There's a sweet spot where your thoughts & actions, your talents & strengths, and your values & virtues align and overlap.

This sweet spot is the place where your peace of mind lives. For many people, peace of mind is hard to find...like that tiny font in a sweet spot.

Here's the picture:

Other people can sense but not really feel or see your peace of mind. Other people cannot truly know your thoughts. AT best, other people can guess your talents and your values. However, they can and do observe your actions and make conclusions about your virtues, values, talents, strengths, and thoughts. They sum all these things up very quickly and, in a word, they call them your character. This all starts with first impressions, which get corrected each time you perform and they observe new actions. And, in their minds, you character remains fragile...slow to build and quick to demolish. Their minds are harsh judges, always opining on your actions. And, again, their opinion of your character can easily sustain damage and permanent injury.

Your character, as they decide it,  becomes the framework they use to determine the nature of the relationship they will [or will not] have with you. 

Here's the picture:

Of course, you have a biased view of these aspects of your peace of mind and your character...as do others who observe you.

Trust & Work: We want our teams to do both. 

Trust without work accomplishes nothing. 

Trust is the foundation and catalyst for interpersonal harmony and heightened cooperation. However, those things – those fine things - accomplish nothing physical until they are accompanied by goal-aimed action, including going the extra mile.

Work without trust accomplishes, at most, isolated and fleeting success. 

Alone, the thoughts/plans and the actions of work offer little gratification or peace of mind. Busyness contains value, however, its value is limited. Regardless, work is considerably more valuable than idleness. Work contains the seeds for success.

When combined with trust work-seeds have opportunities to be fully productive. 

Trust & Work: We want our teams to do both. 

Inspired by one of Stephen R Covey's phrases, "...balance between courage and consideration"

Courage and consideration of others are two character traits.

Perhaps, courage and consideration are antagonistic toward one another? Certainly, to a degree courage and consideration can cause our thoughts to move in different directions. The character qualities known as courage and consideration can bring opposing goals and make people feel conflicted. So, there is value in considering the need to balance one against the other and vice-versa. 

It seems to me, courage and consideration come into balance when true & pure self-confidence is present. The words "true & pure" are there to remove the possibility that self-confidence is less than sincere, laced with bravado, or clouded by bluster. True & pure self-confidence survives internal tests...it passes conscience tests and it promotes peace of mind. When confidence like that exists, courage and consideration are in balance.

To be more clear: When true & pure confidence exists, from the perspective of the owner of that confidence, courage and consideration are in balance. These concepts - courage, consideration and confidence - are very personal/subjective. Individuals know whether or not their self-confidence is true & pure. And, they know when their self-confidence is ego-speak...not so true or pure, when tested by their conscience and monitoring their feelings...[or when subjected to objective 3rd party testing such as stress studies].

Perhaps, you care about being courageous - perhaps, you see courage as an admirable character trait?

Perhaps, you want to be considerate of other people...perhaps, you see consideration as an admirable character trait?

Perhaps, you see value in possessing both these character traits and keeping them in balance.

If that's the case, work at building true & pure self-confidence.

[Consider the wisdom Napoleon Hill provided in 'Think and Grow Rich', (1937).]