Steve Biko and Black Consciousness
Introduction & Programs ~ Starting Out; Some Basics ~ Success Journeys ~ Accelerate Your Learning ~ Time: Your Most Valuable Asset ~ How to Feel Good All the Time ~ How to Overcome Self‑Interference ~ A Few Health Basics ~ Cause & Effect ~ Additional Articles
Here is knowledge to enable you to become more successful, earn more money, feel good, enjoy great health (while cutting your health bills), and extend your life...
Extracts from: The FlipSide: Break Free of the Behaviors That Hold You Back by Flip Flippen#24: Apply the 80/20 Principle to Become more Effective and Efficient
#25: Apply the Law of Forced Efficiency (& "Leverage Points")
#25A: Learn from the Example of Jack Johnson's Champion Mentality!
Suppose the Single Most Important Success Principle is: Spend Your Time Most Productively!
The MOST VALUABLE THING in the Universe!
Gary Halbert: Gun-to-the-Head Marketing
The above video is indirectly related to time usage because if what you're doing is "on target," you'll automatically make better use of your time.
Halbert, one of the greatest marketers ever, describes how he couldn't pay the bills because he spent the money on postage. He was clearly operating in failure territory. Then he essentially asked: "If my situation were such that I would be beheaded if my next mailpiece didn't work, what would I write?" That was the catalyst that enabled him to "flip his success switch." Virtually in an instant he shifted from failure to making a huge success of his life.
His major realization was that he had to be "on target!" Sell something people want. Better still: Sell something people can't do without! Halbert has also written that, "The best market is a hungry crowd."
Extracted and edited from The Gary Halbert Letter -- Copyright © 2003 Gary C. Halbert. All Rights Reserved. (Emphases and comments added):
...I am about to illuminate something you really, really need to think about. Listen: In only 365 days from today, one more year will have passed into history. No matter who you are, 365 days is all you are going to get in the next year. By the way, that comes out to 8,760 hours... or 525,600 minutes... or... 31,536,000 seconds.
Now, let's say you are rich as hell and you are willing to pay dearly to have more time in the coming year than other people. Let's say you want just 10 extra minutes and you are willing to pay one million dollars for each of those 10 minutes.
You can't buy them. They're not for sale.
You couldn't even buy one extra second... for 100 billion dollars. Time is not for sale. Not at any price. During the next year, nobody is going to have more time than you and nobody (except those who go to "Check-out City") is going to have less.
So what? Well, here is the "so what" of it: The difference from where you are right now, today... and where... you will be 1-year from today, depends on one thing and one thing only. It depends on...
What You Do With Those 8,760 Hours You've Got To Work With In The Next Year
What you think about isn't going to produce any change whatsoever. What you plan isn't going to create any change either. How you feel isn't going to make a difference. What you read; what you learn; what you study; what you discover... none of these things... none whatsoever... is going to make a scintilla of difference about where you are 1-year from today. Get this straight in your head: The only thing (except for pure happenstance) that is going to make any difference at all in your life... is...
What You Do!
[Comment: What you DO is primary. How you FEEL has a major impact on what you do and how well you do it -- see "Raise Your Mood Level!" An important principle is to perform actions that produce LEVERAGE. You can do what makes you more EFFECTIVE and EFFICIENT. What you do today can enable you to produce increasingly more in your future. What you READ, STUDY, LEARN, and DISCOVER can raise the quality of what you "Do!" in your future. What you THINK and PLAN can also improve what you "Do!".]
So, what are you going to do with those 8,760 hours you've got to work with in the coming year? Actually, what you are going to do with a lot of those hours is outside your control. For example: You've almost got to spend approximately 2,920 of those hours sleeping. True, you could sleep less... but... that will almost certainly be counter-productive. The most recent research indicates the vast majority of Americans need MORE than eight hours of sleep per day... and yet... most of us get less.
Which, of course, makes us a nation of people who are sleep deprived... and... sleep deprived people suffer from fuzzy thinking, make bad decisions, and are more at risk for all types of health problems.
Whatever you do, don't try to become more productive by getting less sleep. That tactic will backfire on you...
