A @BBCArchive clip - 1984: How Rik Mayall created Rick from The Young Ones

#Failure means you have the #courage to step out of your box and try something unknown to you - which creates #character and #empathy by exposing vulnerability - character cannot be developed in ease and quiet

'Reasserting the principle that freedom of speech does not include the freedom to falsify unchecked seems timely' David Hare

the importance of #character

I listened to this RSA lunchtime lecture this last Thursday - David Brooks was the speaker on the subject of a book he has just written.

What follows is a mega summary of the lecture...    

.... and then a bit more detail created from some the ideas that particularly struck me.  

At the foot of this post are links to some other posts you may find useful.

Mega Summary



Luke Robinson ‏@LukeRobboUK  link to this tweet

.@nytdavidbrooks "We focus much more on how to build a good career rather than a good character" #RSACharacter

to build character you need to:

1) be self aware of your good and bad points;

2) let that awareness and your experience of life (including love & suffering) affect the humility and empathy and generosity with which you treat others;

3) focus not on your value but on your service to others



and in a bit more detail ...



David Brooks started off by talking about incandescent people  - like the Dali Lama  - and their inner glow.  In looking at such people he had started to think about how he could achieve that inner glow himself.

He then went on to describe 2 differing focus people seem to have in their lives


1) some seem to focus on their CV virtues - that is things they are good at, that are helpful for getting a good job and successful career

2) others seem to focus on their Eulogy virtues - the things that people will say about them at their funeral

1. Luke Robinson ‏@LukeRobboUK  ilink to tweet here

   Today @nytdavidbrooks asks are you focused on your value to the marketplace or on the integrity of your inner life? @RSAEvents #RSACharacter

He described these different approaches as "Adam 1" and "Adam 2" (taken from The Lonely Man of Faith by Rabbi Joseph B Soloveitchik) 


Adam 1 - the CV virtues - so an economic focus typified by words like logic, practice & produce & perfect, calculating, shrewd, work focused, conquer, venture, win

Adam 2 - Eulogy virtues - so typified by words like humility, love, doing good, vocation, selflessness, generosity and self sacrifice



David suggested that our culture is out of balance with a focus on Adam 1.

So we are taught to brand ourselves, to have a good career, to focus on our self interest, to broadcast ourselves via social media.  Children are told to love themselves, that they are wonderful inside - to be "true to yourself"

1. Kevin J Ruth ‏@kevinjruth  link to tweet

   Median narcissism scores have increased by 30% over 20 years. People losing ability to hold moral conversations. @ECISchools #RSAcharacter

Indeed using Google Ngrams he said that we can see that the use of "economic" Adam 1 type words is increasing ...
whilst the use of "moral" Adam 2 type words is decreasing ...

He also mentioned a survey which asked College students which they would choose - a life of fame or a life of sex.  Most picked fame

Sharliza Jelita ‏@sharliza  link to tweet

'80% of young people think they are really important' Hence increased desire for fame #RSACharacter


David then went on to describe how he had looked at various people to see how to develop a moral life and the activities that would help - bravery, gratitude, kindness, humility

so he talked about Eisenhower ....

1. Rashmir ‏@rashmir  link to tweet

   'Humility is radical self-awareness from a distance, the ability to see both your strengths and your weakness' - Eisenhower #RSAcharacter

and how a childhood experience taught Eisenhower about acknowledging the anger he had inside - "the key confrontation is against yourself" - so he could manage his anger and so lead others

then David talked about Samuel Johnson - with his OCD tendancies

1. 
   

