April 26, 2024 • 21 mins
In this episode, De Hicks describes 12 often ignored but flawed 'mental models' that are at least as hazardous as warning signs posted on dangerous stretches of mountain highways.
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Episode Transcript
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(00:00):
Honey, please buckle up. It's time to start the drive. Hazard reported ahead. Slow down.
Police reported ahead. Act normal.
Rerouting. You never listen. Okay, you've reached your destination.
Time to call your mother.
Don't you love that? You probably wonder what that is.
(00:21):
I was looking for who did the voice on Waze. W-A-Y-Z.
That's the navigation software that we have been using recently whenever driving
across country or through a new town or something like that.
And the voice on Waze is a little different in my truck than it is in Donnie's
car, as he and I might drive from one place to another.
(00:42):
And the one in my car sounded a little condescending to me, just a little bit,
almost like her commands were preceded
by, you know, a big sense of disappointment or something like that.
So I hopped on to find out who did these voices, and I ran across this one,
which is a YouTube video about Away's voices from a Brooklyn mother.
(01:04):
It's hilarious. Hilarious. Waze is more fun to use than the Google Maps or the
navigation systems that come on some of our phones with Apple CarPlay.
So we decided to use that a while ago.
And it was interesting because when it first started happening,
Waze would warn us that something was ahead.
And the most common one we hear was, watch out!
(01:26):
And it would occur oddly at times where it might have been a silent moment in
the car or a gap between songs.
And unbeknownst to me, I had set Waze in my truck to come up louder than the
music around it, so it would always startle me, watch out!
And there was just a little bit of a pause and then it would say,
(01:47):
police reported ahead or hazard reported ahead or something like that.
Well, today, how about if I show you a little bit of, watch out,
it's not from Waze, but it's from experience.
Music.
(02:19):
Leveraged lessons from high-impact leaders. For the past 30 years,
I've researched the disciplines, habits, mental models, and assumptions of the
most effective leaders.
Music.
This podcast takes what I've learned from over 2,000 of these influencers and
distills it into practical tools and tips you can use immediately.
(02:41):
So let's get started.
I really like talking about things that work and things that work really, really well.
I like studying when things have been successful, as in approaches or business
(03:05):
models or ways to live or leadership tools, that sort of thing.
I appreciate finding, especially in light of a problem, where it's not a problem
where it used to be and how people solve that.
I like that approach. approach but once in
a while we need to have an approach where we
do actually look at what doesn't work once in
(03:25):
a while we need a little bit of a watch out hazard ahead
from life and that's what this podcast is all about today watch out i want to
show you a few roadblocks or a few road signs or a few ways warnings about how
you and I think that will be very,
(03:48):
very helpful if we pay attention to them.
But before I get too far into that, let me tell you a story.
For several years, my family had a piece of property in northeastern Washington
along a beautiful river.
We would drive from our home in western Washington out on the Puget Sound and
(04:08):
the Olympic Peninsula over to eastern Washington, itself about a five and a half hour drive.
And then from Spokane north about an hour and a half to two hours to a wonderful
place we had on the river.
Just before we got to that property
on the river, we would go through a little area called Blue Slide.
(04:28):
It was actually home of the Blue Slide Resort. Not much of a resort now, by the way.
The years have not been good to that resort. It's just a bit of a ramshackle
buildings and some trailers and an unmown lawn, but it's right on the edge of
the river, so it's kind of beautiful.
But just past the Blutes Slide Resort, we would come to a place where the highway
(04:50):
would go up away from the river in elevation and then bend sharply to the left.
Approaching that part of the highway, there were several signs that warned people
that there was a problem, that they needed to pay attention to.
These road signs up in northeast Washington are like everywhere else,
they're warning you, you know, slow down, there's a curve.
(05:12):
But there's something kind of interesting about this one. People had ignored
these road signs for so long that the highway folks had begun to paint warnings
on the road and then to put rumble strips on the road.
And then every time we went up, there was a little bit more done.