...After deducting the time we need to spend sleeping, we're down to 5,840 hours to work with in the coming year. Let's say you are neither rich, retired nor retarded. That means you've got to spend a significant amount of time earning enough fungolas to support yourself and your family. To do this, let's say you work the proverbial 40 hours per week. Also, you've got to get ready for work, get to work and get home from work. Some of you have a long commute, some are lucky enough to work at home... but... I'm going to decide arbitrarily, we need to add an average of 10 hours per week to get ready, and get to and from work. Let's give you a two week yearly vacation... which means... you are going to use up 2,500 of your hours (50 hours per week times 50 weeks per year) on work-related activities.
We are now down to 3,340 hours we've got left in the coming year.
Ah, but we ain't at the end of our deductions yet. No Sir. But rather than belabor the obvious, let's make one sizable deduction for what I will designate as "Absolute Necessities of Life." This might include playing with your kids, giving time and support to your spouse and friends, brushing your teeth, shopping for groceries, getting your car repaired, shaving, taking some "down time" to let yourself recharge and so on. The time necessary to take care of the "Absolute Necessities of Life" will, of course, vary from individual to individual... but... I can't even imagine this taking anyone (who actually has a life) less than 3 to 4 hours per day so... this means... we're going to have to whack off at least another 2,000 hours from the stash of time we're allotted for the coming year.
I'm going to stop with these deductions. You've got the idea by now, don't you Boopsie?
Let us inch a bit closer to the truth: You really do not have 8,760 hours to decide what to do with in the coming year. In truth, with so many of your hours already "spoken for," you probably don't even have 1,000 "discretionary" hours to decide what to do with in the next year. That gives you something like 2 hours and 42 minutes per day with which you have to work to change your life for the better.
And, I feel certain, most of you have lives so jam-packed that... the truth is... you only have a fraction of even that small amount of "discretionary" time each day. And, I bet whatever amount of discretionary time you do have, I bet you use almost none of it to seriously advance the quality of your life. And, if you care... if you truly care... about elevating your status and achieving your goals...
This Has Got To Stop!
You simply must use your discretionary time intelligently... or else... you don't have a rat's ass of a chance of getting anywhere that's worth being.
So, what do you do first? I'm gonna tell you but, before I do, I want to make an important observation: Many people hate it when I write newsletters like this. These readers don't want to get the fundamentals right... no... they want to skip right to the "details." But your life is already filled with details... none of which... are doing doodley squat to enhance your life. You cannot intelligently decide which details you should really attend to... unless... you are clear and accurate about what your guiding fundamentals must be.
Here's something else: Success is not complicated. It is simple. The real answers are... so simple... they are downright corny. But simple does not mean easy. Running the Boston Marathon is very simple. All you have to do is keep putting one foot in front of the other for 26+ miles.
Simple as pie. Hard as hell.
I want you to be one of the "Masters of the Millennium." I want you to achieve more in the year 2,000 than you have achieved in all the previous years of your life. That means you've got a lot of details to attend to in the year 2,000... plus... you've got to attend to the right details. I've got less than two months to help you get this in laser-sharp focus. Let's see if I can get a commitment from you. Just for approximately the next 30 days. Just from the time you read this letter and the time you read next month's. This commitment will cost you maybe $20.00 or $30.00 and will take less than five minutes of your time for each of the next 30-days.
Here's all I'm going to ask you to do: Go to a local drug store, a Radio Shack or wherever and get yourself an el cheapo, microcassette tape recorder and 30 of those little bitty microcassettes. [Of course nowadays you could just use a voice-recorder app on your mobile-phone - no need to buy or carry anything extra with you!]
Keep your el cheapo recorder with you all the time and use one microcassette each day to keep a "time diary." Use it approximately once every hour of your waking hours. Your audio entries should only take seconds. They should be something like this:
"2:15 to 3:10: Had cavity filled by Doc Megapain." "3:10 to 3:40: Drove back to office." "3:40 to 5:30: Returned phone calls at work from customers with routine questions." Etc., etc., etc. That's all I want you to do. I know, I know. You're way ahead of me. You already know what this is all about. You already know the basics of my evil scheme to change your life for the better.
Bullshit!
You don't have a clue. Please just trust me on this. All you've got to lose is $20 or $30 and a couple or three hours out of one lousy month.
All you've got to gain is everything you've ever lusted for.
Look, stop thinking you're so damn sophisticated. So damn smart. So far above doing a simple exercise like this. Let me tell you something...
You Don't Know Shit!
