New Heading Primary and Secondary Greatness My experience with my son, my study of perception, and my reading of the success literature coalesced to create one of those aha experiences in life when suddenly things just simply click into place.

I was suddenly able to see the powerful impact of the personality ethic and to clearly understand those subtle, often consciously unidentified discrepancies between what I knew to be true, some things I had been taught many years ago as a child, and things that were deep in my own inner sense of value, and the quick fix philosophies that surrounded me every day.

I understood at a deeper level why, as I had worked through the years with people from all walks of life, I had found that the things I was teaching and knew to be effective were often at variance with these popular voices.

I am not suggesting that elements of the personality ethic, personality growth, communication skill training, education in the field of influence strategies, and positive thinking are not beneficial.

In fact, sometimes essential for success.

I believe that they are, but these are secondary, not primary traits.

Perhaps in utilizing our human capacity to build on the foundation of generations before us, we have inadvertently become so focused on our own building that we have forgotten the foundation that holds it up.

Or in reaping for so long where we have not sown, perhaps we have forgotten the need to sow.

If I try to use human influence strategies and tactics of how to get other people to do what I want, to work better, to be more motivated, to like me and each other, while my character is fundamentally flawed, marked by duplicity and insincerity, then in the long run I cannot be successful.

My duplicity will breed distrust, slowly, silently, imperceptibly.