I thought they're similar.
Well if they're similar, what do they both mean?
Because if I know someone, only take care of themself, and only want other people to follow their opinions, then I will think he is self-centered. But if use another stronger words, maybe we will say, he is very selfish! So it's similar. No, no, no, it's different.
What's different?
No, selfish is he only cares about he or herself, but self-centered want others to...
Take care of--
...follow his or her opinions, but he only cares about him or herself.
I agree with your first one. And I think, a selfish person, he or she always thinks his opinion is right. Or they are the most smart, others are stupid.
I think self-centered is just care about themselves, and selfish, I think it might harm other people. And self-centered, you don't think about harming other people.
I guess selfish has benefit involved. Selfish people care about what benefit they will get.
What would be an example of self-nurturing?
What might the difference be between self-nurturing and selfish?
What's nurturing mean?
Give yourself nourishment
Nurture:Mothers nurture their children.
to feed and protect: to nurture one's offspring.
To support and encourage, as during the period of training or development; foster: to nurture promising musicians.
To bring up; train; educate.
So what's self-nurturing?
Self-development?
Sure.
Self support.
Zen.
[laughter]
Wait, what does that mean, here?
It means, 'one'.
Oh, come on.
You are your own universe.
Oh!
Ok.
Absorb new ideas and thinking, and change your mind.
What's the difference between self-nurturing and selfishness?
Self-nurturing gives yourself strength, but selfishness weakens you.
How?
Selfish people only think about, only use their energy to calculate their own benefit. But self-nurturing means you try to build yourself up, you try to strengthen yourself.
But don't they both focus on yourself? Why is it sometimes bad and sometimes good?
Selfish people think they are the best, and they seldom want to develop themselves and/or renew themselves.
So it's not focusing on self per se that's bad, it's how you do it?
Because I feel like society's message to women is don't focus on yourself, focus on others. Take care of other people before you take care of yourself.
But that's mothers.
Actually all women.
But I actually take care of myself first
And you're kind of saying that like you’re ashamed.
Oh!
What about men?
They're allowed to put themselves first.
Isn't 重男輕女 about taking care of the men?
Spoil them, not actually take care of them.
True. Yeah, it's hurtful to them too.
What I’m trying to say, women are taught, don't take care of yourself.
But they're put out in the cold--
So yeah, we're taught not to take care of our selves, but in order to survive we have to.
What does a leader look like? What would you describe a leader as?
Willing to take responsibility.
Willing to listen to the group.
Everyone will follow her or his lead.
Willing to take care of everyone.
Convinces others easily
Always have a conclusion. They always have the final conclusion to do the subsequent things.
So they make the decisions.
Yeah.
Who’s a leader you admire.
Admire?
Yeah, it's harder to find this kind.
For me it's Gail West, the things she says make deep sense to everyone, so everyone gathers around her, and wants to hear what she has to say.
I thought of someone, lingyishiong, but I'm not sure of their name. He has opinions that …
He insists on his idea, that even the idea--
Is not so ideal, meaning it's hard to achieve, actually, I think. The idea is good, but it's hard to achieve, because we need electricity.
I think it's because the way he leads other people, for most leaders in political, they always discuss things during the meeting, and maybe they will influence the policy in ugly ways, but for lingyi shiong, he leads the group of people to work through the island.
How can you tell when someone is 'in power'? Who's an example of being 'in power'?
Maybe if sb is talking to the audience, and the audience is willing to hear what he says, willing to listen to what he says.
The audience gives him power.
I think Ma Yingjiu is in power, he's got the position of president, so he could make the decision.
And no one can say, no that's not--
He has the authority to do the things that position, sb else in that position can do. But not everyone will agree with his opinion.
But if you disagree with him, there's very little you can do about it.
In power is, a person who decides to do one thing, no one can say, no.
Yeah, I agree with that definition.
It sounds like sb in power is a dictator.
Not all people in power are dictators, but all dictators are people in power.
What's the difference between being in power and being a leader?
They're all leaders, right? Different types of leaders.
A leader is sb people are willing to follow out of their hearts, and a person in power is sb are forced to follow.
