As I scour the networking sites for more knowledge and information, I came across this LinkedIn post, Personal Branding And Identity: Experts Read Between The Lines, by Stephan Trano. In the post he discusses how presenting yourself in social networking can affect the way you are perceived and what capabilities you have. The vast majority of how people use social networking is worthless.

We are not at school but in a professional sphere. If you show nothing and wait for others to act, like or answer, you can’t pretend that you are proactive and that you are a good manager or a leader. If you overreact, take a challenge for an expression of negativity, “like” before you read and agree or easily applaud because others do it, you just show that your need to believe is stronger that your need to question.

I have have the tendency to ask my martial arts students many “bad” questions. The idea of “bad” here is from the likelihood of there being three or four different answers depending upon which direction my lecture is going. As with high school, there are always two or three that will offer answers while many remain silent. Recently, I have taken to asking True/False questions, instead. When I ask for a show of hands on each answer, I usually say “shame on you” to those who didn’t choose one.

If you build a very conform, consensual and featureless identity, never take risks, never engage, or frenzy follow the crowd, it becomes obvious that you are not outstanding.

The modern martial arts are intended to develop many things from improving personal characteristics such as confidence and esteem to actual physical self protection. One thing that gets lost in translation is the actual principles used to create these benefits. None of the benefits found in the martial arts are found from following. They only come from being the “doer”.

Even the Justice League illustrates that it is about the loyalty and credibility based on what you do and not how you follow. Those who work and think to achieve will never make everyone happy but their capabilities and skills will show the world who they truly are.

Author: Master Robert Frankovich

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One thought to “Your Personal Brand: Lead or Follow?”

  • Bruce Burns

    Great Post!

    This post makes me think of a couple of things.

    First, of the people we now revere who decided that the martial arts world as they knew it was insufficient. Bruce Lee never received his teaching certification, but most of the modern martial arts world has been touched if not changed by his revolutions in sparring and training ideology. Morihei Ueshiba and Jigoro Kano brought their visions of softer style arts to an increasingly militant and modernizing Japan, and though the Japanese Empire fell, their vision of Aikido and Judo respectively endured and has been embraced worldwide. On the European side I admire the work of Michel Casseux and Imi Sde-Or who brought strong arts of Savate and Krav Maga forward in ways that helped the common people in times of domestic unrest and street violence.

    Just as in the clip you included (hooray Justice League) they didn’t completely reject what had come before, but they followed their own understandings in ways that brought fresh and vital traditions forward to our own time.

    Just starting my own school, it’s encouraging and challenging. I’m encouraged to try and find my own vision for how I want the school to go forward, and challenged to make sure that how that vision plays out serves people, honors the past, and seeks to grow and go forward all at the same time.

    If it were easy, what would be the fun?! But if I can pull it off, I think it will be amazing. If not, then I tried for something great, which is a sort of victory in and of itself.

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