Chapter 4
Self-EDUCATION
Construction Stage 1.1: Gathering Information
SAL Model Stage 1.1: Self-Education
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Ultramodern construction wonders, such as those seen in
Dubai, UAE, require enormous pre-construction efforts
before they become real and tangible structures. |
When a construction company sets out to build a skyscraper—or any other physical structure—a great deal of planning and preparation must precede any tangible work. This planning and preparation is part of the PRE-CONSTRUCTION stage, all of which is done
behind the scenes in architectural offices and engineering meetings.
There are SEVEN (7) different steps in the PRE-CONSTRUCTION stage.
PRE-CONSTRUCTION Stage
- Gathering information
- Consultations
- Acquiring and allotting financial resources
- Obtaining approvals and permits
- Planning and scheduling
- Assembling a cohesive team and crew
- Drafting blueprints
The SAL Model contains SEVEN (7) corresponding step-habits analogous to this PRE-CONSTRUCTION stage. We call this the PLANNING and PREPARATION Stage.
PLANNING and PREPARATION Stage
- Self-education
- Building relationships
- Self-awareness
- Self-organization
- Self-recording
- Self-oneness
- Drafting a Self-Constitution
Most people who eventually view a completed skyscraper don't see the time and effort invested in the PRE-CONSTRUCTION stages. Similarly, your visible self-improvements and/or public professional advancements and victories as a self-action leader are usually preceded by a lot of personal planning and preparation, almost all of which is done in private and without any fanfare, attention, or applause.
Just as a construction company must obtain and gather necessary information, knowledge, experience, and skills to properly build a skyscraper, EDUCATION is a key component for effective life construction.
The planning and preparation phase of Self-Action Leadership begins with SELF-EDUCATION. In the words of Habeeb Akande, Formal education makes you a living; self-education makes you a legend.
"Formal education makes you a living;
self-education makes you a legend."
—Habeeb Akande
For many self-action leaders, much of their education may come formally—by way of institutionalized teachers and coaches. Formal education can be very valuable. But it is not the only kind of education—and for self-action leaders, it is ultimately secondary to the primary knowledge you will proactively seek out on your own.
This primary process of education is called Self-Education, and YOU are primarily responsible for its attainment.
Self-action leaders don't wait for the "right" teacher to come and teach them at the right "time." They take initiative to seek out knowledge, experience, and wisdom of their own accord. Moreover, like a young Abraham Lincoln walking 20 miles to borrow a new book, self-action leaders will sometimes go to great lengths to seek out and acquire information they need to grow and progress in their life and/or career.
The acquisition of self-knowledge begins with a burning desire to obtain it.
In the Good Book, Jesus says that: Blessed are they which do hunger and thirst after righteousness: for they shall be filled.
"Blessed are they which do hunger and thirst after righteousness: for they shall be filled."
—Jesus Christ
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Socrates
470-399 B.C. |
This principle of DESIRE works for knowledge, experience, and wisdom as well; those who authentically, genuinely, and deeply
want it are more likely to eventually find their fill (and sometimes more) of it. And the stronger your desire, the more fruitful your quest and search will be.
One famous (albeit possibly apocryphal) story on the subject of self-knowledge involves the famous Greek philosopher, Socrates. As the story goes, a man approached Socrates after seeking him out for knowledge. Socrates took the man down into the ocean and proceeded to shove him underwater. After several moments of perplexing struggle, the man was able to wriggle free of Socrates' grasp, resurface, and catch his breath. Gasping for air and spitting water, the man turned to Socrates and angrily demanded to know why he had apparently attempted to drown him; to which Socrates replied: "When you desire knowledge as badly as you just wanted air, come and see me again and I will show you the pathway to wisdom."
