The following contains excerpts from the book, The Daniel Dilemma (The Moral Man In the Public Arena) (Peggy Stanton).
At our music school in Midland, Texas we believe that music is more than sound, it is relationships. In the study of the subject of Leadership, relationships matter, and how integrous our relationships are become the foundation upon which all leadership is built.
“What is The Daniel Dilemma? Very simply, it is the dilemma of the principled man in the public arena, the tension between personal morality and the possession of power. In the Old Testament, the story of Daniel is the story of man’s relationship to power and the Creator of power…The king’s authority exists only by a grant from God. If the kings abuse their power, it will be taken away from them…Daniel’s faithfulness to Go0d did not remove pressure from his life…But never did Daniel defect to mere earthly authority. Never when his power was taken away, as in the lion’s den, did he cease trusting God. As a result, he always survived the circumstance. Today, swimming in an unending stream of scandalous headlines about public figures, we find ourselves wondering if Daniel was the last man to resolve his dilemma in favor of morality…What emerged was a book…stories, amazingly varied but remarkably striking in some similarities…All have achieved worldly success. Most have been recognized as leaders of their fellows. All of them believe in God…Ultimately, each was able to see his crushing letdown as a disguised benefit, a refining, a shaping, a honing of themselves, an occurrence that was inevitable and necessary for their betterment…The can accept the fact that, no matter the evidence, without supernatural aid from the Almighty, man struggles hopelessly with his existence.”
We believe, at our music school in Midland, Texas that the study of music and the arts fosters more than artistic disciplines but rather is foundational in the development of life-skills and character traits in things such as patience, perseverance, courage, poise, empathy, listening skills, and so much more.
This book shows several lives of public figures in the author’s generation (the 1970s) in America, going into detail in their struggles of leadership and their faith in God through the difficulties they faced. Although the book is dated, it gives clarity on many issues facing today’s leader in the public arena.
Don Shula
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- “He was the first coach to win a hundred-plus games in ten years. He was the first coach to command a professional football team through an undefeated season. But if his Miami Dolphins bowed to the Washington Redskins in the Los Angeles coliseum tomorrow, he would be the first coach to lose three Super Bowls. And that would be the first that would live on.”
- “Reflecting on the two Super Bowl defeats, Shula recalls many hours of ‘searching for inner strength…you can put on a show of being calm, cool and collected, but deep down, you have your own doubts. Can you win the big ones?…What I made myself do after those frustrating losses was get off alone, make a visit, light a candle, and ask God for help…The thing that I didn’t want to develop was the ‘why me?’ syndrome – the self-pity, the thinking that God has aimed something directly at you. Because of my faith, I was able to get by that and just charge ahead to believe in what I was doing and hope the next time I would be the one who would end up the winner.”
At our music school in Midland, Texas we teach students that it is not the ‘big wins’ in life that are most significant, but the daily, incremental, progress over time. Eventually, the big wins will come if focus is placed on the steady, patient process.
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- “Softening a blow is not one of Shula’s gifts or desires. ‘I’m about as subtle as a punch in the mouth,’ he concedes. Coaching is full of unpleasant choices and only one man can make them. ‘This is where credibility is important. You sit down and look the guy in the eye and say, ‘This is what I think. You may not agree with it. But this is the way I feel and this is why I’m doing it. I know it’s tough to swallow, but I just want you to try and understand what I’m thinking and what my purpose is.’”
- Upon winning the 1973 Super Bowl, “I was all of a sudden placed in a position of recognition. I was looked up to. And I knew the influence that professional football has on the family…I wanted to take great pains to live my life in a way that, hopefully, would set an example for anyone who was looking for one.”
- “‘We talk football all the time,’ Dorothy Shula asserts, ‘in season and out of season.’ She is his best friend. She inhales and exhales every run with the same intensity as her husband.”
- “There’s no magic formula, he has told anyone who will listen. Just hard work. Anyone who has the wisdom to surround himself with a superior coaching staff, is ready to put in eighteen-hour days, study game films hour after hour appraising talent, organize team schedules, and practices down to the second, cover every player’s move in detail, make any physical and mental sacrifice to win can accomplish the same results.”
There is no substitute for hard work, and at our music school in Midland, Texas our students learn first-hand the rewards and value of doing their best.
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- “The fact that Don Shula is concerned about the well-being of his players is part of his coaching success, according to Tim Foley, ‘If a guy’s going to go to war for you, put his body on the line – and that’s a very real thing for us – a player has to feel that the coach cares about him as more than just a left cornerback or a number 57. If the player doesn’t feel that the coach cares about him as a person, there is, I think, a percentage of that player that the coach isn’t going to reach.”
One of the most important aspects of teaching is to let the students know that you believe in them. At our music school in Midland, Texas we endeavor to show each student our commitment to their success.
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- “There are forty-three different personalities that make up a football team, and as a coach you’ve got to get inside each and every one of them and find out what makes them tick, what motivates them.”
- “Participation in sports, he thinks, teaches children a great deal about living. ‘There is the preparation; the actual competing; the finality of it, whether you succeed or fail; trying to learn something from having succeeded, so that you can succeed again; learning to walk away from failure without making excuses or worrying about it.’ He is fond of summing this philosophy up in the phrase, ‘Success isn’t final. Failure isn’t fatal.’ ‘There’s one thing he really hates,’ notes David Shula, ‘and that’s when you give excuses why you didn’t do something. You didn’t do it and that’s all there is to it.’”
These kinds of life-lessons are also evident in the study of music and the arts. Learning to step forward in uncomfortable situations and rise above the difficulties to achieve greatness is a character trait that will last a lifetime.
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- “‘Faith,’ he told a Biscayne College graduation class, ‘is the greatest force in all humanity. It is greater than intelligence, charm, physical beauty. It is greater than strength, political power, money or social position. There is practically nothing a man can’t do for himself if he has faith. Supreme self-confidence is based on faith, and without self-confidence, success is an impossibility.’ When a man has faith, Shula contends, he is without limits. ‘Faith gives you a definition and a purpose.’ It makes football more than just a game… ‘I think the worst thing I see, the thing that bothers me the most, is an individual with great ability who doesn’t have what it takes to make that ability come to the front…In order to get the most out of the gifts that God has given you, I think you’ve got to reach as far as you can reach. Some people are so afraid. Some people never play the game. They never enter into the arena. They never give themselves a chance to accomplish. They go through life without ever knowing how good or how glad they are. I want to find out.”