Until at one point there were eight different signs in a row that said,
(05:33):
slow down, curve ahead, slow down, curve ahead, even giving you the mileage.
You need to be going 15 miles an hour to get around this corner.
And then after time, we noticed that there were great big arrows that pointed
to the left, one after the other, after the other.
Huge arrows pointing, saying slow down, and even flashing lights.
Guess what? Almost every time we went up there, somebody had gone through that
(05:57):
corner faster than they were supposed to.
The first indication were skid marks. The second indication were some of those
signs had been snapped off by the bumper of a car not paying attention to the warning road signs.
There was more than once when I noticed the effects of people ignoring those
warning signs, and they were pretty intense, that people had actually reshaped
(06:21):
the guardrail with their vehicle.
They'd slammed into the guardrail and gone over the edge more than once.
It's amazing to me. I hope that no one got injured in it other than their cars
being bent out of shape and their wallets,
but it's likely because going around that corner and going over the edge through
the guardrail resulted in about a 50 to 75 foot drop into trees and rocks.
(06:44):
It's likely that there were injuries as a result of it.
So with that model in mind, I want to show you some time-tested,
look out, watch out, slow down, don't go this way signs that might be very helpful to you.
And they're going to be in the category of mental models.
You remember, if you spend any time together with me, or if you've read about mental models before,
(07:05):
you know that our mental models are constructs we build about ourselves and
about other people and about the world and how we fit and about everything from
what's Ford Motor Company to what is a slow, slow down,
turn left, sign mean, what doesn't mean me, that sort of thing.
We have these mental models that we build in our mind.
And then once we build these mental models, we just assume they're true.
(07:29):
We don't even notice them anymore. We look through them instead of at them.
And they govern so much of what we do in life.
So I wanna share with you the dirty dozen.
Here are 12 mental models that do not work.
And you can heed these mental models and say, whoops, I have that mental model.
(07:49):
I am going to pump the brakes.
I'm not going to follow that mental model anymore. I'm going to change it.
Or you can ignore it and you can say, oh, that doesn't mean me.
And maybe you'll just get a few skids on the pavement.
Maybe you'll rearrange the front bumper of your vehicle. Or maybe you will crash
the vehicle of your life over the edge.
One of the signs that a person doesn't really believe that these mental models
(08:14):
are true is when they experience the negative consequences of those mental models,
they hide from other people because they're kind of ashamed,
or they blame other people.
I am sure that there have been many drivers that have hit that left-hand corner
just north of Blue Slide and immediately blamed the highway department for not
(08:36):
warning them that the turn was so intense.
Wow. All right, here we go. Let's get right to it. What are these 12 mental
models that just don't work?
Number one, I equal what I do.
That person believes that their performance at work or outside of work,
(08:59):
that their work is who they are.
The second mental model, I equal what I have as in the way of my reputation
or my possessions. That's the most common one.
I have a newer car than you do, so I am therefore better than you are, that sort of thing.
I equal what I own, what I have, what my possessions are. Maybe I even equal
(09:21):
the opportunities that I have.
The third mental model that the ways of life would say to us,
watch out, hazard ahead, is I equal my position.
Now, that's either my position on an issue, here's what I think is true about
this issue or that issue, or my position in a group or in an organization.
(09:42):
If I am the one who's in charge, I equal that.
If I'm the boss or the owner, I equal that, or the supervisor or the director or whatever.
I equal my position.
If you have that mental model, watch out. It's very destructive.
Here's the fourth mental model. I need everyone's approval. This is a little bit more subtle.
(10:05):
It has four quick corollaries that go with it. That is, that if someone doesn't
approve of me, they're dead to me.
They must be so bad, so wrong, that they're dead to me. All right?
The corollary that goes with I need everyone's approval. Another one is I need
to know what people think of me.
And I need them to think well of me.
(10:27):
A third corollary is, I equal what others think of me.
Wow, here's a fourth point under this one that I need everyone's approval.