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Abraham Lincoln
1809-1865 |
Abraham Lincoln
—16th President of the United States—is one of world history's greatest examples of self-education. "Honest Abe" was born and raised in humble, poor, and unsophisticated circumstances in the dense, rural backwoods of Kentucky and Indiana in the early nineteenth century. Lincoln was not blessed with many chances to obtain a formal education, yet he craved knowledge like he craved air—so he created his own opportunities for learning by continually demonstrating a willingness to sacrifice time and energy to attain knowledge. As previously mentioned, he would go to great lengths (literally) to access a new book he had not yet read.
Young Abraham devoured all the educational resources he could possibly access. This homespun lawyer-turned-politician eventually educated himself right up into the White House—a place that typically houses Ivy-Leaguers who were born with a "silver spoon in their mouths" and ready access to a quality formal education.
Forty-five (45) men have served as President of the United States since George Washington first took the first Oath of Office in 1789. (1) Of those 45 men, most of them were born into prominent and affluent families who could afford personal tutors and would send their sons to be educated at the nation's most prestigious universities.
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Frederick Douglass
1818-1895 |
In light of this reality, isn't it fascinating that the man who is almost universally lauded as the greatest and nobles and smartest of them all was Abraham Lincoln—a self-taught, self-made man who never went to high school, much less college, yet whose extraordinary character and capacity as a self-educated self-action leader and skilled communicator more than compensated for whatever formal education, training, refinement, and polish he may have lacked.
Two other prominent examples of self-education from American history include Sequoyah, a Native American responsible for creating a written alphabet for his people, and Frederick Douglass, who was a leading voice in the American abolitionist movement.
Freedom Focused strongly encourages YOU to study the lives of these three remarkable men. The following books are a good place to start:
- Lincoln the Unknown by Dale Carnegie
- Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, an American Slave by Frederick Douglass
- Sequoyah by Grant Foreman
Self-action leaders spend a significant portion of their discretionary time in pursuit of SELF-EDUCATION. They read, study, ponder, reflect, ask questions, experiment, carefully observe their surroundings—including other people—and seek out information in whatever other ways they can.
In my case, there's no way to calculate the residual benefits and overall value of self-education in my own life and career. Suffice it to say, it has been absolutely indispensable to my success and has shaped everything good that has come into my life and/or career.
While I have been blessed with a much broader formal education than Abraham Lincoln, I am certainly no Ivy-Leaguer. Indeed, you will not find any top-tier institutions on my academic transcripts. Nor will you find anything extraordinary or remarkable about my elementary or secondary schooling. And never once did I ever benefit from a paid, professional tutor.
Despite the relative obscurity and average nature of the schools I attended, I was able to compensate mightily for any knowledge and experience I might have missed out on by making the most of whatever opportunities I did have—and then supplementing my formal education with a broad and ambitious buffet of continual and never-ending personal study, experimentation, and tireless personal drive, effort, and energy.
Because YOU are ultimately responsible for the quality of your own education, where you learn, or from whom, should always be secondary to what, why, and how well you learn. Whether your opportunities include attending elite private schools and prestigious universities, an obscure state or community college, or simply visiting your local library or logging on to the Internet, you can still take responsibility for your own learning.
If Abe Lincoln didn't make any excuses about having to walk 20 miles to get a single new book to read, no one in the twenty-first century who has access to a public library and/or the Internet should be making any excuses about why they can't self-educate, either.
In other words, no matter how hard it may seem for you to acquire knowledge in your present circumstances, chances are you still have far more (and better) access to information than Abraham Lincoln, Frederick Douglass, or Sequoyah ever had—or ever dreamed of having, for that matter!
Don't let these magnificent self-educational opportunities go to waste.
Take full advantage of them and get studying today!
And take advantage of any opportunities at obtaining a formal education as well. Doing so will multiply your options and opportunities in life.
Learning to Learn
A quality education goes way beyond just memorizing facts and storing them away for future retrieval. As such, there are several components of self-education that all self-action leaders would be wise to focus on. These components include understanding
how YOU learn best (e.g. visual, auditory, kinesthetic), knowing
where to go for needed information,
how to efficiently access it, and the proper calibration of your attitude, perception, and work ethic throughout the process.
