© Elliot Essman 2005. All rights reserved.

These pages contain the complete 2005 revised text of Building Yourself, public speaking trainer Elliot Essman's guide to living the successful life.

Elliot Essman Public Speaking Training
Building Yourself Table of Contents
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• There is nothing so stupid as an educated man, if you get off the thing he was educated in. Will Rogers (1879–1935)

Following the Will Rogers quotation above, there's nothing as pitiful as a person who is superbly knowledgeable in one field and ignorant of most other things. It's hard to call such a person educated. Nor is that person flexible or able to react to changing circumstances. Let's look at a few different fields. You can't be an effective expert in finance, for example, without having a good idea of what business in general is about. You can't be a good teacher of history without having a sensitive understanding of what your students are going through in their daily lives. You're not getting much out of your car if all you know is the one road to work and back. Certainly you must specialize at some point, but broad interests and knowledge will still keep you ahead of the game.

Being eclectic is important for understanding the world in all its wideness. But it's also essential for getting along with people. Most people's interests and areas of expertise will differ from yours. You need to understand their world, their framework, their concerns.

In an army, a sports team, or a business, each member of the team needs to have a perspective on the goals of the team as a whole. If the money people and the marketing people in a company don't understand each other's concerns, nothing will work. You can't have a true conversation with someone without reaching into their experience and understanding their point of view.

An eclectic person is well placed to maximize relationships with people. By being able to understand other parts of the human experience, you'll be better able to choose the most effective people to deal with and avoid most of the others. Because your brain stretches across a wide area, you won't fall prey to “experts” who try to impress you.

You can't know everything about law, taxes or medicine, but you'd better have a good general knowledge of these areas if you ever deal with lawyers, accountants or doctors. You'd better understand current events pretty well before you choose to vote for one politician over another.

But even more than being practical (and necessary), the eclectic life is a rich one. Science, art, economics, music, business, film, poetry, books, psychology, history, all the varied cultures of the world and their histories; dip into this fabulous wealth. Keeping yourself eclectic is the way you'll keep your brain open and young.