Tag: potential

The pursuit of your potential

You should always look at results through the lens of did you try your best and did you max out your potential. It is better to play your best game and still lose to somebody who is better than you at that particular moment than it is to play substandard to your potential and blow the other team out. This may sound add to those who are ultra competitive, but think of it this way…

Would you rather play an intense game, give it your all, and lose by a single point to one of your peers? Or would you rather not really try (or care) and easily beat a child at a game? Which would give you more satisfaction?

Try to live up to your potential in everything you do. We are not all created equal with our talents, but we are not all going to give equal effort. If you try your best, and you know there is nothing else you could have done, that’s all you can ask for.

Forget perfect

Perfectionism is the killer of dreams. It kills dreams before they even get started because nothing will ever be perfect. If you wait for everything to be perfect to take action, or if you keep tweaking something and decide not to launch it because it’s not perfect, you’ll never end up doing anything.

Instead of waiting for perfect, just take action! Action is almost always better than inaction. Don’t procrastinate. Don’t overthink. Don’t let outside circumstances dictate what you can do. Just do it. You may stumble and fall along the way, but as long as you keep getting up and trying again, you’ll be ahead of where you would have been if you never tried. And who knows, maybe you’ll stumble over something better than you ever expected…

“Keep on going and chances are you will stumble on something, perhaps when you are least expecting it. I have never heard of anyone stumbling on something sitting down.” – Charles Kettering

Growth over comfort

Will you choose to be comfortable or to try to reach your potential?

Have you ever noticed that we make the most improvement when we are forced outside of our comfort zones? If that’s the case though, why aren’t we always pushing the limits of our comfort zones? It’s simple. It’s because we are creatures of comfort. Who doesn’t want to sleep in a warm, cozy bed? Or to not feel the pain of an intense workout? Of course we tend to stay within our comfort zones – it’s easier!

This is not to say that you always have to be going 100 mph in every area of your life, because at that rate you’re bound to burn out. But in order to move from average, mediocre, or good enough, to excellence, you can’t be complacent. Jim Collins said, “Good is the enemy of great. That’s why so few things become great.” Isn’t that the truth? So often we do just enough to get by – we’re ok with good, so we don’t push to be great. Good is comfortable. Great is difficult.

As I was reading the other day, I came across this quote by Benjamin Mays. He said, “The tragedy of life is often not in our failure, but rather in our complacency; not in our doing too much, but rather in our doing too little; not in our living above our ability, but rather in our living below our capacities.” It echoes the same sentiment that Jim Collins describes above. We all have so much potential that we never live up to. Make sure you don’t waste your time here by not pursuing your dreams.

I’d rather fail trying than to never have tried at all. We will stumble when we have lofty goals. We’ll be uncomfortable at times. But remember, there is no growth without discomfort.