Give Me A Chance To Help You!Sincerely,
Gary C. Halbert
"We must learn to tell the difference between arrogance and confidence in ourselves and in others. When we are truly confident within ourselves, and not just feeling confident, we can easily and readily accept that we may be wrong, even when we believe that we are right without the slightest doubt." -- Tsúnyöta Köhe't
There may be one factor that constrains you much more than anything else. Identifying and improving this one factor may provide you with greater "benefits per effort" than anything else. (Google: "leverage point"; "problem solving techniques"; "theory of constraints"; "root cause analysis"; "fault tree analysis"; five-by-five why's; "barrier analysis"; "causal factor analysis"; "liebig's law"; triz; "psychological inertia"; "reverse salient"; "weakest link.") You may find a great deal on how to apply such methods in business, but rather little on how individuals can apply them to their personal lives. Why do you think this might be?
See also "SWOT Analysis."
Can you find even one website that focuses on helping individuals to identify and overcome what constrains them most? Maybe it's easy for people in a company to think in terms of: "Find out what constrains us most, and fix it!" Maybe it's much more difficult for an individual to say: "I'll find out what constrains me most, and fix it! Maybe DENIAL is involved!
Realize that you might have blind spots that prevent you from seeing what constrains you most. Ask yourself: "What am I missing?"; "What haven't I noticed?"
For some people, Idenics may be a good way to quickly identify and fix the most important things.
Suppose you have a "procrastination habit." As soon as you try to do something you find "uncomfortable," you put it off til tomorrow when you'll hopefully feel refreshed and energetic... So you never get around to doing it! Until you overcome your procrastination habit, everything else you try to become more successful might be a waste of time, effort, and money! Procrastination may be a "Make-or-Break Issue" (MBI) you need to handle first!.
From interacting with tens of thousands of people trying to make money online, we've come to the conclusion that about 98% don't succeed very well. What if most of them don't succeed because they're held back by one or more MBIs. We don't recall any of the "success books" we've read saying that there might be one crucial thing the reader needs to fix before he/she could make any progress toward success! Maybe that's one reason why most "success books" don't work for most people.
Mediocrity may be an MBI for some. There may be a hill or mountain to climb to Rise above Your Success Threshold.
Some people may remain stuck in mediocrity because they Fear Looking Stupid. They don't ask questions. For some, the only way to rise up from mediocrity to competence is to ask stupid questions!
Denial may be an important MBI for some. If they deny their mediocrity, what will ever persuade them to become responsible enough to take the steps to become more competent? What can make them realize that they need to "pay the price" to become more competent.
If you know people who have been trying for some time to make money online without success, then you can be sure that they've been "unlucky" and/or "stuck in mediocrity" -- particularly if they've been "blaming others or factors outside themselves."
If you've watched the early stages of any American Idol (TV singing contest) season, you may have noticed how many contestants were mediocre singers. You may have noticed some denying their mediocrity and blaming the judges. Denying their mediocrity can't make them better singers!
You may ask: "Well, specifically how do I identify my most important Make-or-Break Issue (or Constraint) so that I can start working on it?"
Good question! The answer is that you could look over GRSS to see what might apply to you. Is procrastination an issue for you? How often do you "Not FEEL like doing" something you know you should do? Do you sometimes feel helpless? What robs you of your Personal Power?
"Is it possible that something other than your talents, abilities, personality, or academic achievements will define how far you go in life? Could it be that the things that hold you back -- or constrain you -- are a far more reliable indicator of your success than any skills or talent you may possess? And if it is possible to identify whatever those personal constraints are and break free of them, do you believe that you could soar to new heights in your life? Would you choose to break free of your personal constraints if I could show you what and where they are and how they are affecting you?"
"We have been able to prove year after year, with thousands of success stories, that people who actively choose to identify and remove their personal constarints will fare better than those who do not. It boils down to physics: the lighter the load you carry, the farther you can go. This final law provides hope: you can do something about your current situation that will also have an impact on your future."
"In my work as a psychotherapist, I have two important tasks I must accomplish for every patient: first, I must make a diagnosis and second, I must prescribe the proper treatment. The diagnosis of any situation is critical. If the diagnosis is wrong, then it is difficult -- if not impossible -- to prescribe the correct treatment."