   Sharliza Jelita ‏@sharliza  link to tweet

   It's more empowering to confront inner flaws, which in turn builds character, rather than blaming others. #RSACharacter
   

and pointed out that such confrontation of our inner flaws increases our empathy for others


David next talked about Francis Perkins and her commitment to work safety that arose from seeing a fire in a factory where people threw themselves out of upper storey windows and so fell to their death - to escape the intense heat.  He thought that Francis embraced a call within her - a vocation - what life was demanding of her


and the final example David gave was George Elliot  - and how love humbles, how it ploughs open hard ground, how it de-centres us from from ourselves 



We then turned to a Q&A - various quotes from the Q&A session are below

Martin Robinson ‏@SurrealAnarchy  link to tweet

Dissatisfaction with neuroscience revolution brought @DavidBrooks420 to 'character' #RSAcharacter


David mentioned a reading list of 14 books he gives his students - this maybe close

1. Emma Louise Boynton ‏@EmmaLouBoynton  link to tweet

   'The Internet is a vast de-commitment device'-Is technology eroding an essential aspect of character building? #RSACharacter
   
   

"do you want to have a little impact over a large no. of people or do you want to have a larger impact over a few people? "

1. Sharliza Jelita ‏@sharliza  2ink to tweet

   You get what you bring to social media - don't blame what 'tech' does; it's how you use it @nytdavidbrooks #RSAcharacter
   
   

"but social media does encourage shallow short interactions rather than deeper longer ones"


"the message is the person - think of how Pope Francis is"


"Volunteering for worthy causes doesn't necessarily build character - that is confusing the external with the internal"

other posts on RSA, TED, other lectures, conferences, others blog posts

2015

in search of a fuller life - an RSA event with philosopher Theodore Zeldin 

18 management practices to measure good management & 10 conclusions on the data gathered on such across firms and countries - summarised out of this paper - Why Do Management Practices Differ across Firms and Countries? - by Nicholas Bloomand John Van Reenen

algorithmically enhanced confirmation bias - 6 uncomfortable facts about how facebook affects what we see - from a post by @nathanjurgenson

10 thoughts on some possible insights (& questions) from the UK Election results

11 headlines on why we use facebook & social media - summarised out of a very rich buffer post by Courtney Seiteron  

10 tips on how to use twitter to build a learning community

The 10 problems which mean the process to allocate scientific funding is broken
where does creativity come from? - a @RSAEvents lecture by mathematician @Cedric_Villani @alexbellos 
how to innovate & survive - by @markf212  (Mark Payne)

18 top tips and thoughts about using #social media to enable #community source = an article by  Anatoliy Gruzd PhD & Caroline Haythornthwaite PhD 

thinking straight in the age of information overload - by @danlevitin 

how to become a soulful organisation - by @fred_laloux 

2014

thoughts & headlines from a conference on social media and images 

Data Protection & Privacy - 8 issues from an International Conference

escape your social horizon limit & understand more - source = a blog post summarising the work of  Jeffrey A. Smith, Miller McPherson & Lynn Smith-Lovin

OECD - challenges for the next 50 years - in an OECD report 

Want to help somebody - shut up and listen - by ermesto sirolli 

social media & death - 10 things you may not have thought about - #DORS conference

persuasion and power in the modern world and the rise of soft power - UK House of Lords 

2013

UK Government Policy Blunders & their common causes - by Anthony King & Ivor Crewe

the development of the U2 spyplane - source = CIA historians Gregory Pedlow & Donald Welzenbach

Guide to Comments (esp. #YouTube) for creators - by @vihartvihart

considering culture and business process improvement  - source = an article by Schmiedel, Theresa, vom Brocke, Jan, & Recker 

ideas for your organisation from the 2013 99U conference 

ideas that may help you attract older volunteers - source = a paper by Brayley, Nadine, Obst, Patricia L., White, Katherine M., Lewis, Ioni M.,Warburton, Jeni, & Spencer, Nancy

physical factors which help people get better quicker - source = a paper by Salonen, Heidi & Morawska, Lidia 

a new approach to school and education - by Geetha Narayanan 

principles for software to encourage participation - by Gerhard Fischer

guiding principles on designing construction kits - by Mitchel Resnick & Brian Silverman

how to identify the #culture of an organisation

signs of overparenting - source = an article by Locke, Judith, Campbell, Marilyn A., & Kavanagh, David J

making ideas happen - source = a 99U conference

2012

how to spot a liar - by pamela myer 

the related world of cyber crime, warfare and industrial espionage - by @mishaglenny 

ambiguity, irreverence, commentary & judgement - by lauren zalaznick

measuring happiness - source = talk by jim clifton, jim harter, ben leedle

well of course my #approach is #right

situations matter

via brain pickings