Beyond the f#$* it

If anyone who knows me was asked,  does Mike have a positive disposition of a negative one, I would expect a large percentage of responses would be that I am a pretty consistently positive person. Recently, I listened to the second TED talk given by one of my favorite TED speakers, Benjamin Zander. In this talk, Benjamin, who is a conductor, talks about the difference between positive thinking and possibility thinking. And while I personally believe having an optimistic disposition is an important trait of leadership (I’m not sure there is a long list of people waiting to follow someone who is always negative), you aren’t using positivity as a tool, that’s the job of possibility.

As the saying goes, possibilities are endless. But it is also true, as Mr. Zander mentions in his talk, that sometimes our behaviors and preconceived notions stand in the way of our achieving all that is possible. If you can remove those barriers and focus on possibility, there is no telling what can be achieved.

Toward the end of the talk, there is a particularly lovely moment where he engages the audience in singing a fairly well-known song. Watching him shift how the audience put everything they could into their singing, by explaining the meaning of the song, was just beautiful.  I think we could all use a little more, as he suggests in the talk, “eh, fuck it” in our efforts if we really want to achieve all that is possible. #beyondthef*^kit  #lessonsfrombeethoven

Hope you’ll watch!:)