How do you develop personal authority?

Answer 1

First - know yourself and your beliefs

Personal Authority is about knowing what you believe and acting accordingly. Authority by definition implies certainty and understanding. If you do not know what you believe you cannot be said to have Authority over yourself.

Second - Act

Knowing what you believe is only good in that it guides your actions. If you don't act on your beliefs then you will lose your personal authority. By acting in accordance with your beliefs you gain personal authority.

Examples:

a) If you say that you don't think it is right to criticize people, then spend an hour criticizing the people who do criticize others, your personal authority will diminish.

b) If you state that you believe that racism is wrong and come to the aid of a person being persecuted for their race, at your own cost, your personal authority will increase. Anyone who witnesses something like this will remember it for a long time to come.

Third - Stay the course

Once you know what you believe you cannot back down simply because your belief is not popular, or because peer pressure is being applied to sway you from your belief. The only acceptable reason to change your mind is because you have learned that you were wrong. There is no shame in being wrong, only shame in knowing you are wrong and doing nothing about it.

Additional points to consider

Telling people what you believe is definitely a part of personal authority, but harping on them and expecting them to change their belief is not. It is enough that the people you come in contact with understand your belief. Convincing them to side with you is not important, they either will see the merit in your belief or they will not.

You do not need to sit down with people and explain your every belief in detail. This is something that you do situationaly. Often times you will not need to explain your beliefs because your actions will do that for you. Again the only thing that matters is that people understand that you do have definite beliefs and that they understand what they are.

People who have personal authority are highly influential. Please make an effort to be worthy of that influence and to lift people to a higher place rather than drag them down.

There are not a great many people who do have strong personal authority, it is often a good idea to explain to people that if they act a certain way your beliefs will compel you to do xyz (if you continue to act that way I will leave, I cannot tolerate this behavior). Many people are surprised that there are consequences to their actions.

The more clearly you learn to articulate your beliefs the better.