Tweet

I am me – (living by my own authority).

Written by: Andrew Campbell-Watt

Article Overview: I am me. I am not you. I am comfortable (I think) with my beliefs, with my likes and dislikes, with my judgements and opinions; I try to be as honest as I can; I try to be truthful; I try to be kind and compassionate and generally try to behave towards other people as I would like them to behave towards me. In other words I like to think of myself as an ordinary kind of bloke trying to live by my understanding and interpretation of events and circumstances. In other words I am trying to live by my own authority.

I am me – (living by my own authority).

I am me. I am not you. I am comfortable (I think) with my beliefs, with my likes and dislikes, with my judgements and opinions; I try to be as honest as I can; I try to be truthful; I try to be kind and compassionate and generally try to behave towards other people as I would like them to behave towards me. In other words I like to think of myself as an ordinary kind of bloke trying to live by my understanding and interpretation of events and circumstances. In other words I am trying to live by my own authority.

And yet how many of us do things, have beliefs or have interpretations of events which we never worked out for ourselves – ones accepted by us because we heard them on ‘talk back’ radio, or saw them on TV or read about them somewhere - ones spoken or written about by someone we consider an ‘authority figure’? This means accepting, even if subconsciously, the decisions of someone else, who, we must think, also subconsciously, knows more, knows better. Otherwise why should we accept their opinion, their view of the world and how we should interpret it?

To accept someone else’s decision is to accept their view of what they think our lives should be and how we should live it. In other words (whether we actually like it or not) we conform to someone else’s set of values, someone else’s views of life, not our own. We are not living by our own authority. This reduces our range of choices, our range of actions because we are constrained by what we think someone else would do in the situation presented. We may have followed someone else’s directions for so long that when we are presented with a situation that demands our input we are unable or unwilling to do so. We are now unable to think for ourselves or to make a judgement based or our own interpretation of events. To have arrived at this point means we are now controlled; we have been diminished as human beings and are unable to live by our own authority.

Very few of the judgements we make on a daily basis, about what is “right” or “wrong” for us, are made by us, based on our true understanding of the situation as presented. It often seems that the more important the decision, the less likely we are to rely on our own thoughts and ideas, based on our own experiences. Advertisers tell us what we should buy – what we ‘deserve’; we are told what books to read, or music to listen to; we are told what fashion dictates we should wear and such like. Statisticians tell us that it is a statistical probability that, being a male in a certain age group and with certain racial physical characteristics and with certain religious beliefs, we will have certain likes and dislikes, be of a certain height, be overweight, even obese and have this or that medical problem and that when presented with an ethical dilemma we will answer in this or that way. But we are not a ‘probability’ – we are human beings.

No doubt it is a great nuisance to business and strategic planners that mankind is not uniform but compounded of individuals with their own likes and dislikes and their own interpretation of events and situations.

One does not do something to be happy – one IS happy and does something to express it. One does not do something to be ethical – one IS ethical and does something to express those ethical ideals. We don’t need someone else to tell us – we act on our own authority.

So it should be with all activities.

In business it is assumed that things are different and that money, cash flows and profit margins are the beginning and the end of the business model. This is not so.

As has been repeatedly stated in these articles, money is a human construct, has no intrinsic value and that its principle use is as a medium of exchange in the facilitation of trade. To place the consideration of money before the consideration of people and the environment that sustains life as we know it, abrogates the duty of care that everyone in business must have regarding their staff and customers – those very people who provide the money those in business so desperately seek. Such a positioning of money first, before people, alienates the employee from the organization in that they become an accessory to that organization, rather than being seen as a part of it; as a human being doing something for him or herself to help the organization. If this is the corporate mentality then the customer will be similarly alienated. People are not a means to an end – making money. To consider them as such is unjust and creates a great deal of disharmony and distress.

The ‘economy’ cannot be paramount – it is ‘humanity’ that is paramount. It is not humanity that is set free by competition; it is, rather, capital that is set free. To consider anything else means that the ‘market’ comes to dominate humanity.

Commerce and industry must again revert to the position of the servant of humanity and never try to subvert this wherein humanity is considered the servant of commerce and industry.

Life is about choices and no one can make a choice for you, that suites you – be it as an employee or customer. It is your life and you need to live it your way, as you see fit to bring you peace of mind – your mind, not someone else’s. You need to live by your own authority – yours, not someone else’s.