This is actually a statement from Eleanor Roosevelt who said,
you know, you wouldn't worry so much about what people think of you if you realized how rarely they do.
(10:49):
Hard to swallow that one. If you equal what you do and equal what you have,
you equal your position and you need everyone's approval. you think they're
thinking about you all the time. Surprise, they're not.
Here's the fifth mental model that is a problem if you have that.
Things, me included, have to be perfect in every detail.
(11:10):
Whenever I ask somebody who's a self-proclaimed perfectionist who believes that
mental model, what perfection looks like, they usually can't answer it.
Here's the truth. We don't experience things in detail. We experience them in the whole.
Very few things arrive at perfection and stay that way like some static state.
(11:36):
Here's the sixth mental model that if it was part of a Waze navigation system would be a big warning.
Truth persuades people who don't want to be persuaded.
There are three corollaries to this one. The first one is that truth makes people
want to give up their power. It does not.
The next corollary is truth makes us feel good.
(12:00):
I have a dear friend named Tim who says that reality, which I think of as truth in action, right?
Reality is an acquired taste.
And in my experience, once in a while, truth, reality makes me feel good. It often does not.
Here's the third corollary to the mental model that truth persuades people who
(12:23):
don't want to be persuaded.
Just give them more truth and eventually they'll be persuaded,
right? Here's the third corollary.
The truth will set you free
but only if you want to
be free all right the next mental model number
seven on my list of 12 is i am my
brain there's a lot of this floating around today but in reality i am not my
(12:47):
brain my brain is an organ my mind can change my brain so much work has been
done around that theory that it's no longer a theory.
It's now proven fact in science that I can, with my mind, rewire my brain.
There's so much about that that we could talk about. It's amazing.
(13:09):
So I don't equal my brain. My brain's an organ. I have a mind and there's more
to me and my mind can control my brain.
All right. Here's the eighth mental model that is really a dangerous one.
If if you have it. It's a mental model that doesn't work. Here it is.
I'm in control and I have authority.
(13:30):
Therefore, to quote the philosopher Cartman, you will respect my authority.
Okay. Take that one apart. I'm in control. Ooh, not so much. I have authority.
Ooh, you may have positional authority. You may have organizational authority,
but people don't follow authority.
They follow wisdom and leadership. They follow selfless leaders,
(13:52):
or they're afraid and they stampede.
Here's the ninth mental model that if you've got this one, oh,
look out, look out. Okay.
Success means comfort.
The more successful I am, the more comfortable I will be.
Danger, danger, danger. All right. Three corollaries. First one, I've arrived.
(14:13):
Therefore, therefore I deserve.
The next corollary, the purpose of life is comfort or some sort of similar theme that goes with that.
The third corollary under success means comfort is success means security.
Oh, if you believe that, then you are going to be in trouble.
(14:34):
Careful, careful, careful. Here's the 10th one. We've only got 12. Hang in with me.
We are smarter and wiser than those who have gone before us.
Those folks who didn't have smartphones, oh, they didn't have science,
air quotes around science as it grows and changes, that they didn't have that.
That those folks back in the day, a hundred years ago, 500 years ago,
(14:55):
a thousand years ago, they were just kind of dumb.
They didn't have all the stuff we have now. We're so much smarter and wiser than they are.
The corollary to that is that people before the digital age,
before connectivity were probably actually kind of dumb.
They weren't very smart. Now that we have all this knowledge available to us,
at our fingertips, at a whim, we've got to be a lot smarter.
(15:18):
Oh, dangerous mental model. Here's another corollary that's a little bit more close to home.
This one comes, of course, from we're smarter and wiser than our ancestors.
Let's get it to just your family of origin, your parents and grandparents, for example.
Here's the corollary that my family of origin and how it chose to think and
live and believe and work and or not work has really no effect on me. I'm separate from them.
(15:42):
Oh, danger, danger, danger.
