I chanced upon this quote, and it resonates well deeply in my soul and mind.
1st application: speaking against what you disagree with that’s not good
It’s a stark reminder of me mustering the courage to speak up and against things that goes against my and good values, and to be proponent of good.
An example is how I finally decided to remove someone from our organization whom spoke so much about being valuable to the company for many years…but frankly, we disagree. We gave chances and opportunities again and again, and finally decided to have that hard conversation and pulled the plug and paid the price to remove them.
Same time for errant employees or non-valuable business partners.
Moving forward, we will likely NOT have any more business partners or joint venture partners without very clear business and relationship goals and contracts that are clearly articulated and revisited again and again – some people are good at bullshitting and putting lipstick on their lack-luster capabilities.
That’s an example of where having a backbone is important: to speak up and out against things, people or relationships that are not helping you or worse, destroying what you’re building.
2nd application: have a backbone to pursue what you care about.
Deciding and staying the course to pursue what you care for required a pretty big backbone as well as balls and ovaries of steel.
Such as
- entrepreneurship / start ups
- education of choice
- quitting a well paying job that’s toxic
- leaving people (even family) that’s toxic
- etc
Cos it’s hard.
There’d be a lot of resistance, failures, people laughing / scheming against you.
You may even doubt yourself.
You may need a bunch of experienced and mature council of advisors, be it paid mentors or high quality friends (which can take a lot of time and effort to find, nurture and keep) to guide you.
Wishing is useless
The answer lies in clear direction and daily, consistent actions that brings you closer to your destination and direction, regardless of how much money you have, how much talent you have, how much time you have.
Don’t just wish – have the backbone to go and pursue the life and dreams that you want.