It is unhelpful for the individual to be ‘categorized’, to be considered a ‘statistical probability’ – again this is someone else’s idea of what we should be or do. The essence of every life is the fulfilment of the potential each is born with. All human life is bound to individuals who manifest it, and it is simply inconceivable without them. But every human is charged with an individual destiny and destination, and the journey to that destination or the fulfilment of that destiny is the only thing that makes sense of life. We are all members of the species ‘Homo Sapiens’ (reasoning man) why not try to live up to the promise of that and live by our own authority?

There is no need to change yourself, just BE yourself. How can you be successful in your life if you live by someone else’s ideas? You must live by your own authority.

Related Articles
  Internet marketing allows you to literally make money at the press of a button
  The Trusted Sales Authority
  ESCALATION AS A NEGOTIATION STRATEGY
  Reciprocal Links Are Still Not Dead
  Do You Have the Power

Article Tags: authority, bloke, circumstances, commerce and industry, duty of care, ethical dilemma, humanity, judgements, likes and dislikes, unjust



Related Forum Posts
Women Managers vs Men Managers - I've worked with men and women and the issues I had were with the way they handled their responsibility and authority - not whether they were a man or woman. Any one - male or female - can abuse the authority they have. Shri
Re: Can you make a real living online? - Hi, Yes, I make a real living online. I started my online business with Google Adwords (interestingly) and have spent a lot of money for education and started to see the results and worked on it and still working and making money. But my main method is to join high paying programs (MLM or affiliate programs) and advertise them on ezines. For example, I joined Cruise to Cash last month and contacted to travel ezines to sell it and made agreement for each sale we will share the money (it is sold for 1477$ or 997$ and half of it is good money). There are a lot of programs like this which pays 997$ or more. Join them and advertise in different ways (press releases, article marketing, calssifieds, magazines). But I think I should have my own authority websites, too. So I bought one website and created a blog for it to share my marketing opinions there. In 15 - 20 day I'm going to build another authority blog around my another niche). Orxan
Re: How Much Do You Need To Start? - From reading the responses - it seems that we're getting two different types of replies. One is for people who are talking about starting a business and figuring in enough money to keep the every day living expenses paid while beginning to build the business and before revenue starts to come in. The other reply is from people who are talking about the amount that is needed only to start the business - no living expenses being included. If the person is starting a business part time, they probably won't need to consider what it takes to live. But, if the person is considering starting a new venture fulltime, they need to also consider what they will need to live. I lived at home with my parents when I started my business and they covered my living expenses, but not everyone has that luxury. Chris
Re: Are we defined by what we do for a living? - [quote="Kevin":2yyx2pw3]I'd like to ask who are you as an individual? Are you defined by what you do for a living?[/quote:2yyx2pw3] People generally define themselves by what they do for example when introducing themselves they will state their name and then say something like I am an accountant or teacher but that is merely your profession not WHO you are. I guess we all tend to do that but we are usually far more than just what we do for a living. MichelleJ
Re: Global Moderators - [quote="Evan":2aeuy81o]Thanks for the opinions everyone - any other moderators want to weigh in and GT and I can discuss offline with your input?[/quote:2aeuy81o] Hi Moderators, As a new moderator I don’t really feel I should comment but as you have asked for input then I am happy to reply. I am the sole and global moderator on another forum which is neither as large nor as influential as this one but I have become quite used to spotting spammers. I can understand Trent’s concern about the need to respond quickly because if I don’t go in every day there is no-one else to do it. I think that all moderators should be able to delete posts in any section as long as we are given guidelines but maybe banning authority should be limited to Evan and GT. As GT has pointed out, there is the possibility of banning someone incorrectly but with the experience of the moderators here, I think the chances of that happening would be slim. My only suggestion would be that maybe if you do decide to give all moderators the authority to ban someone then perhaps we should include an appeals procedure which I am sure would be a big turn off for a genuine spammer. regards, Mal.


Share this article with your friends. Fund someone's dream.

Leave a comment below or share on the left and you'll help support entrepreneurs in Africa through our partnership with Kiva. Over $50,000 raised and counting - Please keep sharing! Learn more.

Tweet

Newsletter

Get advice & tips from famous business
owners, new articles by entrepreneur
experts, my latest website updates, &
special sneak peaks at what's to come!

Name:
Email:

Popular Articles

Four Reasons Why Entrepreneurs Should Blog

B2B PR – Planning for Success

Make Small Commitments. Get Big Changes.

Suggestions

Email us your ideas on how to make our
website more valuable! Thank you Sharon
from Toronto Salsa Lessons / Classes for
your suggestions to make the newsletter
look like the website and profile younger
entrepreneurs like Jennifer Lopez.