Of course, sidebar, we don't have to repeat everything that's a part of our family of origin,
but most of us dramatically underestimate the power that our family of origin
had on shaping us and shaping us to this very day in ways that are utterly invisible
to us. But they don't have to be.
(16:02):
Here's the 11th one. I'm supposed to be right as a leader.
I'm supposed to see and manage every risk and never make a mistake.
Danger, danger, danger. And here's the 12th mental model that is utterly flawed.
If you have this mental model, you're going to go off the edge of the road north
(16:26):
of the blue slide resort of life.
How'd you like that? I know it's kind of corny. I work with me here.
Okay, here's the last one. You ready?
I am the center of the universe.
Oh, of course, you don't believe that. You don't have any friends that believe
that. But do we act like that sometimes?
There are two corollaries to that. One of them is, there is no God.
(16:48):
That's a corollary that goes with, I'm the center of the universe. I'm the top. I'm it.
The philosopher, one of my favorites of all time, is named A.W.
Tozer. Tozer wrote this, what comes to mind when we think about God is the most
important thing about us. It shapes us.
We tend, he went on to say, by a secret law of the soul to move toward our mental
(17:12):
image of God, whatever that is.
I hope you pondered that for a while. And here's the last corollary that goes
with that 12th mental model that I'm the center of the universe.
There is no objective truth. And that if I don't believe something to be true.
It's just simply not true.
My truth is the closest thing I could ever get to actual truth.
(17:35):
That's the corollary that goes with that. Wow. Okay.
Wouldn't it be nice if we had a voice in our head that shouted,
watch out when it came to these mental models, whenever we're using flawed mental models.
We've got lots of signs along the road of our life that point out our flawed mental models.
And we, like many of the drivers that drive north of Blue Slide,
(17:59):
can ignore them on Highway 20 and plunge over the bank into the Pend Oreille
River in northeastern Washington, metaphorically or literally.
And we will suffer the consequences.
Some of the consequences are slow as they come upon us, and some of them are fast.
There are signs flashing all along the way, and maybe this little list,
(18:22):
maybe one or two of these mental models that I pointed them out to you,
really resonated, what's the word?
Resonated. Resignated? What's that? I can't even say the right word.
Maybe they harmonized with you. There, I'll just pick a different word, okay? Watch out.
Every time I go by the road, that bend in the road up there north of Blue Slide,
(18:45):
another sign has been knocked down, and another section of guardrail has been destroyed.
Then the next time, that's been repaired, and people just keep thinking, how silly can people be?
We told them, careful, watch out, watch out, watch out.
All right, there you go. I hope it's not a downer for you. I hope it kind of
sets you free a little bit, and you can go through that list and think,
(19:05):
ooh, that's one of my mental models.
But these other ones, oh, those are not. That's good. I'm doing good,
but I'm going to work on that one right there.
You've got a really important work to do. Leadership isn't everything,
but it's the first thing.
We need you to get there first because we're going to follow you.
Whether you go off that cliff or slam on your brakes and dent the car of your
leadership and of our organization, or whether you do it well,
(19:28):
we're going to follow you.
And therefore, we need you to succeed.
All right, friend, here's to you. You can't see me, but I'm sipping on a wonderful bourbon.
This is a Bainbridge Island Distillery bourbon.
And it says Bainbridge Island Distillery on this 750-milliliter bottle eight times on this bottle.
(19:51):
So it'd be pretty hard to miss the communication from that distillery that came from them.
It's a pretty good bourbon. I like it. Very enjoyable. No cigar today.
I'll have one on the next one. I hope your day is going great. Take care.
Music.
(20:14):
Thanks for joining me i know your time is valuable and i appreciate the opportunity
to spend some of it with you if this was worthwhile why not take a minute and
share this podcast with a friend you could also check out our youtube channel
that's packed full of more ideas that will help you grow as a leader.
It's called the Hilt Academy on YouTube.
(20:34):
H-I-L-T stands for High Impact Leadership Training.
You can also find my latest books on Amazon. Just search for Dr.
