Forget money, cars, fine wines and property.
None of them are, to use a sporting analogy, in the same league as investing in yourself.
Let’s take things a step further and use sport as an example as how this can be done, about how you can see and appreciate the bigger picture for yourself.
It’s 1969 and Great Britain and the United States are engaged in sporting combat at Birkdale for golf’s Ryder Cup. A contest bigger than sport. It’s about national honour.
The USA’s Jack Nicklaus has just made a difficult putt on the last hole in the last game to ensure that his team cannot lose. His British contemporary, Tony Jacklin now has to hole his own tricky putt to ensure that the British team come away with at least a tie.
The competition hasn’t been played in the best of spirits. Bernard Gallacher, 20, has irritated his opponents pre-match by suggesting that, “...maybe they should be awed of me” to which one of his more seasoned opponents has responded by saying, “He’s some kind of arrogant”.
Golf, that gentlemanly game that has an ethos of etiquette and sportsmanship has descended into a bitter battle. And Nicklaus can now make Jacklin grovel. If he misses it, the US will be victorious.
Except that, as Jacklin looks to make his putt, Nicklaus steps forward and concedes it. In doing so, he has surrendered the victory and glory that his nation feels is theirs to celebrate by right.
One small gesture. But one with massive implications. The most long lasting of which is that the choice Nicklaus made is still regarded as one of the most famous examples of sportsmanship in history.
It’s still remembered and celebrated to this day. A lasting legacy to Jack Nicklaus, a gentleman and a player.
It would have been understandable for him to insist Jacklin made the shot. Yet he chose to concede because, to paraphrase JFK, doing so was not the easy choice but, as decisions go, the hardest he could make at that time.
He made that choice because, at that moment, Nicklaus saw the bigger picture.
Not the glory that was his to come. But the implications for Jacklin had he missed.
Nicklaus realised that, whatever they might have been, those possibilities were not acceptable to him. Thus, in an instant, he not only changed the course of that sporting conflict but that of Jacklin’s sporting life and future.
Plus the reputation and integrity of professional golf.
A lead we would all do well to follow.
Next time a friend or colleague is facing their equivalent of that make or break putt, see if you can step in and make a difference. By looking beyond your own boundaries you can play a big part in their lives by investing in your emotional bank account, a place where the interest is reliably high plus an accompanying personal dividend that, as Jack Nicklaus discovered, remains with you for the rest of your life.
