Positive Change Begins WIth The Leader In You!

Positive Change Begins With The Leader In You!

For the past few months, many young and older Americans across the country have been following the primary elections for both the democratic and republican party. Each presidential candidate has tailored their speeches and political platforms to reach specific audiences in different states from across the country. Of all the different speeches and political platforms on various issues, I think the one thing we can all probably agree on is that America is looking for someone that can bring about positive change. Even though I am a strong advocate of voting and political engagement, I strongly believe that positive change can start in the White House, but will not take precedence in our country unless we have other strong leaders of positive change spread throughout the country making a difference as well.

Former president, John F. Kennedy said it best when he stated that we should, “Ask not what our country can do for you, but what you can do for our country.” Approximately twenty to thirty years before Kennedy made this powerful statement in his inaugural speech, Mahatmi Ghandi made the statement that is similar by saying, “Be the Change you wish to see in the World.” In essence, both of these great men and leaders understood that positive change within a nation or country does not just occur with national leaders, but it occurs with everyday people becoming leaders of positive change. As a speaker, educator, advocate, and leader of positive change, I want to share with you four keys principles that can lead you towards becoming this leader of positive change in your family, community, nation, and world.

Principle #1: Have A Vision for Positive Change in your Community, Nation, or World

There are many principles toward becoming a leader of positive change, but the foundation principle of becoming this type of leader within your community, nation, or world is developing a vision of what that positive change looks like. In essence, if you are going to become this leader of positive change, you must have a picture of that vision from within that can be clearly articulated to others.

Principle #2: Make sure there is Passion behind your Vision of Positive Change

Vision is great, but you need passion behind your vision because it gives you the strength, perseverance, and determination to overcome any obstacle that may try to stop you from attaining your vision of positive change. One key thing that I have found is connected to passion is an unstoppable desire on the inside that does not allow any challenge or obstacle hold you back from manifesting your vision of positive change.

Principle #3: Develop A Strategic Action Plan

Every great leader who has ever made a positive impact in their community, nation, and world has developed some strategic action plan. Even though these strategic action plans may differ from various leaders, the same concepts were true in that these different leaders developed goals, gathered research from other experts, mentors, or friends, and used personal failures as well as failures of others to help them develop a strong strategic action plan.

Principles #4: Have Courage and Faith to Step Out and Pursue Your Vision

Some visions of positive change are easy to pursue because everyone may agree with your decision. However, many times there may be several risks connected to your desire to make a positive change in your community, nation, and world. In these cases where some risks are connected to your vision of positive change, make sure you have the courage and faith to stand against all the negative opposition that may attempt to stop your progress towards manifesting your vision of positive change.

There are many other key leadership principles connected to leaders of positive change, but I personally believe these are some essential leadership concepts that you must adopt in order to become one of the countless number of leaders of positive change in our community, nation, and world.

Speak On It! Elections Show 2008 Part 2!

Elections Show 2008 Part 2

For the beginning two months of this year, due to schedule conflictions and studio problems, we have been unable to shoot any shows for Speak On It. Luckily, on the first day of March, we were finally able to get into the studio and produce two incredible shows on the 2008 presidential elections over the past two months.

The second of these two shows on the 2008 presidential elections dealt with three new topical discussions of interests. The first topic addressed on this show was the role of the media. Ironically, some panelist believed that the media coverage has been great, while others felt that the media coverage has been horrible. On the positive side, the panelist who felt the media coverage was great felt this way because they believed the media was doing an awesome job at educating the public on the process of the primary elections. On the negative side, the panelist who had issues with the media coverage felt bad about the coverage because they believed that the media did a horrible job at providing actual facts to the viewing audience. Personally, I gave the media a 5 on a 1-10 scale because I believe they have gave some great information about the election process and presidential candidates, but the negative spin to the media is the inaccuracy of certain stories developed by respected media professionals who stress having the facts correct as effective journalists.

Following this intriguing discussion came the next topic that dealt with the young vote. During this discussion, each person believed that more young people were involved than in years past, but had questions concerning the impact this younger generation will have on the upcoming elections. I disagreed with the concern about the young vote not coming out during election time in November because I personally believe that more young voters are engaged than in years past and studies show that the political involvement has been increasing since 2000.

Mixed in with this information about the youth vote was also insight into why young people supported Barack Obama more than any other candidate. Personally, I felt that the reasoning behind Barack Obama’s impact with the young vote was accurate amongst the panel because they explained how his stance on college loans and being against the War in Iraq were huge. Also, they stated that his platform of change, his attitude about a new generation of politics in America was extremely important as well. And most importantly, they felt out of all the candidates, Senator Obama seemed to be the candidate that could be most trusted by this younger generation in America.

Once this in-depth discussion about the youth vote was complete, we finished the show talking about what is more important experience or inspiration. Every believed that both were important and neither was more important than the other except one person who said inspiration is more important. I agreed that both are important, but I also stated that I would rather someone have an ability to inspire other verses experience because experience can be gained from choosing the right team members while inspiration is more of a natural gift that different people possess on the inside.

For these next few moments, please take the time to comment on these three topics of discussion and tell the Speak On It staff how you feel about these next three connected topics to the 2008 Presidential Elections?

Elections Show 2008 Part 1

For the beginning two months of this year, due to schedule conflictions and studio problems, we have been unable to shoot any shows for Speak On It. Luckily, on the first day of March, we were finally able to get into the studio and produce two incredible shows on the 2008 presidential elections over the past two months.

The first of these two shows on the 2008 presidential elections dealt with three main topics of interests that really developed in the discussion. The first topic of discussion was about which candidate best represents change in America. With a panel that was equally balanced between democrats and republicans, each person agreed that any of three candidates left is going to bring some change to the White House. But, the greatest change will probably be demonstrated by Senator Clinton or Senator Obama. Personally, I agreed with this statement that change will come and the democratic candidates will definitely make the most changes in the White House.

Following this first topic came the next topic of discussion that dealt with the War in Iraq. As you probably know, the republican representatives argued that it’s beneficial for our country to stay in Iraq until the War is over, while others like myself totally disagreed with their stance. Instead of talking about the constant debates that occurred on the show, the key points discussed were that one panelist believed that the War was a personal agenda verses a fight against terrorism. Another panelist believed that we should stay in Iraq until the Iraqi people are able to run the country themselves. My belief was that we should exit Iraq slowly, deal with the issues in this country in a diplomatic way, and stop trying make these people adopt our ways of living when they have total different beliefs from us.

As you know, this heated debate on the War in Iraq continued into the third segment and we were only able to ask one more question before the entire show was complete. The question was, “What key issue will determine the upcoming elections in 2008?” Ironically, instead of hearing about each of these intelligent guests talk about a specific issue they thought was key in the General Election this November, three out of the four panelists believed that issues likeability will be the determining factor instead of a specific issue. I could see their point, but personally, I believe their will be a common issue that will determine this upcoming elections. At this point, I do not want to share until I know exactly which two candidates will be running against each other in November.

For these next few moments, please take the time to comment on these three topics of discussion and tell the Speak On It staff how you feel about the three connected topics to the 2008 Presidential Elections?

Welcome to Speak On It!

Welcome to my offical Speak On It Blog! The purpose of this Blog is to give emerging leaders, television viewers, event attendees, friends, partners, supporters, and experts the opportunity to voice thier opinions on various issues each month, interact with others across the country, network, and build partnerships!