Long Live The Dragon

MY Christian friend who was here on a visit recently really wanted to buy traditional Chinese suits to take home as souvenirs. We took him to the famous Silk Street tourist shopping mall where he browsed from stall to stall but could not find anything that appealed to him.

“It’s not the price,” he explained. “It looks like every one of them has the dragon motif.”

Obviously, he did not want to have anything to do with the dragon. To the Chinese, the dragon is the national symbol, a mythical creature, benign, strong, righteous and protective, and it has influenced China’s culture and that of its neighbouring countries like Japan, Korea and Vietnam for thousands of years.

So, a traditional Chinese suit is not culturally correct without the dragon motif and many Westerners like it as it is. They like to have it on their T-shirts, their kungfu outfits and even have it fashionably tattooed on their bodies.

On the other hand, there are those, some Christians among them, who are not quite comfortable with the mythical creature. To them, the dragon is symbolic of evil and is offensive. As such, they don’t want to have anything to do with it.

As China continues to interact with the West and come under increasing Western influence, the dragon, like other things traditionally Chinese, is in a bit of trouble.

A storm is brewing on the Net over an out-of-the-box suggestion that it should be dethroned and replaced as the national symbol of China.

It all started with a proposal by the deputy president of the Shanghai Public Relations Association, Prof Wu Youfu, who feels that the iconic dragon may no longer be suitable as a national symbol of modern China.

According to a media report, Prof Wu argued that the dragon is seen in Western culture as a symbol of “arbitrariness and offensiveness” and, as such, does not fit the image of a rising China that’s a peaceful and harmonious nation.

Noting that the bias from Westerners who know little about China’s culture may cause a negative impact on the country, the report says that Prof Wu and his team are now working on a new symbol based on positive Chinese characteristics.

Although Prof Wu subsequently explained that the report was not quite correct, the controversy he sparked off is raging on nevertheless, as the suggestion has touched a raw nerve in the Chinese who are proud of their culture.

They feel so strongly about keeping the dragon as their national symbol regardless of the fact that it is not enshrined in the Constitution as a national symbol.

The Chinese website sina.com did a survey and found that 90% of 100,000 respondents wanted to keep the dragon as the Chinese icon.

However, one expert feels that the Chinese word long should be used instead of the English word “dragon” to avoid any negative connotation.

Pang Jin, director of the China Research Centre on Dragon and Phoenix Culture, explained that the dragon of the West and China’s are different.

He said the dragon in Western countries represents evil and is usually seen as a symbol of arbitrariness and offensiveness.

“However, the dragon in China is a supernatural animal that is always good without aggression. What is more, the dragon in Western culture is low in rank but in China it is a spiritual and cultural symbol representing prosperity and good luck,” he was quoted as saying.

Visually, the Chinese dragon is a combination of several animal parts. It has the horns of a deer, the head of a crocodile with bulging eyeballs, flared nostrils sprouting two lengths of hair and a goatee. It has the body of a snake and four legs with the claws of an eagle.

According to Chinese mythology, the dragon, which controls the weather and thus the fortune of the ancient agricultural society, always moves among the clouds.

It has permeated Chinese culture for thousands of years to the extent that it was adopted as the royal emblem of every Chinese dynasty. Accordingly, Chinese emperors sat on a dragon throne, wore a dragon robe, and slept on a dragon bed.

He lived and worked in royal palaces decorated with dragon motifs and was even buried in royal mausoleums decorated with similar motifs.

The dragon is also featured in tens of thousands of art works in various shapes and sizes and in different postures and appears in books, poems and in ancient architecture.

Such is the attraction of this mythical creature that many Chinese today still pride themselves as Long Di Chuan Ren or “Inheritors of the dragon (culture)” even though the creature is non-existent.

Prof Guan Shijie of Peking University was quoted as saying that to some extent the misconception of the Chinese dragon is due to faulty translation.

Thus, he suggested that the Chinese word long be used for the Chinese mascot to distinguish it from the baddie dragon of the West.

On the other hand, Prof Yu Guomin of Renmin University believes that a PR campaign is needed to spruce up the image of the Chinese dragon.

“If the ogre Shrek can become famous and loveable in America, I think the Chinese dragon can learn from it too,” he mused.

Sharpen Your Axe

“Employ your time in improving yourself by other men's writings, so that you shall gain easily what others have laboured hard for.” - Socrates

A few years ago, while at Lawas in Sarawak, I was told this story of a very strong and skilled Kayan woodcutter who asked for a job with a timber merchant.

He got the job with a good salary and decent work conditions. And so, the woodcutter was determined to do his best for the boss. His boss gave him an axe and on his first day, the woodcutter cut down 15 trees. The boss was pleased and said: “Well done, good work!”

Highly motivated, the woodcutter tried harder the next day, but could only fell 13 trees. The third day, he tried even harder, but only 11 trees were chopped down.

Day after day, he tried harder but he cut down fewer trees. “I must be losing my strength,” the Kayan woodcutter thought. He apologised to the boss, claiming he could not understand why.

Great leaders like Steve Jobs, Mahatma Gandhi and Nelson Mandela have a continuous appetite for learning and growth.

“When was the last time you sharpened your axe?” the boss asked. “Sharpen? I had no time to sharpen my axe. I have been too busy cutting down trees,” said the woodcutter.