"Personal constraints are just that. They are personal, and they constrain you in many ways. Some are from birth, others from your childhood experiences, and still others you pick up -- like dangerous hitchhikers -- along life's unpredictable road. But no matter where your personal constraints come from, they all have one thing in common: unless you can find and remove them, they will certainly hold you back from your greatest plans, hopes, and aspirations in life."
The FlipSide includes a questionnaire to help readers identify their constraints, and specific approaches to overcome certain constraints.
How to Double Your Productivity -- Leadership
http://www.globalchange.com -- How to double your productivity as a leader -- Dr. Patrick Dixon, Futurist and Author of 12 books on global trends, including Futurewise and Building a Better Business.
"The point about the 80/20 Principle is this: do what works best especially in those parts of life that are themselves supremely important. There will always be a minority of methods, a minority of practitioners, a minority of reasons and approaches that produce overwhelmingly superior results. Identify these. Then multiply them." -- Richard Koch.
Brian Tracy: Apply the 80/20 Principle to Everything! (click to watch video)
A most useful book: The 80/20 Principle: The Secret to Success by Achieving More With Less by Richard Koch. The most fundamental realization behind the 80/20 Principle is that there are imbalances in the universe -- it's inherently unbalanced. For example, in a particualr business 20% of the customers may account for 80% of the sales. The ratio needn't be 80/20; it could be 90/10, or 95/5, or some other ratio. Richard Koch wrote:
"The 80/20 Principle asserts that a minority of causes, inputs, or effort usually lead to a majority of the results, outputs, or rewards... The reason that the 80/20 Principle is so valuable is that it is counter-intuitive. We tend to expect that all causes will roughly the same significance. That all customers are equally valuable... That all problems have a large number of causes. That all opportunities are of rouhghly equal value, so we treat them all equally... But this "50/50 fallacy" is one of the most inaccurate and harmful, as well as the most deeply rooted, of our mental maps..."
"Understanding the 80/20 Principle gives you great insight into what is really happening in the world around you... If we did realize the difference between the vital few and the trivial many in all aspects of our lives and if we did something about it, we could multiply anything that we valued... Up to a certain point, a new force... finds it difficult to make headway. A great deal of effort generates little by way of results. At this point many pioneers give up. But the new force persists and can cross a certain invisible line, a small amount of additional effort can reap huge returns. This invisible line is the tipping point."
You can utilize the 80/20 Principle to identify which parts of this Success System will be of most potential benefit to you. Then you can skip (at least for now) the "less important" and FOCUS on those parts that will provide you with the greatest benefits from your least effort...
There's a great deal of value in Richard Koch's book The 80/20 Principle on how to apply the 80/20 Principle to your personal life, how it can be applied in business, and the benefits it could bring to society.
Richard Koch also wrote The 80/20 Individual: How to Build on the 20% of What You Do Best. Product Description from Amazon.com:
"A new 21st century individualism is overtaking "corporation-as-king" capitalism, transforming the way we work and live. Today, real power rests in the hands of creative individuals like Bill Gates, Warren Buffett, Oprah Winfrey, and Steven Spielberg, who are changing the world one great idea at a time. In THE 80/20 INDIVIDUAL, Richard Koch reveals the secret of their success: they discovered what they do better than anyone else and rode it for all its worth.
In this inspiring sequel to his classic bestseller THE 80/20 PRINCIPLE, Koch shows how to maximize success in your career and life by using the proven principle that 80 percent of changes in the world result from the most powerful 20 percent of actions and ideas. He'll show how to use your own powerful "20 percent spike" -- your most creative ideas and unique skills -- to measure the amount of value you bring to your employer, clients or customers. For most people, there is a huge disparity between their intrinsic value and the compensation they receive for their efforts. THE 80/20 INDIVIDUAL shows how to narrow that gap.
Drawing from his own success as an entrepreneur, as well as from the stories of scores of companies and individuals who have flourished as a result of an 80/20 mind-set, Koch offers a step-by-step method to remodeling a career or existing business, or creating a new one -- one that most benefits you. He provides valuable insights on finding 80/20 partners, hiring 80/20 employees, and running an 80/20 business.
By building a team that supports your efforts and excels in areas where you lack experience or knowledge, you'll be able to focus your time and energy on your strengths. Productivity and profits will soar because you'll be doing what you do best and enjoy the most. By using the 80/20 strategies outlined in the book, you can take control of your career and financial future."
