave it down in the comments below and put it in quotes so that other people can be inspired. And when you write it down, it's much more likely to stick with yourself as well. Enjoy.

If I could just literally come off the stage and I could get real close to you and we could have kind of like a one-on-one conversation, there are two questions that I would ask you. And the two questions I'm about to ask you will really determine how successful you're going to be in this business without any question. These are the two questions. It's not like there's three or there's four or there's seven. There's two. Okay? Just trust me on this. I'm an old man. I know this. I've been around the block a few times. And there are two questions that if you can answer in a positive way about yourself, you're going to be very successful. And if you really cannot answer that in a positive way, to be honest with you, you're not going to be near as successful as you would like to be. The first question is very simple. What are you doing to develop yourself? And if you'd say, "By gosh, John, I'll tell you right now, I'm doing a lot to develop myself. I mean, I've got a personal growth plan and I'm intentional in this and I'm doing this on on a daily deal? If you could say that to me, then I'd say, hey, we're in good shape here. We're in good shape because that's the key. What are you doing to develop yourself? And by the way, the reason that's first is not because you want to be selfish. It's kind of like almost a selfish question. Person says, well, why do I start with myself? The reason you start with yourself is because you cannot give what you do not have. So you better start with yourself. Because if you're leading others and have nothing to give them, nothing to share with them, nothing to teach them, then I can promise you, you'll never be what you want to be as a leader. And I can promise you that after 40 years of personal growth, the secret of any success, if I've had any success at all, the secret of that success has been personal growth in my life. And growth has literally placed me where I am. So what are you doing to develop yourself? It's a huge question. The 15 Laws of Personal Growth. Basically, these laws are all about developing yourself and developing the second question, what are you doing to develop others? You see, on the first question, you're foundational for your future. The second question is all about compounding, multiplication. That's where you build a huge business, when you know how to develop other people. Passion often is linked with purpose. What I love to do is often what I should do. We have been created within us the capacity to have things that we enjoy greatly, and a lot of times there is a definite relationship between what I am in love with and what I should be doing. We are created and wired in such a way that passion and purpose many times comes together, and passion is the great energizer. Once you have passion, you have energy. Once you find your passion, you find your purpose. There is something energetic about it. You have never known a person who was passionate that lacked energy. We talk about high-energy people, we talk about low-energy people. There's no such thing as like low-energy people or high-energy people. If you have high energy, you have passion. If you have low energy, you don't have any passion. You know, some people, they're already dead. They haven't made it official yet. You just look at them. I just want to walk around and do the committal, let them watch and observe the whole process. But passion gives us a great amount of energy. And when we have that passion, there's something about how we love what we're doing and we enjoy what we're doing. And passion energizes us. A person with passion always stands out. The world is so full of apathy. It's so full of average. It's so full of whatever. But once you have passion and once you have a sense of energy in your life, it just sets you apart. It distinguishes you. It already gives you what I would call a head start in success in life. So when they ask me, are leaders born? I know what they're not really asking. Are they born? What they're really asking is, are there some people when they're born, they got it? And some of you, when they're born, they don't got it. And if you got it, you go to the front of the line. If you don't got it, you go to the back of the line. That's what they're asking. And I've got great news for you. And I do believe, I have no question about it, that there are some people that are born with what I call leadership leanings. No doubt about that. Just like some people are born with kind of a musical leaning. No doubt. But the great news is, because I've done this for so long, and I've done this with so many over such a long period of time in every country of the world, What I know is you can learn to lead. You can learn to lead. You can learn to be a better leader than you are right now. You can grow as a leader. If I'm a 5 as a leader, that means my organization will be what? Talk to me. A 4. Okay, here we go. Because the lid, the leadership lid won't allow it to go higher. So how do I grow my organization? This is very simple, folks. I've got to raise my lid, don't I? I've got to get this lid up, and because I can become a better leader, I can raise my lid. True? So I can go from a 5 to a 6, to a 7, to an 8, to