Or follow out of fear.
Wow, you kind of nailed it, there.
Should a leader prove themselves in some way? If so, how?
In a democracy, you have to prove yourself by winning the election.
A leader in a company should have, should organize a group of people, or support them to achieve their goals or plan or complete the job.
Leaders on television: they can induce some kind of fashion.
So how do people on television prove themselves to be a leader?
By being different.
They know how to convince people
They're persuasive.
They have the ability to solve problems.
Good point!
Does winning an election prove that a leader is the best for the job?
No.
How do you know when you trust someone?
You believe in them.
How do you know that?
You will like to listen to what they say.
Why?
Think about sb you trust
Seldom to challenge…
They listen to you.
Good point.
The things that they say or do turn out to be right, like they make an observation and it turns out to be true.
So their judgment is often right.
Or, they don't hurt you.
And you will like to describe your difficulties in life to them
You'll confide in them.
I'm thinking about the same point as you.
You feel like they genuinely want to help you.
Just want to talk to them.
How much should you trust a leader? Of a team? Of a company? Of a country?
This is a tricky one!
It's hard to evaluate how much you trust a leader.
Let's put it in numbers. 100%?
80.
90.
Your compliance is better than me.
It depends.
On?
The company or the country.
But what's the criteria? What makes on e country more trustworthy than another?
If the leader doesn't deliver what they promised?
Then you stop trusting them?
In the west, we have this saying. "Power corrupts. Absolute power corrupts absolutely." So for me, the more power a leader has, the less I trust them.
When you are in power, you are not a human being, you are just a tool of politics, you hardly make choices by yourself, because others will…you are just a tool of others.
Things become more complicated.
So Obama once was a human being.
He still is, but he's severely constrained by his position of power
Chinese has a saying, when you change position, you have to change your brain.
It's the same thing! You have to become less human. Or less humane.
Humane means 人性。
So power and humane do not go together.
Yes, unless it's used as a tool of power, which the US does a lot. 'Humanitarian Aid' is usually neither humanitarian nor aid, usually. It's one reason Africa’s got a lot of problems.
"...being in a state of authentic peaceful awareness, [the horse] will follow my lead without any force, bribery or coercion."
I don't have this kind of experience
You know, kind of agree, but, I just, I don't get what authentic peaceful awareness is. Aware of what? It's really abstract for me. But I love this way, you don't need to do anything,
Yes.
Like true love.
You just follow.
I don't understand when sb is in awareness, the other being will naturally want to follow. The other person can just be like, ok you're doing your thing, I'm doing my own thing.
I think that's about charisma.
I only can … the god can do this. I mean, God has power. God doesn't need to force people, people just.
I don't know the Christian religion does kind of force people
Yeah, I think so
When a person becomes a god!
"The dream helped me realize. The matriarch wasn't stressed, running around trying to take care of everyone. In fact she wasn't trying to prove herself at all. She was the horse who could be trusted to lead, because she was the one who trusted herself the most. She trusted her own intuition, followed her own guidance. She had a clear focus, and never hesitated to set a boundary on energy coming from other horses that simply didn't feel good to her. Most people would consider this insanely self-centered or selfish. Yet, if you step outside our social conditioning, you realize, this self-nurturing, not only helps the matriarch mare, but protects the entire herd. If she's busy about worrying about how the herd's going to judge her, and running around trying to take care of them all the time, she'll no longer be aware of the potential predators lurking ahead."
So, this paragraph means that the leadership means to be self-centered? Is that true? Yeah. Maybe I think.
When you trust yourself, you will show your leadership, and , but if you always focus on others' judgment, it shows your weakness, your insecurity, then others can feel your fear, it's hard to become a leader. For instance, one of my senior officers is a kind of person that only focuses on others' judgment.
And what happens then?
What happens is we think we need to cover for her, not to follow her.
What's others judgment in this case?
She's afraid others think she's not good enough. And her insecurity will be reflected in her behavior. So I totally agree with what she's saying here, that people mirror each other. You can feel it.
I think, if a leader is afraid of something, or doesn't have enough self-confidence, then they will focus more on their own fear, instead of leading skills, leadership.