D. Hicks, or you can find out more on dhicks.com.
Once again, thanks. Keep up the good work.
Music.
Honey, please buckle up. It's time to start the drive. Hazard reported ahead. Slow down.
Police reported ahead. Act normal.
Rerouting. You never listen. Okay, you've reached your destination.
Time to call your mother.
Don't you love that? You probably wonder what that is.
(00:21):
I was looking for who did the voice on Waze. W-A-Y-Z.
That's the navigation software that we have been using recently whenever driving
across country or through a new town or something like that.
And the voice on Waze is a little different in my truck than it is in Donnie's
car, as he and I might drive from one place to another.
(00:42):
And the one in my car sounded a little condescending to me, just a little bit,
almost like her commands were preceded
by, you know, a big sense of disappointment or something like that.
So I hopped on to find out who did these voices, and I ran across this one,
which is a YouTube video about Away's voices from a Brooklyn mother.
(01:04):
It's hilarious. Hilarious. Waze is more fun to use than the Google Maps or the
navigation systems that come on some of our phones with Apple CarPlay.
So we decided to use that a while ago.
And it was interesting because when it first started happening,
Waze would warn us that something was ahead.
And the most common one we hear was, watch out!
(01:26):
And it would occur oddly at times where it might have been a silent moment in
the car or a gap between songs.
And unbeknownst to me, I had set Waze in my truck to come up louder than the
music around it, so it would always startle me, watch out!
And there was just a little bit of a pause and then it would say,
(01:47):
police reported ahead or hazard reported ahead or something like that.
Well, today, how about if I show you a little bit of, watch out,
it's not from Waze, but it's from experience.
Music.
(02:19):
Leveraged lessons from high-impact leaders. For the past 30 years,
I've researched the disciplines, habits, mental models, and assumptions of the
most effective leaders.
Music.
This podcast takes what I've learned from over 2,000 of these influencers and
distills it into practical tools and tips you can use immediately.
(02:41):
So let's get started.
I really like talking about things that work and things that work really, really well.
I like studying when things have been successful, as in approaches or business
(03:05):
models or ways to live or leadership tools, that sort of thing.
I appreciate finding, especially in light of a problem, where it's not a problem
where it used to be and how people solve that.
I like that approach. approach but once in
a while we need to have an approach where we
do actually look at what doesn't work once in
(03:25):
a while we need a little bit of a watch out hazard ahead
from life and that's what this podcast is all about today watch out i want to
show you a few roadblocks or a few road signs or a few ways warnings about how
you and I think that will be very,
(03:48):
very helpful if we pay attention to them.
But before I get too far into that, let me tell you a story.
For several years, my family had a piece of property in northeastern Washington
along a beautiful river.
We would drive from our home in western Washington out on the Puget Sound and
(04:08):
the Olympic Peninsula over to eastern Washington, itself about a five and a half hour drive.
And then from Spokane north about an hour and a half to two hours to a wonderful
place we had on the river.
Just before we got to that property
on the river, we would go through a little area called Blue Slide.
(04:28):
It was actually home of the Blue Slide Resort. Not much of a resort now, by the way.
The years have not been good to that resort. It's just a bit of a ramshackle
buildings and some trailers and an unmown lawn, but it's right on the edge of
the river, so it's kind of beautiful.
But just past the Blutes Slide Resort, we would come to a place where the highway
(04:50):
would go up away from the river in elevation and then bend sharply to the left.
Approaching that part of the highway, there were several signs that warned people
that there was a problem, that they needed to pay attention to.
These road signs up in northeast Washington are like everywhere else,
they're warning you, you know, slow down, there's a curve.
(05:12):
But there's something kind of interesting about this one. People had ignored
these road signs for so long that the highway folks had begun to paint warnings
on the road and then to put rumble strips on the road.
And then every time we went up, there was a little bit more done.
Until at one point there were eight different signs in a row that said,
(05:33):
slow down, curve ahead, slow down, curve ahead, even giving you the mileage.
