2nd Reaction Post

1. Your reactions to what you have read so far since last time you posted. Have any of your thoughts about the book changed? What has stood out so far? What do you agree/disagree with?

2. Have your views of what you thought leadership was changed in any way so far? If so How?

3. Can you relate a time when you were put in a leadership position. What was it? How do you feel you did in this position? Is there anything you regret? What would you do differently?

4. Following up from the question above, citing particular quotes or passages from the book, write about something you can use that the author said or did when you are put in leadership role now or in the future.

After reading about 25 more pages of my book "My Personal Best", my reactions and thoughts about the book have stayed pretty much the same. John Wooden continues to show strong leadership skills even in situations where defeat and a loss looks to be the only outcome. He shows lots of character and humbleness in the part of my book he read. The part that sticks out the most is that on one of John Wooden's teams he had a black player and that player couldn't eat with the rest of the team at the normal restaurants where the white players could eat. John thought this was unfair so he made the whole team eat only where the black player could which I thought was pretty cool. It taught the white players about discrimination and gave them a taste of what African-Americans go through and deal with everyday. I completely agree with his decision and thought he showed good leadership skills, character, and humbleness.

My views of leadership have stayed primarily the same throughout my reading of this book. In the part I have recently read I have started to understand a little bit more how character and humbleness come in to play with leadership. In the book John Wooden talks about how if you become to cocky it can result in bad performance during your next game. He knows that you need to stay humble, yet persevere and have a winning attitude at the same time. Wooden talks about how he has seen many great players and coaches let winning get to their head which makes them too overly confident and makes their performance level drop.

One time where I was put in a leadership position was in golf last year where I was selected as a team captain. I had to make sure that our team was staying focused and practicing as hard as possible each day. We didn't stay as focused late into the season which is why our post-season success wasn't as good as the previous years in our program. I did a good job early in the season keeping our team focused, but later in the year I started to slip up which caused our team to not be as determined to go to state. We ended up not making it to state by a few strokes. I learned my lesson and now know how important it is to stay focused and stay committed throughout the year. Also, I learned that even when you are playing well, things can quickly change so you need to stay humble throughout the year. Next year I will make sure that we stay focused on our goals and not get to cocky.

One quote I will remember for our golf season next year is one by John Wooden - "You lose, you feel bad - sometimes very bad. But a much worse feeling is knowing you haven't done everything you possibly could have done to prepare and compete". Next season in golf I will try my hardest to make sure we stay focused and practice everyday, as hard as possible so that we will be prepared.