a 9. Now this organization is a 4. When that leadership lid starts going up, that organization goes from a 4 to a 5, to a 6, to a 7, to an 8. You see, your organization will grow to the size of your leadership ability. Now if I were where you are and I was listening to what I just said, and I was taking notes, somewhere on my notes or somewhere on my iPad, I'd be putting a star right here. I'd be putting a rocket ship. I would be putting a sign that says, "Do not miss this." Because your ability to lead will determine how successful you'll be in this house without any question. The best leaders will build the biggest business. The whole concept, the whole idea that you can learn to lead, and if you learn to lead, and the better you learn to lead, the more successful you can become and the greater your business. This is an absolute fact. It's not a theory. It's not a thought. It's not an idea. It's not a principle. It's a fact. And the law of the lid says the better you learn to lead, the higher you lift that lid, the greater your business can become. Now that's the law of the lid. I brought something with me today that's very special. It's a kit, and I'm just so pleased to have this because this kit is very important to me. Now it cost me $799, And I got this kit back in the 1970s, okay? And this was my first personal growth kit. It's, you know, Dynamics of Personal Goal Setting by Paul Meyer, Personal Success Planner. And I was so excited. It cost $799. Now you have to understand, I made about $800 a month. So get the picture. It took me 6 months to buy this kit. I saved up. We didn't have credit cards back then, and I just saved up and worked hard, and it took me 6 months before I had enough cash to buy this kit. And I was so excited when I got it. And I mean, I opened it all up, and this is just amazing. I just— it had— I mean, you'll just see some things here that just crack you up. For some of you young people, you've never seen this before. They're called cassette tapes. I remember taking the first cassette tape out. Put it on my little cassette player. Opening this up, oh my gosh, this was so wonderful. That wasn't. They had, I mean, they had page-by-page plans. This, and I mean, I went through the plans and listened to the tapes and go through the plans, listen to the tape, go to the plans, listen to the tape. This is my first growth. Experience. And the ROI on this $799K? It's worth millions of dollars to me. Yeah, you heard me right. Millions of dollars and experiences and a lifetime of growth. And what's interesting is, now here's what I want you to hear, the value of this kit, the content was good, but that wasn't the value. The content was good, but as I look back now, I say, what made this so special? What made this so special is very simple. This is the kit that got me started. Hear me out. The value of what you do for people is not so much what you give to them as much as it challenges them to get started. Getting started is absolutely the key to life. And by the time I finished going through this personal growth kit, by the time that was all finished, I had 6 months of day in, day out personal growth. And what it did is it developed a habit in my life. And by the time I finished with that kit, now I'm used to spending time every day in personal growth. It got me started. I mean, this is worth this whole lesson if you can just get this. The reason I'm so passionate about personal growth is personal growth keeps me prepared. In other words, if I'm continually growing, I continue developing myself and I'm continually learning and I'm continually doing new things and going to another step higher, can I tell you what that is? That constant growth is the preparation for the opportunity. So when the opportunity comes, it's— here's the way, you don't go into an opportunity, you grow into an opportunity. And so I'm passionate about personal growth because for that person who says, "Wow, I had an opportunity, I wasn't ready." If you're growing, you're always ready because after I intentionally started growing, I made a commitment to grow as a leader, I started writing, I became an author, I developed growth resources for other people, I founded my first company, I began training conferences, everything I can think of that has ever been good in my life was a result of the fact that I started personal growth in my life. I got started and guess what? When I got started, let me tell you what I didn't have. I didn't have experience. I didn't have knowledge. I did not have a model. I did not have a mentor. I did not have a plan. I did not have a fellow traveler. I did not have resources. I did not have money. I did not have a growth environment, but I got started. You don't stop or not start because of what you don't have. You don't start because you don't realize yet, ah, that the fruit of everything good in life begins with a challenge. There's nothing easy in life. Worthwhile in life. Everything is uphill that's worthwhile. And it's not going to come to you and it's not going to fall in your lap and it's not going to be something that, oh my gosh, it just was so simple. It's always going to be difficult. The rule of 5 is the most life-changing concept for focusing on success that I have ever taught, that I've ever lived. So I'm just gonna drop it on you just enough to help you understand the 5 concept, to help you