And what happens then?
Then they will do everything just in order to prove that, they just want to do anything to prove that they are good leaders. But no matter how hard they try, they just can't be good leaders. Because they care too much about how other people will think of them. So they just focus on the things that they lack, they cannot pay attention to other subordinates.
Or they cannot pay attention to how to solve problems, how to create a new situation.
How to make good decisions, because their brain is just focusing on what they need.
I think this is very important, because this is what the horse wants to teach us.
[laughter]
How to become a good leader.
"When I dissolve my fears, and nurture my instincts, I become the matriarch mare that leads the way."
You have to believe in yourself, then your dream will come true!
"Fear can make a hell out of many ordinary looking lives."
What does it mean?
Fear will twist the things that we see or we hear, and make us unable to see the situation very clearly.
Also it doesn't leave us feeling very good, right.
Is you're full of fear all the time, the world is a scary awful place
So that's why authority wants us to be afraid of everything, that way we cannot see the whole thing clearly.
But can fear be controlled by ourselves.
I'm told so.
Fear, fear is not something that you can control, it's something that you lack.
Holy cow, say more!
Any example?
I don't actually have an example, but that's how I feel.
It's a lack of what?
It's a lack of…
I remember that we discussed the fear, last week, or the week before last--
I know what she's saying. If the fear is, if you cannot expect, then that is the deepest fear you will experience. Is that what you mean? Because the
The article said, the fear is what you need to develop, or what you need to prove, so that's why Stacy said the fear is what you lack.
Lack? Actually I don't understand.
Because you think you're not good enough, so you feel afraid to do this thing, or you're afraid of facing this problem.
It's definitely related.
For instance, if you are rich, you will not fear so much, but if you are poor you will fear a lot.
Yeah, money is great insulation.
"When you hold back, for fear of being judged, others will mirror your lead. When you become stressed about the lack of abundance around you, others will mirror your lead. When you become afraid to openly celebrate love, others will mirror your lead."
I feel like this is what the media does.
When you trade in the stock market, when you see sb else sell stocks, you'll feel nervous and think, what happens now, and just follow others lead.
That's when ppl say the economy is rational I just laugh and laugh and laugh.
And others say if mothers are nervous, then the baby will also feel nervous. I don't know, I--
I have personal experience. My mother is a very nervous person.
So you're very nervous?
And I have had anxiety issues my whole life.
Actually this is true of my dad, he always felt he's not good enough, and all of us have the same problem too.
I want to talk about the point that others will mirror your lead. Because, in the past, I was told that you have to express yourself, you have to gain others' trust, you have to do the things by yourself, but in the others' opinion, you have to take care of your things, and others will feel the kind of atmosphere, I think, it's a special point that I got from the article.
Final statements:
I'm going to figure out why I feel that something is something you can't control, fear is that you actually lack.
I'm really deeply interested in what you learn!
Because i’ve been working on this issue on my own. And I know I bit by bit get rid of this fear issue, but still it's deep in my heart.
And I think we can observe the leaders we have in our lives, and to see their style of leadership, and to see how much their leader style matches this, the video we just watched.
But I think this kind of type of leadership is not so typical in our society.
So it's worth to observe the leadership style.
Because you're missing something, so you're afraid.
But what is that thing?
I don't know myself yet. We're always talking we have to ke fu ourselves, but it's we're lacking something, what's the thing you don't have enough of?
When you accept what you lack, you can be a good friend with your fear.
Because in the past, I always focus on how others judge me, and focus on how people like me dislike me. So I focus on how to attract their trust. But after I listen to the video, I rethink some experience in my life, I find that, if I just focus on myself, and just focus on how to do my job, how to live my life, then other swill maybe feel the atmosphere/energy. And when I don't care about others' judgment, I will not be so nervous, not be so insecure.
I'm just very curious. If the horse is very insecure, why do people want to ride it so much?
Because they've paid money for it. It's capitalism. If it can't be ridden, they have to kill it, and lose their investment. Horses are super expensive to keep.
Because it's not so safe, if the animal is very nervous.