You need to be going 15 miles an hour to get around this corner.
And then after time, we noticed that there were great big arrows that pointed
to the left, one after the other, after the other.
Huge arrows pointing, saying slow down, and even flashing lights.
Guess what? Almost every time we went up there, somebody had gone through that
(05:57):
corner faster than they were supposed to.
The first indication were skid marks. The second indication were some of those
signs had been snapped off by the bumper of a car not paying attention to the warning road signs.
There was more than once when I noticed the effects of people ignoring those
warning signs, and they were pretty intense, that people had actually reshaped
(06:21):
the guardrail with their vehicle.
They'd slammed into the guardrail and gone over the edge more than once.
It's amazing to me. I hope that no one got injured in it other than their cars
being bent out of shape and their wallets,
but it's likely because going around that corner and going over the edge through
the guardrail resulted in about a 50 to 75 foot drop into trees and rocks.
(06:44):
It's likely that there were injuries as a result of it.
So with that model in mind, I want to show you some time-tested,
look out, watch out, slow down, don't go this way signs that might be very helpful to you.
And they're going to be in the category of mental models.
You remember, if you spend any time together with me, or if you've read about mental models before,
(07:05):
you know that our mental models are constructs we build about ourselves and
about other people and about the world and how we fit and about everything from
what's Ford Motor Company to what is a slow, slow down,
turn left, sign mean, what doesn't mean me, that sort of thing.
We have these mental models that we build in our mind.
And then once we build these mental models, we just assume they're true.
(07:29):
We don't even notice them anymore. We look through them instead of at them.
And they govern so much of what we do in life.
So I wanna share with you the dirty dozen.
Here are 12 mental models that do not work.
And you can heed these mental models and say, whoops, I have that mental model.
(07:49):
I am going to pump the brakes.
I'm not going to follow that mental model anymore. I'm going to change it.
Or you can ignore it and you can say, oh, that doesn't mean me.
And maybe you'll just get a few skids on the pavement.
Maybe you'll rearrange the front bumper of your vehicle. Or maybe you will crash
the vehicle of your life over the edge.
One of the signs that a person doesn't really believe that these mental models
(08:14):
are true is when they experience the negative consequences of those mental models,
they hide from other people because they're kind of ashamed,
or they blame other people.
I am sure that there have been many drivers that have hit that left-hand corner
just north of Blue Slide and immediately blamed the highway department for not
(08:36):
warning them that the turn was so intense.
Wow. All right, here we go. Let's get right to it. What are these 12 mental
models that just don't work?
Number one, I equal what I do.
That person believes that their performance at work or outside of work,
(08:59):
that their work is who they are.
The second mental model, I equal what I have as in the way of my reputation
or my possessions. That's the most common one.
I have a newer car than you do, so I am therefore better than you are, that sort of thing.
I equal what I own, what I have, what my possessions are. Maybe I even equal
(09:21):
the opportunities that I have.
The third mental model that the ways of life would say to us,
watch out, hazard ahead, is I equal my position.
Now, that's either my position on an issue, here's what I think is true about
this issue or that issue, or my position in a group or in an organization.
(09:42):
If I am the one who's in charge, I equal that.
If I'm the boss or the owner, I equal that, or the supervisor or the director or whatever.
I equal my position.
If you have that mental model, watch out. It's very destructive.
Here's the fourth mental model. I need everyone's approval. This is a little bit more subtle.
(10:05):
It has four quick corollaries that go with it. That is, that if someone doesn't
approve of me, they're dead to me.
They must be so bad, so wrong, that they're dead to me. All right?
The corollary that goes with I need everyone's approval. Another one is I need
to know what people think of me.
And I need them to think well of me.
(10:27):
A third corollary is, I equal what others think of me.
Wow, here's a fourth point under this one that I need everyone's approval.
This is actually a statement from Eleanor Roosevelt who said,
you know, you wouldn't worry so much about what people think of you if you realized how rarely they do.