understand the 5 things you need to do to lift your leadership lid. The rule of 5 just simply says, if you have a tree in your backyard that you wanna cut down, and you have an ax, if every day you pick up that ax and you go to that tree and you swing 5 times with that ax to hit that tree, put the ax down. The next day you go out, pick up the axe, swing 5 times at the tree. Put the axe down. The next day you go out, pick up the axe, and 5 more times you swing at that tree. 5 times every day you pick up the axe, and only 5, not 50, not 15, not 500. If you swing 5 times a day at that tree with that axe every day, let me ask you a question. What eventually is going to happen to that tree? That tree is going to— More. Now there's no question about that, is there? There isn't any doubt. You don't have to sit around the table and kind of say, "Do you think it will? Let's hold hands and sing Kumbaya." If you swing 5 times a day at that tree every day, that tree will fall in the story. Now, if it's a big tree, it may take a couple years. If it's a little tree in your backyard, I don't know, maybe in a month you could knock that baby down. I don't, see, now the size of the tree will determine how long it takes for it to fall. But that's not what we're debating here. What we're teaching here is if you swing 5 times a day at that tree every day, The tree will fall. Now that's the rule of five. The rule of five says find your tree. What's your goal in life? What's your purpose? What do you want to accomplish? What do you want to knock down? Where's your axe? What are your tools? What is it that you're going to use to effectively go after that goal? 5 times a day? What are you? What is it? Because whatever that is, whatever that is, if you use it 5 times a day every day, you'll be highly successful. For example, I write books. So let me just put that in writing for a moment. I've written 73 books. Jason, that was a nice introduction. It's 22 million, not 19. But what's 2 or 3 million? Give a little, take a little. Little here, little there. People say, "John, how have you written 73 books?" Oh, thank you for asking. The rule of 5. You see, there are 5 things I do. I do every day that allows me to write that many books? It's not magic; it's not that I'm brilliant. It's just that I know The Rule of Five—The Rule of Five! You see, everyday I read. Everyday I file. Every day I think. Every day ask questions and every day I write. Every day—I do those 5 things every day. Every day I read. Every day I file. Every day I think. Every day I ask questions. Every day I write. Every day I read. Every day I think. Every day I file. Every day I ask questions; every day I write; every day I think; every day I read; every day I ask question— Every day I file; every day I write; every day I write; every day I read; every day I think; every day I file; every day I ask questions. Yes, I can do different orders but everyday! Doesn't matter whether you swing an axe left-handed or right-handed—you've just got to hit that tree. Everyday—I read-file-think-ask questions-write-read-think-file-ask questions-write-read-think-file-ask questions-write... Right? You say, "Now, John, what do you mean by every day?" This is where it gets a little long sometimes. What I mean by every day is every day. Now, you say, "Now, let me— when you say every day, do you mean you do that on Sunday?" Every Sunday I read, think, file, ask questions, write. "Do you do that on your birthday, every birthday?" Guess what? Every birthday I read, think, file, ask questions, write. Do you do that on Christmas? Guess what I do every Christmas? Every Christmas I read, think, file, ask questions, write. Do you do this when you're not feeling well? Can I tell you when I'm not feeling well? Even when I'm not feeling well, guess what I do every day? Every day when I'm not feeling well, I think, write, ask questions. Do all those things. Every day. You say, every day? At the age of 17, I started filing. I've never missed a day. I don't have 100 quotes. I don't have 1,000 quotes. I have tens of thousands of quotes. I don't have 100 stories. I don't have 1,000 stories. I have 10,000 stories. Where did you get all those stories? Where'd you get all those quotes? Well, let me tell you something. Guess what I do every day? See, we overestimate what we can do in a day and we underestimate what we can do in several days. And you got to understand, you got to understand, the secret of success is not the fact that, hey, I didn't say, hey, some days I get up and I write for 12 hours. No, no, no, no, no. I didn't say I write all day. I didn't say I read all day. I didn't say I think all day. I didn't say I ask questions all day. I just said every day. Every day. You see, doing a little bit every day is a lot more important than doing a lot some days. And most people live in someday. Well, I'll tell you what, I think I'll get to that. You know what, I think I'll try that. You know what, I believe I got it. Now, here's the key. You gotta figure out what the 5 are. It took me 7 years to find my 5 for writing. You say, man, John, you're slow. I am. It won't take you 7 years. But it'll take you a long period of time. I could get the first 2 quickly, but the 3rd, the 4th, the 5th— it took me 4 years to get the last one. I can remember as a parent, as my children got to a certain age and where they looked to me for