David Ross: Stand-alone, the 80/20 Individual needs not a predecessor, April 11, 2005:
"After reading the 80/20 Individual without reading Koch's first book, I can say it is well worth the read on its own. The initial chapters of the book seemed like an autobiography to me and, frightfully, I almost put it down. But the author jumps off this base of case studies and solid historical references (besides being a hugely successful entrepreneur/consultant, Koch has also a history degree in his pocket), head-first into solid, practical content. I loved the no-nonsense language. The author takes the natural selection process of business life at face-value, even referring to the value-creating knowledge from a century of capitalism as "business genes." And without spoiling the story, I would summarize the idea as this: Take the absolute best of yourself, consumate your talents with the absolute best business genes you can seduce, and leverage the combination with a business structure that places you in the direct path of credit for the results. True to the buyline on the cover, this book "shows you how"."
Brian Tracy: Apply the 80/20 Rule to Gain a "Winning Edge!"
Richard Koch's The 80/20 Individual consists of 3 Parts and an Appendix:
In addition to applying the 80/20 Principle to increase personal and business success, The 80/20 Individual may be of great value to anyone interested in the future of individual freedom.
Brian Tracy: The Law of Forced Efficiency
The Law: "There is never enough time to do everything, but there is always enough time to do the most important tasks."
Seven important questions (to identify "Leverage Points"):
Notice which of the "7 Questions" (above) and the "3 Keys" (below) are related to Being on Target. Find a balance between doing the most productive things right now, and doing the things that will make you most productive in the future, including maximizing your leverage.
Key #1: Set Priorities and Do the Most Productive Things First!
Key #2: Use More Discretionary Time to Increase Your Competence and Create Leverage for the Future!
Key #3: Reduce Time-Wasting Activities!
Some people live their lives in such a way that they "don't have time to improve themselves" -- or so they think. If your opinion is that you "don't have enough time to upgrade yourself," then you may want to check out what Gary Halbert has identified as "The Only Thing That Makes Any Positive Difference In Your Life!"
The implication of what Halbert says is that How You Use Your Time is the most important make-or-break issue. If you're not yet highly successful, chances are that you're not utilizing your time very well. If you do the right things during the time available to you, how can you not be highly successful?
According to Mike Brescia of Think Right Now!, if you concentrate on doing the most important tasks related to your responsibilities and on your list of things to do (and you put off only unimportant tasks), you will be in the top half of one percent of the human population. So the challenge for you is to identify your most important tasks and do them!
Mike Brescia also says that "...[I]f you want to make any kind of significant change in your life, you must take a lot of "uncomfortable" actions that are not "normal" for you to take." So keep in mind that some of the Steps in this Success System may seem "uncomfortable" and "not normal" to you. YOU MAY HAVE TO EXPAND YOUR COMFORT ZONE! -- see One-Small-Step Booster.
Muhammad Ali Introduces Jack Johnson!
Jack Johnson provides a great role model for any success seeker. He demonstrated the development of personal power like few others have. Johnson overcame all the obstacles he faced, and persisted until he succeeded. At his funeral, a reporter asked his widow what she had loved about Johnson: "I loved him because of his courage. He faced the world unafraid. There wasn't anybody or anything he feared."
We are very fortunate to have Jack Johnson as a role model. You can find out more about him from the book Unforgivable Blackness: The Rise And Fall Of Jack Johnson, by Geoffrey C. Ward. A two-part documentary on Johnson's career by filmmaker Ken Burns was aired on PBS during 2005.
You are invited to get inspired by Jack Johnson's example of how to overcome obstacles and become successful...
In terms of his Champion Mindset, Jack Johnson was very advanced. Particularly remarkable about this is that he grew up during extreme racist times when some blacks were lynched merely for whistling at a white woman. Many whites treated Johnson with racist contempt, including in hundreds of newspaper cartoons and reports. He was attacked viciously in the media because an "inferior black" wasn't supposed to beat "superior whites." Johnson rose above it all. He had an "unstoppable desire to succeed!"
