Do you focus on your strengths or on your weaknesses?

Research tells us that most people are more concerned with their supposed weaknesses than their strengths.

As someone who grew up on a farm in the prairie land of Minnesota, I never thought too much about such issues. After all, there was work to do! Then, life moved beyond the quiet prairie.

In college, I soon realized my less than capable abilities in the academic field of science was definitely a weakness of mine. If I had continued in science, let’s just say I would not have received acclaim for academic achievement. That bothered me a bit, but life soon moved on.

In the Navy, I was an enlisted man with little sense of worth. You were a cog in a very big revolving wheel. However, I noticed some of my buddies who were shy and needed support. I talked with them, and discovered it wasn’t shyness that bothered them. It was that they looked differently than the rest of the company or spoke with an accent. From these conversations, I gained insight into many of their stories and it helped me to not only give them a chance to unload, but it helped me to overcome my inherent shyness.

One of the side notes I gained was to slowly enter into their lives, and I did that slow moving into the world of wines. Within these enlightening wine moments, I realized one of my strengths was a sincere enjoyment in tasting and talking about wines. For a shy farm lad, this was a revelation! It was a time of exploration for me, and I found no weakness in vinology. I enjoyed tasting Bordeaux wines, Beaujolais wines along with Rieslings, Chardonnays and many others. In those wines, I coupled my infatuation with history to bring wines to life — every wine has a story. I’m proud of that strength of knowledge.

In today’s society, there seems to be a growing trend to minimize certain people — especially, those who don’t look as we do, act or do as we do, or who are “newcomers.” Again, as a history major, I know that is nothing new for us, but it develops and fosters a weakness that could harm everyone.

For a number of years, it was my privilege to serve refugees and other newly arrived immigrants. After being with them for awhile, I began to notice how hesitant they were to becomes fully engrossed in discussions or activities. Naturally, there were language issues and with them being unfamiliar with new settings. Many of these matters were settled with teaching and experience.

But there was an underlying issue, and here’s where my naval experience came back into play.

After many hours of them sharing stories of their personal journeys, I noticed a lack of self pride. They had been beaten, brutalized and set aside for so long that their personal image was always one of being inferior.

What the combined newcomers — a term used for newly arrived immigrants — needed was a reminder to be proud of themselves. That means to be proud of your nationality, your personal differences and to bring back to life one’s identity. A starting point for this was a community effort to bring cultures together in a festival.

When promoting this festival, I always began and ended my spiel by urging folks to be proud of themselves, and to bring forth the strengths of their identities. Don’t bow to those energy sapping weaknesses, but be proud of your strengths and how much you have achieved. The festival was filled with amazing colors, music, flags, native dress, stories and more. There was no lack of pride.

One of the people on the planning committee would only drink chardonnay. After prodding this person about what seemed to me to be a deficiency, I was corrected. The person had tasted many wines, and had came to realize that chardonnay was their wine of choice. It wasn’t a weakness but a strength. She asked me why I always had a cabernet sauvignon. We looked at each other and broke out laughing! The answer was obvious.

Isn’t that what life should reflect? Yes, it’s very easy to focus on our perceived weaknesses and to forget our strengths. We should always acknowledge both elements. We grow by acknowledging our weaknesses and become a stronger and prouder person.

Be proud of yourself! It is you!