I like little reminders of leadership or social responsibility. Usually, I get leadership lessons from reading Soul of a Citizen, or How To Win Friends and Influence People, but I don't read everyday and the books are usually filled with specific lessons. A few weeks ago, I signed up for Leadership Freak's email update, and so far I like it. Here's a recent (and rather good) lesson about encouraging others.

Encouraging others is incredibly easy.
1.Understand the dreams of others. Leadership begins with understanding and accepting the dreams of others.
2.See the strengths in others rather than persistently working to improve weaknesses. Inordinate desire to improve things may create negativity. Spend more time focused on strengths.
3.Speak hopefully. All great leaders are always realistically optimistic. If you don’t think others can rise up to meet challenges, get out of leadership.
4.Serve others by helping them reach their dreams.
5.When possible, meet a need.

Discouraging others is incredibly easy.
1.Do nothing.
2.Say nothing.
3.Be negative.

Pretty good lesson.

Here's the catch: these come to my email in the morning.

I thought I would love this. Little daily reminders to keep me going strong. I thought it would give me something to think about each day. That's all great. Here's the problem. Every morning, I wake up to a chunk of emails that are junk. I go through and delete all of them in one swoop. It has become habit to include these lessons in that purge. It's not that I don't like the lessons. When I have gone back and actually read them, I've enjoyed them. I almost feel like it's a routine thing. My morning routine isn't such that I sit down for 5 minutes and enjoy them. So, I delete them from my Android as I'm rushing out the door to my first class.

What I have noticed is this: I read them when I'm craving it. I will go through my trash and find them when I'm want a leadership pick-me-up.

All-in-all, the lessons aren't ground breaking, but are good. The value comes in his ability to be concise and consistent.

Do you subscribe to Leadership Freak? (No? Subscribe here!) What other leadership blogs do you follow?

Update: After writing this post, and before it was published, I got a new lesson from Leadership Freak titled "What Do You Pay Attention To". Although the discussion is different, I thought it was a funny coincidence.