influence, I could remember very well when I saw them beginning to go to their friends. And that's where their influence began, and that's where their influence began to increase. As a parent, that got a little scary for me because I could I could see I was having a little less influence and the friends were having a little bit more. Well, my parents were very wise. My parents understood that who my friends were would determine who I was going to become. Birds of a feather flock together. And in their wisdom, they decided that they wanted to know my friends and they wanted to see my friends. So therefore, they provided a lot of wonderful things in our home so we would have our friends at our house. So that my parents could observe and watch the kind of kids I ran around with. And what I learned as a, a kid growing up is very simple. There are some friends that were positive for me, and there were some friends that were negative for me. And my determination of which friends I was going to let influence me basically determined whether I was going to have a positive or a negative life. Fortunately, because of good parental advice and guidance, I chose good friends, which really did make a difference. Because you see, friends are wonderful. They give us support. They give us strength. They're either, though, a real asset or a real liability. So I would just want to encourage you, choose your friends wisely. You don't need a lot, but you need some good ones. Every leader I have ever known had a dream, had a vision. In fact, I would say to you, if you're not seeing what could be and what you would like to have, I would say you probably are not a leader. But what I've discovered about dreams is this: dreams are free, but the journey isn't. And so leaders go beyond just having a dream. They go beyond having a wish list, sitting around a table and kinda hoping something might come to pass. They understand that if they have a dream, if they're a dreamer, they have to pursue that. They have to take the journey. The dream's free, the journey isn't. And what leaders find is that when they go forth toward that dream, they continually have to pay that price. They continually have to realize that they make down payments on the dream they have. But there's one thing else I would like to say. All leaders realize that whatever they pay, it's worth the price because dreams for them do come true. I was sitting at a roundtable with executives one day, and a person that is highly successful, I could tell, was a little discouraged. He said, John, I've hit every goal in my life, and now I basically have lost my motivation and my passion. And I looked at him, I called him by name, I'll say Don, that wasn't his name. I said, Don, the problem is you've been goal-oriented instead of growth-oriented. You see, if you and I are just goal-oriented, when we hit our goals, it's kind of like eureka, we've arrived, we celebrate, have a party, but then all of a sudden there's an emptiness like, okay, I've hit it. But if you're growth-oriented and establish goals within your growth-oriented journey, You'll hit those goals, but you'll look at it and say, hey, this is just another step towards my total growth. And I've never known a person who said, John, I've grown as big as I can ever grow, and I know as much as I can ever know, and so therefore I have nothing to accomplish. You see, if you're goal-oriented, you'll hit your goal and then be a little empty. But if you're growth-oriented, you'll never hit that goal. Just keep growing. You and I both know that God's gift to us is our potential, and our gift back to him is what we do with our potential. Perhaps the greatest insult that we can ever give to our Creator is to be a slacker, to somehow have these gifts and have these opportunities and have this potential and do nothing with it. I would suggest today that you believe in yourself as much as God believes in you. He created you for greatness. Now, That's how He created you. You determine how great you become. He has already given you the potential and He's already given you the opportunity. Your response? Either seize the moment in the day and become all that you possibly can be, or slack in the moment and basically rest and just let things come to you. I encourage you on Minute with Maxwell, take the potential that you have been given as a gift. And the way to say thanks to that gift is by giving your life your very best. And the word that came to my heart this year that I think God wants me to focus on in 2015 is the word intentional. He wants me to be intentional. He wants me to, maybe more than ever before in my life, really focus on some things that are important and live a life every day, not a day that kind of where I try to accept my day but a day where I lead my day, a day where I focus on making sure that I really, really put my intentionality where it needs to be. We all heard the expression, all is well that ends well. I'm here to tell you all is well that begins well. And this is the first of the year, and for many of you, this is your chance, this is your shot, this is your moment, this is your time, this is your opportunity. Opportunity. All of you that are watching online, the different campuses, Daystar, this is your opportunity. This is your time. This is your moment. This is your place for you to really begin to live an intentional life.

