Wrestling Blogs - Tom Elmer
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http://www.flowrestling.org/blogs/blogger/bigfan10/907-
December 21, 2007
At age 50 and with a lifetime spent marketing and selling mostly in the corporate world of the automotive aftermarket I have been to way to many seminars on sales, marketing, leadership, customer service, business etc etc I would guess I attended between 200 to 250 plus seminars and it might be even more if I didn’t kill so many brain cells in college (what do you expect? I went to college in the 70’s). So when the Heights Regional Chamber of Commerce offered a networking/leadership seminar combo deal I thought that was the last thing I needed to do. Quite frankly, I can not remember one thing I have ever learned from a seminar on leadership that I was using.I learned leadership by leading and being led. But Angie Polman, the dynamo behind the HRCC promised it was going to be worth attending. It turned out to be THE most powerful learning experience I have participated in since getting my Masters Degree in 2001.
The seminar leader was Richard Boyatzis, a professor at Case Western Reserve Universities Weatherhead School of Management and an author of several books including the title of the seminar that day: Resonant Leadership. In the almost three hour program we danced,we laughed,we learned and many of us were moved to deep emotion from the exercise I am going to try and describe ( for a copy of my notes please email me). Towards the end of his presentation Professor Boyatzis had us pull out a sheet of paper and to divide it into three columns. In the first column we were to write the names of three people who helped us the most in our lives…that without their help we would not be who we are or where we are today. In the second column we were to think of one moment that was important to that relationship and you were to remember what they did or said at the time the moment took place. In the last column you were to write what you took away from that experience as you reflected over time on its impact on you. We then were to break up into teams of two and share our answers for one of those experiences we wrote down.
My partner for the exercise was Doreen Davis, a multi-million dollar real estate producer from Shaker Heights Ohio. I volunteered to go first but I had no idea how the emotion of an experience that took place almost 35 years earlier would affect me so deeply that I fought back tears.
It involved a wrestling match in the state prep tournament at my high school when I was a sophomore wrestler taking on the undefeated and #1 seed in our conference…a wrestler who had won almost every match that season by pinning his opponent with a power move called a three quarter nelson. My classmates were so confident that I was going to be the next victim they put together aâ€pack pool†to determine, in 15 second increments, when I would be pinned. In the packed gymnasium there were in fact only two people who believed I even had a chance – myself and my coach. Of all the matches I ever wrestled in my four year varsity career this was the one match I have never forgotten. And of all the wrestlers my opponent faced that year I am sure he remembers the 105 pound wrestler from Delbarton School who lost by a point, who would so derail his seeming invincibility that he would lose in the semi-finals and drop out of the sport forever.
The seminar leader was Richard Boyatzis, a professor at Case Western Reserve Universities Weatherhead School of Management and an author of several books including the title of the seminar that day: Resonant Leadership. In the almost three hour program we danced,we laughed,we learned and many of us were moved to deep emotion from the exercise I am going to try and describe ( for a copy of my notes please email me). Towards the end of his presentation Professor Boyatzis had us pull out a sheet of paper and to divide it into three columns. In the first column we were to write the names of three people who helped us the most in our lives…that without their help we would not be who we are or where we are today. In the second column we were to think of one moment that was important to that relationship and you were to remember what they did or said at the time the moment took place. In the last column you were to write what you took away from that experience as you reflected over time on its impact on you. We then were to break up into teams of two and share our answers for one of those experiences we wrote down.
My partner for the exercise was Doreen Davis, a multi-million dollar real estate producer from Shaker Heights Ohio. I volunteered to go first but I had no idea how the emotion of an experience that took place almost 35 years earlier would affect me so deeply that I fought back tears.
It involved a wrestling match in the state prep tournament at my high school when I was a sophomore wrestler taking on the undefeated and #1 seed in our conference…a wrestler who had won almost every match that season by pinning his opponent with a power move called a three quarter nelson. My classmates were so confident that I was going to be the next victim they put together aâ€pack pool†to determine, in 15 second increments, when I would be pinned. In the packed gymnasium there were in fact only two people who believed I even had a chance – myself and my coach. Of all the matches I ever wrestled in my four year varsity career this was the one match I have never forgotten. And of all the wrestlers my opponent faced that year I am sure he remembers the 105 pound wrestler from Delbarton School who lost by a point, who would so derail his seeming invincibility that he would lose in the semi-finals and drop out of the sport forever.
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