In our everyday life, we engage with people either at work, on the road, at home, at the store etc. and it shall continue to be so. Therefore, there is every need to get to understand people and task ourselves with how we can contribute positively to their existence. Below are my five principles on how to affect people positively and to keep making the world a better place.
- Value people
- Teach people
- Support people
- Learn from people
- Grow people
Value – Consider (Someone or something) to be important or beneficial. It also means worth in usefulness or importance to the possessor.
When people feel used, that leads to demotivation, depression to name a few. Although, in a work environment, people are paid for the work they do but value is created more when people are cared for genuinely and loved as human beings and not human “doings”. Also, through feedbacks, either positive or constructively, you can always show how much you value people. In addition, understanding that what interests people varies will go a long way in showing a sense of value of a person. Lastly, tell people you value them as often as you can and always show it rather than concluding they should know. Tell someone you value him or her today!
Teach – To impart knowledge or skills; to instruct in; to cause to learn by example or experience.
People sometimes learn through experiencing something by themselves. Most times, the person teaching finds it hard to understand the logic behind teaching. Teaching is not just telling. Most times, we have to get into the shoes of people so that we can better understand who they are, where they are, what they need and how best we can teach them. Most times, different situations warrant different approach and level of teaching. For a person to teach effectively and make a difference, it is advisable to ask oneself these questions below:
How prepared are you towards what you want to teach (level of knowledge)?
How clearly do you demonstrate your teaching?
How much coaching do you give to people during practice or during application of what was taught? Etc.
Do you deliver your teachings in respect to the above questions? Education experts have found out that, the more you teach people, the more you help them to increase comfort in themselves and also increase their confidence level. Teach someone today!
Support – To keep from failing; give confidence or comfort to; offering help or advice regarding something.
People pay attention to what you say, how you say it, what you do and how you do it. Unknowingly, you are influencing someone out there either in a positive way or in a negative way. So therefore, to better support people, it is best for you to have a sense of consideration and right intentions towards people so that you can better influence them in a positive way. Another way you can support people is to have a good understanding of people – so that you can relate better with them or comfort them when they need one, believe in people – so that you can guide them and motivate them, being a role model – so that people would want to pattern their life to yours, sharing your failures – is a good way to support people in learning and also to stay confident about who they are not minding the number of times they fail, encourage an amenable approach towards people, recognise people for a job well done and spending time with people you support is another important way to show support. Nevertheless, it is good for us to have at the back of my minds that there are plenty other ways we can show support to people. Show support to someone today!
Learn – The act of acquiring new, or modifying and reinforcing, existing knowledge, behaviours, skills, values or preferences and may involve synthesising different types of information.
Going by this popular adage: No man is an island – This translates that no man knows it all. Human learning may occur as part of education, personal development, schooling or training. Sometimes, we find ourselves in the midst of highly intelligent people and we end up throwing away the opportunity rather than try to absorb as much knowledge possibly we can. As individuals, we meet people everyday or better still, chat with people daily. For acquaintances, it is difficult to decipher their IQ because we barely know them but sometimes, it only takes one meeting to know/detect intelligence. For your friends and family, don’t just know them; also learn from their successes and failures. It will be of great advantage if one can keep an open mind-set towards people. In that light, you will learn and develop yourself more easily. A very good example I can use here to close this point is about myself. I learn a lot daily from what people have written, what people talked about, blogs and my environment. This has helped me to acquire new, modify and reinforce my existing knowledge, behaviours, skills and values. How about you? Learn something new today!
Grow – To become better or improved in some way; to become larger or increase in size; to increase by natural development.
Growing people should be the key focus of every individual, private organisations, government setups, schools, churches, mosques etc. The more we put into growing people, the more we can keep making the world be a better place. Although, for people to develop from point A to B, individuals need to share as much information in their possession with others. It could be done in various ways either through teaching, coaching, preaching, writing etc. Like it’s always said, knowledge is power. In addition, our personality can be a useful tool in growing people. Like I mentioned above in one of the points, the world is listening and studying and before you know it, your personality is influencing someone out there either to grow them positively or negatively. So, always endeavour to be a good role model at all times. We also need to give others the chance to grow by giving them the opportunity to experience situations themselves so that they learn, develop themselves and pass the knowledge onto others. How often do you endeavour to grow people? Nurture someone today!
Let me conclude with one of my best quote of all time by Maya Angelou –
“I’ve learned that people will forget what you said, people will forget what you did, but people will never forget how you made them feel”.
Pay attention to the people around you today and let’s continue to make the world be a better place for us all.
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