Jack Johnson was born in 1878 in Galveston, Texas. His parents were former slaves. Despite all the disadvantages of poverty and discrimination, Johnson became someone who succeeded bigtime as a heavyweight boxer. For several years, the top white boxers wouldn't fight Johnson because they were scared of him. Their excuse was that "they didn't fight niggers." Nevertheless, Johnson triumphed and became world champion. It's remarkable that a child of former slaves could develop his Champion Mindset to the extent that Jack Johnson did! Geoffrey C. Ward wrote:
"At a time when whites ran everything in America, he took orders from no one and resolved to live always as if color did not exist. While most Negroes struggled merely to survive, he reveled in his riches and his fame. And at a time when the mere suspicion that a black man had flirted with a white woman could cost him his life, he insisted on sleeping with whomever he pleased. Most whites (and some Negroes as well) saw him as a perpetual threat -- profligate, arrogant, amoral, a dark menace, and a danger to the natural order of things.
The real Jack Johnson was both more and less than those who loved or those who hated him ever knew. He embodied American individualism in the purest form; nothing -- no law or custom, no person white or black, male or female -- could keep him for long from whatever he wanted. He was in the great tradition of self-invented men, too, and no one admired his handiwork more than he did. All his life, whites and blacks alike would ask him, "Just who do you think you are?" The answer, of course, was always "Jack Johnson" -- and that would prove to be more than enough for turn-of-the-twentieth-century America to handle."
It was as if Johnson had read The Ego and His Own by Max Stirner, understood and integrated it, made it his own, and implemented it in all areas of his life. Geoffrey C. Ward wrote:
"Why he insisted on acting that way [essentially never accepting any limitations on himself] remains the essential mystery of his life... He was especially close to his mother, who told him again and again he was "the best boy in the world" and assured him he could do anything he wanted if he wanted it badly enough [emphasis added]... He saw himself as someone special from the first -- someone set apart, not subject to the limitations holding others back."
Jack Johnson was an outstanding example of someone largely free from the negative influences most of us experience while growing up. Even today, in many parts of the world, the negative influences heaped upon black children tend to be more severe than those dumped upon whites. (Much later in South Africa, Steve Biko identified as the biggest problem of blacks that in their own consciousness they regarded themselves as "inferior.")
Johnson either removed all notions of "inferiority because of being black," or never had any such notions in the first place. But Johnson went further, in the tradition of Max Stirner, he seemed to have removed all notions of subservience from his mind. Reportedly, Johnson was kicked out of church for stating that God didn't exist and the church was a domination over people's lives. It seems clear that Johnson didn't accept that anybody or anything had the right to be a domination over his life. Geoffrey C. Ward wrote:
"In two decades as contender and champion, Jack Johnson would never once enter the ring against a white opponent in front of a crowd that was anything but overwhelmingly hostile, and as the years passed and his fame and notoriety grew, the curses and racial taunts he'd been hearing since he faced Jim Scanlon back in Galveston would sometimes be supplemented by threats to murder him. Johnson would later admit he'd sometimes been affected by what he called this "pressure," but he refused ever to show his concern. The more the crowd jeered him, the more he grinned and taunted his opponent and joked with the reporters at ringside as if he didn't have a care in the world."
People are free and powerful by nature. Practically all "unfreedom," helplessness, and powerlessness they suffer from, they have acquired or learned. Much of it could be a result of abuse by parents and teachers.
Some people may get frightened and scared when confronted with the the idea of being naturally free and powerful. There may be an overpowering psychological "Inner Wimp" in your mind that blinds you to your freedom and power. If so, the next step for you may be to overcome your wimp.
If what you notice most about Jack Johnson is his "in-your-face arrogance" (or his audacity, brashness, brazeness, disrespect, insolence, rebelliousness, rudeness, etc.) -- and you find these traits objectionable -- then your inner wimp may be "alive and well!"
On the other hand, we hope you can see Jack Johnson as an inspiring example of what can be achieved... a role model to emulate!
If you often find yourself complaining, it's the inner wimp at work. If you regularly feel helpless, hopeless, desperate, or depressed, then most likely your inner wimp may be "alive and well!"
Another important factor may have been "education." Johnson had only five years of "formal education." He may have been mentally strong enough to not get brainwashed by his teachers -- see Dumbed Down by "Education!