You can discover how you learn best through self-observation of your past learning successes (and failures). Online resources also provide ready insights into what YOUR learning style is. A simple Google search, posing the question: "What is my learning style?" will yield a cornucopia of hits that will provide detailed information as well as online tests to gauge your personal style (e.g. visual, auditory, kinesthetic).
The best way to better understand where to go to access information that is desired and/or needed is to simply ASK QUESTIONS of people you know or come across who have more knowledge than you do. If no human beings are available at any given moment, the Internet is a fantastic machine to which you can turn to and pose questions relevant to your informational search. The advent of artificial intelligence (AI) has further enhanced the capacity of the Internet to answer a whole host of different questions in a manner that can be impressively accurate and precise.
The proper calibration of your attitude, perception, and work ethic along your self-educational journey will ultimately be YOUR JOB. If you find you are having trouble in any of these areas, you may find benefits from searching out and studying resources in the self-help field. Better yet, just keep reading and studying the comprehensive Life Leadership textbook you currently hold in your hands! After all, it was designed, organized, and written to assist you in this ongoing calibration!
Repetition and Rote-Learning
When I was a boy, someone taught me the great truism that: Repetition is the key to reception.
"Repetition is the key to reception."
—Anonymous
If you want to commit anything to your long-term memory, you must usually employ a measure of rote learning. Like it or not, there's simply a
lot of material you must memorize to become a highly skilled and culturally literate critical thinker.
For example, you may need to look up certain words in the dictionary several times before you truly OWN those words as part of your fluent vocabulary.
Similarly, an electronic calculator can never replace the efficiency value of knowing your addition, subtraction, multiplication and division tables and other elementary arithmetic skills (e.g. fractions, decimals, estimation, etc.).
The purposeful memorization of important facts, quotes, poems, riddles, stories, jokes, puns, et cetera enriches your heart, mind, soul, and cultural literacy. It also empowers you personally, professionally, and socially in countless ways. Lastly, it strengthens your memory muscles and bolsters your credibility.
And this is just the beginning of the endless benefits of memorization.
There are many others!
For example, memorized knowledge is extremely valuable in emergency or other stressful situations, such as knowing how to administer CPR (cardio pulmonary resuscitation), perform the Heimlich maneuver, and recognize signs of shock, stroke, and other medical emergencies. Memorizing frequently used information is also more efficient than continually looking it up.
Memorization is also good for neural plasticity, increases your brain's ability to remember details, and delays the onset of age-related cognitive decline.
Memorization takes time and effort; but it is usually worth it—and sometimes many times over.
At Freedom Focused, we are big believers that some books are worth reading more than once. There is one book in particular that I have read cover-to-cover 24 times in my life, and I'm a smarter, wiser, and better person for having done so. Every time I've read and studied it, I've derived new insights and wisdom from its pages that I hadn't discovered or discerned during previous readings.
Simply stated, repetition and rote learning are vital components of a quality education. Engaging these practices requires discipline, dedication, and hard work; it is one of the things that separates top tier learners and performers from average ones.
Ongoing Self-Education and Other Training
On Christmas Eve, 2003, I received one of the most memorable phone calls of my life.
It was Dr. Stephen R. Covey.
Earlier that year, I had sent him a letter thanking him for his life's work and telling him about its tremendous influence on my life. I also requested the opportunity to meet him personally.
My motivation for writing the letter stemmed from some good advice I received from Kieth Merrill, a successful filmmaker. I had approached Merrill after a speech he delivered at Utah Valley University, where I was attending college at the time. I was impressed to ask Merrill for advice about how to be successful. As he looked piercingly into my eyes, he told me to: "seek out a person who was already where I wanted to someday be and learn from them."
Stephen Covey was where I wanted to someday be.
So I sought him out in an effort to "pick his brain" and learn from him.