(10:49):
Hard to swallow that one. If you equal what you do and equal what you have,
you equal your position and you need everyone's approval. you think they're
thinking about you all the time. Surprise, they're not.
Here's the fifth mental model that is a problem if you have that.
Things, me included, have to be perfect in every detail.
(11:10):
Whenever I ask somebody who's a self-proclaimed perfectionist who believes that
mental model, what perfection looks like, they usually can't answer it.
Here's the truth. We don't experience things in detail. We experience them in the whole.
Very few things arrive at perfection and stay that way like some static state.
(11:36):
Here's the sixth mental model that if it was part of a Waze navigation system would be a big warning.
Truth persuades people who don't want to be persuaded.
There are three corollaries to this one. The first one is that truth makes people
want to give up their power. It does not.
The next corollary is truth makes us feel good.
(12:00):
I have a dear friend named Tim who says that reality, which I think of as truth in action, right?
Reality is an acquired taste.
And in my experience, once in a while, truth, reality makes me feel good. It often does not.
Here's the third corollary to the mental model that truth persuades people who
(12:23):
don't want to be persuaded.
Just give them more truth and eventually they'll be persuaded,
right? Here's the third corollary.
The truth will set you free
but only if you want to
be free all right the next mental model number
seven on my list of 12 is i am my
brain there's a lot of this floating around today but in reality i am not my
(12:47):
brain my brain is an organ my mind can change my brain so much work has been
done around that theory that it's no longer a theory.
It's now proven fact in science that I can, with my mind, rewire my brain.
There's so much about that that we could talk about. It's amazing.
(13:09):
So I don't equal my brain. My brain's an organ. I have a mind and there's more
to me and my mind can control my brain.
All right. Here's the eighth mental model that is really a dangerous one.
If if you have it. It's a mental model that doesn't work. Here it is.
I'm in control and I have authority.
(13:30):
Therefore, to quote the philosopher Cartman, you will respect my authority.
Okay. Take that one apart. I'm in control. Ooh, not so much. I have authority.
Ooh, you may have positional authority. You may have organizational authority,
but people don't follow authority.
They follow wisdom and leadership. They follow selfless leaders,
(13:52):
or they're afraid and they stampede.
Here's the ninth mental model that if you've got this one, oh,
look out, look out. Okay.
Success means comfort.
The more successful I am, the more comfortable I will be.
Danger, danger, danger. All right. Three corollaries. First one, I've arrived.
(14:13):
Therefore, therefore I deserve.
The next corollary, the purpose of life is comfort or some sort of similar theme that goes with that.
The third corollary under success means comfort is success means security.
Oh, if you believe that, then you are going to be in trouble.
(14:34):
Careful, careful, careful. Here's the 10th one. We've only got 12. Hang in with me.
We are smarter and wiser than those who have gone before us.
Those folks who didn't have smartphones, oh, they didn't have science,
air quotes around science as it grows and changes, that they didn't have that.
That those folks back in the day, a hundred years ago, 500 years ago,
(14:55):
a thousand years ago, they were just kind of dumb.
They didn't have all the stuff we have now. We're so much smarter and wiser than they are.
The corollary to that is that people before the digital age,
before connectivity were probably actually kind of dumb.
They weren't very smart. Now that we have all this knowledge available to us,
at our fingertips, at a whim, we've got to be a lot smarter.
(15:18):
Oh, dangerous mental model. Here's another corollary that's a little bit more close to home.
This one comes, of course, from we're smarter and wiser than our ancestors.
Let's get it to just your family of origin, your parents and grandparents, for example.
Here's the corollary that my family of origin and how it chose to think and
live and believe and work and or not work has really no effect on me. I'm separate from them.
(15:42):
Oh, danger, danger, danger.
Of course, sidebar, we don't have to repeat everything that's a part of our family of origin,
but most of us dramatically underestimate the power that our family of origin
had on shaping us and shaping us to this very day in ways that are utterly invisible
to us. But they don't have to be.