Most "modern subservient humans" have little or no awareness of how they have been effectively forced into submitting to "agreed-upon subjective social reality." Johnson's Champion Mindset was so strong that he understood this very well. Geoffrey C. Ward wrote:
"In 1929, long after his [Johnson's] boxing life had ended, he cooperated in writing a series of syndicated articles about his career. In one, he argued that the outstanding black heavyweights of that era, Harry Wills and George Godfrey, would never reach the heights he [Johnson] had reached, in part because they were from the Deep South and therefore "grew up with the thought implanted in their minds, through generations of tradition, that the COLORED man was not equal to the WHITE. The inferiority complex which was planted in their grandfather and his father has never been shaken off and never will be shaken off."
Johnson had a considerable intellect. In addition to being a masterful calculating strategic boxer, he was also an inventor. On April 18th, 1922 he was granted U.S. Patent #1,413,121 for improvements to a wrench used to work on racing cars.
Monte D. Cox (Jack Johnson, The Galveston Giant..."Master of Ring Science") wrote:
"Jack Arthur Johnson, often called "Lil' Arthur" and the "Galveston Giant" by his contemporaries, became heavyweight champion of the world in 1908. In so doing he destroyed the colored barrier by stopping Tommy Burns in 14 rounds to become the first black heavyweight boxing champion. He had a 10 year unbeaten streak during which time he defeated all of the top fighters of the period. [emphasis added] He fought the other highly avoided black fighters of his day, including the clever master strategist Joe Jeannette 10 times, the hard punching Sam McVey 3 times, and gave the great Sam Langford a beating in their only meeting. His championship reign covered the years 1908-1915 when the giant "white hope" Jess Willard finally defeated him."
If you could acquire the kind of Champion Mindset Jack Johnson had, what would it be worth to you? Is it possible to acquire or develop it? What would you be willing to do to get it?
And if you got it, would it guarantee your success? Would you have to add anything to "back it up?" Would you have to do some hard work? See Organize Your Life to Create Structural Tension so the Path of Least Resistance Leads You Where You Want to Go.
Peter Gabriel: Biko
Steve Biko had an "unbreakable mindset." He refused to be a slave of an oppressive culture and refused to be a slave of an even more oppressive political system. He founded the "Black Consciousness" movement. Unfortunately, his body was "breakable." He was effectively murdered by white policemen in 1977 at the age of 30.
Steve Biko and Black Consciousness
"The logic behind white domination is to prepare the black man for the subservient role in this country. Not so long ago this used to be freely said in parliament, even about the educational system of the black people. It is still said even today, although in a much more sophisticated language. To a large extent the evil-doers have succeeded in producing at the output end of their machine a kind of black man who is man only in form. This is the extent to which the process of dehumanization has advanced." -- Steve Biko
Much of the history of South Africa up to 1994 can be described as an attempt by whites to domesticate blacks. Steve Biko can be seen as someone who attempted to bring about a movement to free his fellow blacks from at least certain aspects of the domestication. He was the founder of the "Black Consciousness Movement" in South Africa in the 1960s. Biko recognized that the biggest problem was that blacks in their own consciousness regarded themselves as "inferior." In terms of the culture in South Africa -- including the languages used -- the notion was planted in the minds of whites that they were "superior beings" and in the minds of blacks that they were "inferior creatures."
Note that Jack Johnson was also very aware of this phenomenon.
Practically all whites and blacks were nonconsciously enculturated in this manner. Biko recognized this phenomenon and advocated that blacks had to free their consciousness from the "inferior-creature" shackles. Biko refused to be a slave of the culture and refused to be a slave of the political system. He became world-famous and was visited by people like Robert Kennedy. Biko was also the greatest threat to the white rulers in South Africa. White police effectively murdered him in 1977. The murder was "whitewashed." In 1987, Richard Attenborough directed the movie Cry Freedom, a biographical drama about Biko starring Denzel Washington and Kevin Kline.
Biko saw the struggle to restore black consciousness as having two stages, "psychological liberation" and "physical liberation":
"The first step therefore is to make the black man come to himself; to pump back life into his empty shell; to infuse him with pride and dignity, to remind him of his complicity in the crime of allowing himself to be misused and therefore letting evil reign supreme in the country of his birth."
Biko used the term "the conscientization process" to describe what we might call recovery from "submitting to subjective social reality."
Steve Biko thought that "psychological liberation" needed to come first and would make "physical liberation" possible. What might both black and white people have to do to liberate themselves psychologically? For an outstanding example of someone who has liberated himself psychologically, watch the videos and listen to the audios of Stefan Molyneux.
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