Go Put Your Strengths To Work
I’ve started reading Marcus Buckingham’s new book called Go Put Your Strengths To Work and thought I would write a series of blog posts in the coming days and weeks and invite anyone who wants to, to journey through it with me. Essentially, the aim of the book is to move people beyond knowing what their strengths are to actually living them out and utilising them in our everyday working lives. To do this, Buckingham breaks the book down into six steps that we need to go through if we’re going to truly put our strengths to work.
Today I want to look at the first part of step one which is all about discovering what’s stopping us from putting our strengths to work. And he identifies three myths that we need to overcome if we’re going unleash and live from our strengths. The first myth that he says we need to break is this:
MYTH - As you grow, your personality changes.
Having identified this as a myth, he then says we need to replace this with the following truth:
TRUTH - As you grow, you become more of who you already are.
Buckingham’s argument here is that, by and large, our personality, the essence of who we are, doesn’t change. Sure our beliefs, values, behaviours may change, but our core personality will always remain the same. I realise that for those of us who have a faith perspective, this may at first appear to be at odds with the belief that people can truly be changed and transformed. I think though, perhaps there’s a need to differentiate between personality and character. Character can very much be transformed and yet, even after that transformation, someone’s personality still remains fundamentally unchanged.
A good example of this would be Paul, the apostle. Whether we grew up in church or not, most of us are familiar with the dramatic story of Paul’s encounter with Jesus Christ on the Damascus Road. It was a moment of dramatic transformation. He went from killing Christians and shutting down churches to becoming Christianity’s most ardent advocate. But here’s the thing. You see Paul’s same personality shining through both before and after his transformation. His personality was simply redirected and refocussed in light of his transformation and change in beliefs, values, behaviour, etc. He has the same unique talents and strengths, they are just now used in very different ways and for a different purpose.
So Buckingham’s main point from all this is that we need to focus on becoming more of who we are, how we’re uniquely wired, rather than trying to become something or someone we’re not. Here’s how he puts it: “As you grow, your goal should not be to transform yourself (as in your personality), to conjure new forces from within you. Instead your goal should be to free up and focus the forces already there.”
To finish off looking at this first of three myths that may be stopping us putting our strengths to work, here’s three questions to think about:
1) How does it serve you to believe that as you grow your personality changes?
2) What would it cost you to stop believing that your personality changes as you grow?
3) How would it benefit you to believe that as you grow, you become more of who you already are?
What do you think?
April 4th, 2007 at 1:03 pm
Thanks for sharing Sam, i`ve been resonating with these thoughts the last while as well.
It`s liberating when we stop pursuing our `idols`and simply acknowledge the strengths and weaknesses we have and build from there. There`s no firmer foundation than walking in the truth of who you are.
My greatest fear was always of thinking I`m someone I`m not.
April 4th, 2007 at 3:34 pm
Great post! We would stop TRYING to be and just BE. I think this is huge. As long as we keep trying to evolve into something/someone else our focus on on self.
April 4th, 2007 at 3:54 pm
Or perhaps we could stop trying to be archetypes and start trying to submit to God and be godly in our unique, multi-faceted way.
I think a worthwhile question to ask in all this though is what it means to die to self. Perhaps we die to our preferences and tastes, but not our personality?
April 4th, 2007 at 4:44 pm
Another great book that falls right along with this idea is: Understanding Your Potential by Myles Munroe.
We are unique for a purpose and it is exciting to discover what that is!
April 4th, 2007 at 4:46 pm
I wonder if the question we need to ask is what (or who) am I going to use my personality, gifts, talents, strengths, etc, for. And maybe the message that Christ taught of dying to self is about laying down our rights to use those things for our own, selfish benefit and to put them in His service and for His purposes.
April 4th, 2007 at 5:26 pm
aha…motivation. Our reason for doing things.
Selflessness…Not doing it for our self, but for the benefit of another (or others).
I think you are hitting on something so very important here. After all, there are many people in the world who don’t know Christ, yet it appears they are putting their strengths to work. But maybe they are still only “tapping into” the full potential of what God has called them to and in order to fully put their strengths to work, they must consider their motivation? Just thinking out loud.
April 5th, 2007 at 10:47 am
Thanks for this Sam.
I’ve been needing to approach the difference between character and personality - and the integrity of the two - in the experience I’ve called theFIRSTadventure (exploring strengths, spiritual gifts, and dreams).
April 6th, 2007 at 10:31 pm
I think this is a really good point and one I will have to think about a lot more so it really sinks in. But this is a releasing truth that I discover who I am no the journey..I don’t need to know who exactly I am to begin it. Hum I think that is the biggest thing I got from it but it is one of those things that is very thought provoking.
April 9th, 2007 at 7:28 pm
[…] us to look at the third of the three myths we’ve been looking at over the last few posts (see here and here). We’ve working our way through Marcus Buckingham’s new book entitled Go Put […]
April 18th, 2007 at 3:53 pm
[…] Go Put Your Strengths To Work […]
November 9th, 2007 at 11:26 am
I’m not sure I get why the difference between personality and character is significant on the way to discovering the gems in this book. However, I get the sense from reading this area of the book and some blogs of those responding to this material that I would need to know who I am to know who and what I am not, or vise-versa to access my strengths.
My thoughts about that are as follows: I’m going to keep it really simple so I don’t get distracted as I do the strength exercises. I may leave some things out and make other mistakes too, but since I believe in Paredo’s Principle (80% of results are fueled by 20% of eforts), I will have faith that I will still make progress which is my goal.