Thank you guys so much for watching. I really hope you enjoyed this video. If there's someone you'd like me to profile in the next top 10, check out the link in the description and go and cast your vote. I'd also love to know what was your favorite message from this video? What did you learn from this video that you're going to immediately apply somehow in your life or in your business? Please leave it down in the comments below, I'm really curious to find out. I also wanna give a quick shout out to Jane Cassell. Jane, thank you so much for picking up a copy of my book, Your One Word, and posting that awesome tweet. I really appreciate the support and I'm so glad that you're enjoying the read. So thank you guys again for watching. I believe in you. I hope you continue to believe in yourself and whatever your one word is. Much love.

I'll see you soon. People that are knowledgeable about habits say that it takes 30 days for a habit to become a habit. In other words, you and I can't in 1 or 2 days develop a habit. It takes a long time. In fact, I am prone to think it takes a little longer than 30 days. Now, habits can be good and habits can be bad. And so over a period of time, you can either be developing habits that are going to help you or you can be developing habits that are going to hurt you. People that grow develop habits that help them. The great value of a good habit is you don't have to think about it. That's why it's a habit. In other words, once you began to, over days and times and periods, began to practice something that's good, after a while it becomes automatic to you. It becomes who you are. In fact, I always tell people, practice a good habit long enough to make it yours. And once it's yours, now it's automatic. Every day you'll do what you should do. Heard a story this week about a lady who bought a parrot at the store, and she was kind of lonely, so she wanted a parrot to kind of take home to talk to her. So she took the parrot home, and Said, there, and you know, the parrot in the cage, and the parrot didn't say a word. Next day she went to the store, said, parrot doesn't talk. Well, the manager at the store said, well, you know, maybe you need to get a ladder for the cage because parrots like to climb and get exercise. And so she got a ladder, put it in the cage, and sat there and watched the parrot. Didn't talk. So the next day she went back to the store, said, yeah, got the ladder, parrot didn't talk. He said, you probably need a swing. Parrots like to swing and just kind of go back and forth a little bit and puts them in a good mood. So she got a swing, put it in the cage, went back home and, you know, sat there and watched the parrot. And the parrot didn't talk. She went back to the store next day, she knew, you know, got the swing, got the ladder, parrot still doesn't talk. She said, well, you need a mirror. Parrot likes to look at himself. And get a mirror in there, and that'll help. She went and got a mirror and put it in there. And the parrot just looked at itself and swing and climb. She came back to the manager the next day. She said, the parrot died. She said, the parrot died? Oh, wow, terrible. He said, did the parrot say anything before he died? Yeah, said the parrot, says, "Don't they sell food down there? I'm hungry. I'm hungry." I know all kinds of people in their spiritual life. They got ladders. They got mirrors. They got swings. They got stuff. And they don't understand. They don't understand that less is more. That what you gotta do is go for the simple, go for the true. Go for the food for your own soul.