ATTITUDE: CONTENT OF CHARACTER

PRINCIPLES OF SUCCESS Series 24

ATTITUDE: CONTENT OF CHARACTER

Martin Luther King Jr. said, “I have a dream…that my children will not be judged by the color of their skin, but by the content of their character.”

Attitudes are content of character. Personal attitudes are units of a person’s character. Character manifests through attitudes, which are emotional outflow of a person’s inner life. Attitudes are fragrance of a person’s character;they give away the stuff a person is made of on the inside. As a substance is known by the kind of odor it releases so is a person’s character in known by his attitudes. Attitudes cannot be separated from character, so they are used interchangeably. When someone’s attitude changes, his character also changes accordingly.

Your attitudes are the ways you respond to issues of life– the way you respond to people, events and situations; the way you respond to whatever life throws at you. Life is not fair because it throws things at people at random. But life is fair because it throws things at all people. Nobody is exempted from blows of life. Therefore, blows of life shouldn’t affect your attitude. Your attitude can either be a shock-absorber for life’s blows, or the bane that fester the wound, depending on the way you respond. What happens to you is not as important as your response.

Attitude constitutes the atmosphere you create around you. It can be magnetic, attracting or repelling, depending on its kind. Attitude is like a garment you have on – it can get you noticed. In fact, it is said that your attitude gets you noticed more readily than you apparel.

Attitude is a quality of the mind. So we talk about attitude of the mind. Mental attitude is your manner of thinking over a period of time. We advocate positive mental attitude because the attitude of the mind has a lot to do with a person’s well being and success. A wise man discovered that “people can alter their lives by altering their attitude of mind.” You can actually improve the quality of your personal and professional life by improving your attitude.

Attitude is a choice. You choose to respond the way you do, and you can choose to change when you want to. You choose to be happy; you also choose to be sad. You choose to be angry; you also choose to be mild. You choose to be irritated; you also choose to be accommodating. You choose to be responsible or irresponsible. Attitudes come from the mind, so you choose your response from the inside of you. Each time you’re confronted with an action, you create your reaction from inside you, and then you respond accordingly.

Attitudes come from thoughts we have accepted to be true. A child who has been told again and again that he could never do well in academics is likely to hate school and books. A girl that was sexually abused repeatedly is likely to grow up thinking that the relationship between a man and a woman is unhealthy. A person who has been fed with the idea that poverty is purity and that wealth is sinful is likely to grow up detesting money, wealth and rich people.

The good news is that you can change your attitudes. Attitudes can be learned and unlearned. Attitudes can be developed. They can be adopted and avoided.

No one was born with attitudes. We all learned them as we grow older, and we can unlearn them. Our mind works much like a computer system. It can be programmed and reprogrammed. We can delete negative software programmed into our mind and install new positive software. Many of us have damaging behavior pattern today because of what was programmed into us when we were children. But we don’t have to continue functioning according to those programs. We can uninstall those software and reinstall healthy programs to live by.

You can reprogram your attitude by a process of change. Change your thinking. Change your choice. Change your beliefs. Change your perspective. Change your responses. Each of these change processes can be done independent of the other, but they all can be done in the mind.

1. Change your thinking. The mind is the thinking faculty. It is the centre of reasoning. Through the process of thinking, we process and accept information into memory. The memory acts like a filling system, storing similar information in the same compartment for easy retrieval. We tend to respond to life’s issues based on the kind of information we have stored in memory. If you think it is wrong, then your memory stores the information as wrong. If you think it is right, it is stored as the right thing to do. The process of change therefore should start from a change in thinking. Negative thinking will result to negative attitudes. Positive thinking will help you develop positive attitudes.

2. Change your choice. The power to choose is one of the most useful tool that God put in us to help us live a successful life. Basically, what you become – or what you achieve – in life is your choice. You have the power to allow and disallow. If it remains in your life, you have permitted it to stay. When once yu make up your mind to get rid of a character trait, you will change.

3. Change your belief. Your beliefs are ideas you have accepted as truth and have settled in your subconscious mind. Each time you are confronted with a piece of information, your mind automatically compares the new idea with your belief system and judges accordingly. Your belief becomes a standard by which you relate with the world around you.

These things are in the mind, and so they are subject to mental manipulation. You can reconsider you belief and change it if you want. It might take concentrated efforts on your part, but it’s possible to change your beliefs and adopt new set of beliefs.

4. Change your perspective.  Challenges of life – trials, troubles, problems – are part of life. You will either enjoy living or endure living depending on your perspective on life’s challenges. Life’s blows will either press you down or push you forward; your attitude to life makes the difference. If you put your problems in proper perspective you’ll enjoy the propelling force they bring with them. On the other hand, life’s challenges can hold you down if you allow them. If you see your problems as mountains, then you allow them to depress you, oppress you, and stagnate you. But if you see them as mobile force, you’ll enjoy the ride they provide. So your problems will either ride on you or you will ride on them, depending on your perspective.

5. Change your response. You might not be able to choose your life experiences, but you sure can choose your response to those experiences. What happens to us doesn’t determine us. It’s how we respond that shapes who we become. Your choice to respond in a particular way determines your attitude. You can choose to respond with negative attitude or positive attitude. It’s your choice. What people say or do to you doesn’t make you. It’s your response that makes you. What people say to you or do to you matters only if you accept it. However, what you say or do to yourself matters most.

When you allow people’s opinions and actions to drive you, then you have given them control of your life. So you say, “He’s driving me crazy!” You allow him to decide your response. You lose control of your life and become like a machine under control of the driver.

You’re responsible for your response, and so you’re responsible for the outcome or your life. When you give control of your life to another person you’re still responsible, because you choose to allow you to be controlled.

You can, however, determine to not allow other people control your life by choosing to respond in a way that favors your well being. As emotional beings, our respond to challenges is largely emotional. Each time life deals a blow at us we normally will become emotional – sad, happy,  angry, excited, dull, hurt, forgiving, unforgiving, jealous, weak, strengthened, dragged down, fired up, confident, grateful, afraid, discouraged, or any of the emotions. Our emotional response largely determines our attitude. If you change your emotional response, therefore, you’ll change your attitude.