(16:02):
Here's the 11th one. I'm supposed to be right as a leader.
I'm supposed to see and manage every risk and never make a mistake.
Danger, danger, danger. And here's the 12th mental model that is utterly flawed.
If you have this mental model, you're going to go off the edge of the road north
(16:26):
of the blue slide resort of life.
How'd you like that? I know it's kind of corny. I work with me here.
Okay, here's the last one. You ready?
I am the center of the universe.
Oh, of course, you don't believe that. You don't have any friends that believe
that. But do we act like that sometimes?
There are two corollaries to that. One of them is, there is no God.
(16:48):
That's a corollary that goes with, I'm the center of the universe. I'm the top. I'm it.
The philosopher, one of my favorites of all time, is named A.W.
Tozer. Tozer wrote this, what comes to mind when we think about God is the most
important thing about us. It shapes us.
We tend, he went on to say, by a secret law of the soul to move toward our mental
(17:12):
image of God, whatever that is.
I hope you pondered that for a while. And here's the last corollary that goes
with that 12th mental model that I'm the center of the universe.
There is no objective truth. And that if I don't believe something to be true.
It's just simply not true.
My truth is the closest thing I could ever get to actual truth.
(17:35):
That's the corollary that goes with that. Wow. Okay.
Wouldn't it be nice if we had a voice in our head that shouted,
watch out when it came to these mental models, whenever we're using flawed mental models.
We've got lots of signs along the road of our life that point out our flawed mental models.
And we, like many of the drivers that drive north of Blue Slide,
(17:59):
can ignore them on Highway 20 and plunge over the bank into the Pend Oreille
River in northeastern Washington, metaphorically or literally.
And we will suffer the consequences.
Some of the consequences are slow as they come upon us, and some of them are fast.
There are signs flashing all along the way, and maybe this little list,
(18:22):
maybe one or two of these mental models that I pointed them out to you,
really resonated, what's the word?
Resonated. Resignated? What's that? I can't even say the right word.
Maybe they harmonized with you. There, I'll just pick a different word, okay? Watch out.
Every time I go by the road, that bend in the road up there north of Blue Slide,
(18:45):
another sign has been knocked down, and another section of guardrail has been destroyed.
Then the next time, that's been repaired, and people just keep thinking, how silly can people be?
We told them, careful, watch out, watch out, watch out.
All right, there you go. I hope it's not a downer for you. I hope it kind of
sets you free a little bit, and you can go through that list and think,
(19:05):
ooh, that's one of my mental models.
But these other ones, oh, those are not. That's good. I'm doing good,
but I'm going to work on that one right there.
You've got a really important work to do. Leadership isn't everything,
but it's the first thing.
We need you to get there first because we're going to follow you.
Whether you go off that cliff or slam on your brakes and dent the car of your
leadership and of our organization, or whether you do it well,
(19:28):
we're going to follow you.
And therefore, we need you to succeed.
All right, friend, here's to you. You can't see me, but I'm sipping on a wonderful bourbon.
This is a Bainbridge Island Distillery bourbon.
And it says Bainbridge Island Distillery on this 750-milliliter bottle eight times on this bottle.
(19:51):
So it'd be pretty hard to miss the communication from that distillery that came from them.
It's a pretty good bourbon. I like it. Very enjoyable. No cigar today.
I'll have one on the next one. I hope your day is going great. Take care.
Music.
(20:14):
Thanks for joining me i know your time is valuable and i appreciate the opportunity
to spend some of it with you if this was worthwhile why not take a minute and
share this podcast with a friend you could also check out our youtube channel
that's packed full of more ideas that will help you grow as a leader.
It's called the Hilt Academy on YouTube.
(20:34):
H-I-L-T stands for High Impact Leadership Training.
You can also find my latest books on Amazon. Just search for Dr.
D. Hicks, or you can find out more on dhicks.com.
Once again, thanks. Keep up the good work.
Music.
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