He sharpened his axe and immediately was back to 15 trees a day. Since then, he begins the day by sharpening his axe.

Most leaders are too busy doing and trying to achieve, that they never take time to learn and grow. Most of us don't have the time or patience to update skills, knowledge, and beliefs about an industry, or to take time to think and reflect. Many assume that learning ends at school and so sharpening our axe is not a priority.

So, what exactly is sharpening the axe? Dr Steven Covey, who popularised the term, believes it means “increasing your personal production capacity by daily self care and self-maintenance.”

Most people fail to understand what it means and mistake it for taking a break or vacation. If you're overworking yourself and your productivity drops off, take a break.

However, that isn't sharpening the axe; that's putting the axe down. When you put down a dull blade and rest, the blade will still be dull when you pick it up.

The woodcutter does need downtime to rest, but it is not “sharpening the axe.” The woodcutter only becomes more productive by sharpening his blade, analysing new woodcutting techniques, exercising to become stronger, and learning from other woodcutters.

Sharpening the axe is an activity. You too can sharpen the axe of your life. Here are 10 ways:

● Read a book every day;

● Get out of your comfort zone by changing jobs. A new job forces you to learn;

● Have a deep conversation with someone you find interesting. Sharpen your axe through that interaction;

● Pick up a new hobby. Stretch yourself physically, mentally or emotionally;

● Study something new;

● Overcome a specific fear you have or quit a bad habit;

● Have a daily exercise routine or take part in some competition;

● Identify your blind spots. Understand, acknowledge, and address it;

● Ask for feedback and get a mentor; and

● Learn from people who inspire you. Subscribe to YouTube/leaderonomicsmedia and watch interviews of great leaders.

You have to do it as often as possible. But if you're so focused on your task at hand with no time for discussion, introspection, or study, you're not really moving forward. Just as a car needs to be refuelled to keep going, we too need refuelling through learning.

The Management Mythbuster author David Axson believes most organisations still rely on outdated management strategies. Unless we are sharpening our axe daily by observing the changing world and changing ourselves accordingly, we risk becoming irrelevant.

Andrew Grove reinvented Intel and oversaw a 4,500 times increase in market capitalisation by his daily habitual “axe-sharpening” ritual of understanding global changes and taking advantage of these to ensure Intel remained relevant.

Employees at Japanese organisations like Toyota believe it's a crisis if they do not create improvement each day. The “Kaizen mindset” means that every day, whether you're a line worker or executive, you find ways to learn something new and apply it to what you're doing. This forces employees to be alert, mindful and constantly improving.

Great leaders like Mahatma Gandhi, Nelson Mandela and Steve Jobs have a continuous appetite for learning and growth. They always listen and watch in the hope of learning new ideas and discovering new truths and realities.

Many of us do just the opposite. By staying in the same job for many years, although we become experts and our roles become easy, our learning flattens.

We don't like changing jobs as there is pain and struggle in taking on new roles. But the more we struggle, the more we learn.

When a new boss with new expectations takes over, we sometimes find ourselves struggling even though we have been in the same role for years. We try harder but still fail to impress. Why does this happen?

Much like the woodcutter, trying harder will not yield results. This is because we did not upgrade ourselves nor grow in the “easy” years. Our years of experience count for nothing as we did not keep up with the world around us and were ignorant and mindless of things that were evolving daily around us.

Two weeks ago, I interviewed Harvard Prof Ellen Langer, who reminded me of our natural inclination to be mindless. Mindlessness is our human tendency to operate on autopilot, whether by stereotyping, performing mechanically or simply not paying attention.

We are all victims of being mindless at times. By sharpening our axe, we move from a mindless state to a mindful state; from “blindly going with the flow” to thinking and “breaking boundaries.”

Why then do so many people fail to sharpen their axe? Well, axe sharpening isn't as fun as whacking away at the tree. And it is painful and tedious work.

Religious leader David O. McKay once said: “The greatest battles of life are fought out daily in the silent chambers of the soul.”

Sharpening the axe is a daily inner battle. Research reveals that self-educated presidents like George Washington and Abraham Lincoln sharpened their axe daily by cultivating the discipline of reading.

In a number of Asian organisations, when there is a crisis or financial situation, the first thing that gets slashed is training programmes for employees. Yet, in a crisis, there is a greater need for employees to have sharpened axes to deal with issues.

Crises often helps companies to become great because they finally take time to sharpen their axe by re-looking at their current strategies and reinventing their industries, sometimes through painful reforms.

Before the 1998 Asian financial crisis, the Korean auto industry were jaguh kampung and known for low-quality cars with strong domestic car sales.

The crisis forced them to take a step back, sharpen their axe, become mindful to the world and move to sell the majority of their cars outside South Korea.

Of course, too much or aimless axe sharpening can become another form of procrastination. Many like to attend training courses and classes but end up never using the axe. After sharpening the axe, use it or all is in vain.

How are your various blades doing? Your skills, your knowledge, your mind, your physical body, your relationships, your motivation, your commitment to succeed, your capacity for growth, your emotions - are all of them still sharp? If not, which ones are dull, and what can you do to sharpen them?

Lincoln once said: “Give me six hours to chop down a tree and I'll spend the first four sharpening my axe.” What are you doing to sharpen your axe? Take a step back this weekend and start sharpening your axe.