Self-help guide not just for students - Part 2

This is a follow up post to my previous one. Basically I compiled a list of mistakes most students make. I was happy to receive a comment from @carlgnash  pointing out that I was probably narrowing down these mistakes too much, and that most of them are actually afflicting most people in their daily lives, not just students. He also pointed out that it was a bit reductive to touch on such a sensible topic with just a list of mistakes without providing solutions. Since I wrote the post only yesterday and it's not terribly long you can have a quick look here so you can catch up with what it was said: https://steemit.com/life/@aboutcoolscience/self-help-guide-for-students.

Source: http://quotesgram.com

So I guess, what @carlgnash wanted to know is which steps I took to help Yossarian (fictitious name of my real student).  Was is just believing in his abilities that could magically bring these abilities to life (it's called pygmalion effect)? Obviously not. Also, I don't want to give you the wrong impression. It wasn't just my student that improved during the past year. I learned a lot from this situation too. 

So how to get a person with talent but with a bad attitude to change and get work done? I guess you have to become a motivator. Simply telling someone what to do is not going to motivate the person. There is a lot we can learn from history and I was always very curious about the lives of  people that were able to make a significant impact in history. Often we are talking about leaders and interestingly some of the greatest leaders shared some common traits. For example how could Julius Caesar or Alexander motivate thousands of men and convince them that it was a good idea to give up their lives for their leader? Simple, both of them were always sharing the same discomforts as their troops. Showing their men that they are not above them but with them, belonging to the same "tribe". 

Caesar for example, was often marching on foot with his men instead of riding a horse, Alexander as well was among his men during the battle instead of cowardly watching the battle from the safety of his tent. In a kind of way, humans evolved to be in communities. Our brain is wired to associate some people as our "tribe" and others as strangers. You definitely want your student to feel that both of you belong to the same tribe. If you can't lead your students you will just end up having a crowd (definition: crowd = a group of people without a leader and with poor communication).

Now, luckily for my students, I don't ask them to give up their lives for science. So convincing them to do work should be relatively easier than lead men to battle, but in some cases it can still prove challenging. Especially if the student is doing it just for credits, or if your employee is doing his job just for money. First of all you have to show them why they should do something, what else will they get in return?Are they working FOR you or are they working WITH you on something? In Yossarian's case I was always trying to be in the lab while he was working. Often he had to perform experiments at night after classes. He had long days so did I. Frequently I stretched my working days above 10 hours just to be around my students and work with them. You feel much more compelled to mirror your mentor rather than just execute his orders. 

Giving orders: that's another thing I tried to avoid. Bossy people give orders, I was trying to discuss problems with Yossarian and together figure out what to do. Often I had to pretend I did not know how to do something because I wanted him to come up with the idea. You can get so stubborn when you want to show to the world that your idea is cool. It did not work all the time but when he was getting stubborn for the right reasons the work proceeded smoothly and we got our best results that way! 

Source: Daily HAHA

Don't be an attention bitch: I see so many of my colleagues mentoring students for their first time abusing them. Relative to their students they are in a position of power, they could help them or ruin their career. But with great powers you also get great responsibilities (source: spiderman). Do you want to be the person that was the cause of other people's success or do you want to use as many people as you can to get where you want to go? I am of the opinion that when you abuse of the attention, you are no longer leading but taking. 

Start with why: I mentioned it before but I will say it again because it's important. Always make sure that students, employees or even your kids know the why it's important for them to do something. Knowing why gives meaning to what you do, it motivates and will give a sense of accomplishment when things get done. Do this to yourself too. Always have objectives and goals, they can give value to your life and give you to energy to overcome anything while living a happier life. Tell people stories they can then tell themselves.

Respect: Oh this is important. Do you know why I work so hard?Because I admire and respect my boss. But most importantly he always respects me in turn. It's great when you can motivate and inspire people through respect. It actually takes less work from your side. If you lead by fear, you constantly have to police people and make sure you always know what they are up to. If you lead by respect, you trust your people. They in turn would not want to let you down and will do anything to win your approval.

It's ok to make mistakes: I saw many students literally get paralyzed by the fear of making mistakes. One of the first things I tell my students is that it's ok to make mistakes as long as you learn from them. This will also unlock something great, creativity. When students overcome fear they start becoming creative, help them take off the breaks from creativity.

Be honest: don't keep people wondering, just be honest about what you think. Try to praise them when they do good things and tell them what they could have done better. Communication is key. How can you expect someone to do something the way you want without telling them first how it is that you want it done? 

You are both on the same side, let them know about it: this is self-explanatory, I guess I don't have to comment on it.

Get organized: begin with the end in mind. Try to make clear where it is that you are going and what to do to get there will come up naturally

Habits: develop working habits, try to have meetings the same day of the week at the same time, work shedule is also important. A messed up schedule can make your life more difficult

Control: Some things are beyond our control. Tell your student not to get upset when something doesn't go his way. Let's focus our energies on what we can change. We don't control what will happen to us but we control how we respond to situations

Have good time: you don't have to like to each other but most likely you will have to spend a lot of time working together, so why don't try to cheer things up with a joke every now and then? Tip: smiling can lower pain. Smiling can help you overcome difficult situations.

I feel we just scratched the surface here. There is so much to talk about: how to develop organizational skills, brain biology to understand how we think, how we can make our brain work better and faster, mind hacking, psychology, motivation, nutrition, fitness. I guess I won't try to cover everything here. These may be great topics for future posts. I would appreciate your comments, let me know what you think.

Ciao