Despite his very busy schedule and international travel itinerary, Dr. Covey—to his credit—kindly carved out a few minutes of his holiday to respond to my epistolary request. On that phone call, which lasted for about 10 minutes, Dr. Covey encouraged me to read for at least two hours every day. He also urged me to read deeply and widely, including outside of my own interests.
While I can't claim to have read for two hours every day of my life, I have read a lot. Doing so is one of the things that has gotten me to where I am today, plain and simple. Indeed, I'm a rich man because of the treasures I have mined from literature, refined in my intellect and conversation, incorporated and synthesized in my writing, and then permanently stored in my mind and heart for later retrieval. Reading will always play a vital role in my ongoing self-education and personal training and development as a self-action leader.
Ongoing self-education includes education of all kinds that occurs beyond the formal classroom. Examples of this kind of education include: personal reading, studying, pondering, reflecting, online courses and workshops, mentorships, research, educational multimedia, observation, asking questions, traveling, trying new things, and doing a wide array of other, positive and productive "stuff" in general.
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Ralph Waldo Emerson
1803-1882 |
Wise, principle-centered experimentation and calculated risk-taking in the interplay of our lives and careers are also excellent sources of self-education. As Emerson once suggested:
Don't be too squeamish about your actions; all life is an experiment.
"Don't be too squeamish about your actions;
all life is an experiment."
—Ralph Waldo Emerson
Don't misinterpret Emerson's words as an excuse to be stupid or engage in unwise or dangerous behavior. But do allow it to inspire you to take calculated risks for your own education, growth, and maturation.
Embracing such risks are a big part of what has gotten me to where I am in my life today.
Self-education is a habit to cultivate throughout your life. Based on my own experience, I highly recommend Dr. Covey's advice to be an avid and voracious reader. If you can't squeeze in an average of two hours of reading per day, commit to one. If that is too hard at first, begin with a half hour. In the wonderful Age of Information in which we all live, so much information is available through the miracle of public libraries and the Internet.
Don't let these precious resources go unused!
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Muhammad
570-632 |
One practical and highly doable way to make this commitment to self-education is to
cut in half the time you currently spend on social media, watching television and YouTube, online shopping, or randomly surfing the web. You can then devote the surplus time to substantive reading, study, and taking advantage of other meaningful educational opportunities.
"Seek education from the cradle to the grave."
—Muhammad
To help you begin—or further inspire and motivate the continuance of—your own journey of self-education, we invite you to complete the next SAL Master Challenge homework exercise.
SAL Master Challenge
Exercise 7
Self-action leaders proactively Self-Educate
Read FIVE (5) Books from the list of Titles in Appendix A. 1___ 2___ 3___ 4___ 5___
Book Titles:
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
Memorize FIVE (5) SAL Mantras from Appendix B. 1___ 2___ 3___ 4___ 5___
Mantras:
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
Memorize FIVE (5) Quotes from Appendix B. 1___ 2___ 3___ 4___ 5___
Memorize FIVE (5) Poems from Appendix B. 1___ 2___ 3___ 4___ 5___
Poem Title and Author:
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
Initials of Accountability Partner or other Recitation Witness:__________
I Have Completed SAL Master Challenge Exercise #7:__________
In Your Journal
- To what extent have you valued and utilized self-education in the past?
- Has this Life Leadership textbook changed the value you will place upon self-education in the future? Why or why not?
- What are three specific ways you could practically and reasonably invest more time in your self-education?
—Dr. JJ
Wednesday, January 29, 2025
Palm Beach Gardens, Florida, USA
Author's Note: This is the 429th Blog Post Published by Freedom Focused LLC since November 2013 and the 237th consecutive weekly blog published since August 31, 2020.
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Chapter 4 Notes
1. While there have been 47 Presidents of the United States, only 45 men have held the office of President. This is because Grover Cleveland (22nd [1885-1889] and 24th [1893-1897) and Donald Trump (45th [2017-2021] and 47th [2025-2029) both served as President twice, in non-consecutive terms.
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