This time of the year is notorious for adding more stress to our already hectic lives. We’re often doing things wildly different from our normal routine and we find ourselves subjected to personal interactions we would normally steer clean from in our daily lives. Ah, the holidays!
In spite of all the extra demands placed on me by all this holiday stuff, I find this time of year fascinating. I enjoy the variety that comes along with doing different things and interacting with friends and family that normally don’t enter my daily life. Obviously, there’s going to be some stressful situations, but there’s a good chance there will be something to be learned from our discomfort.
We usually find ourselves living our lives on repeat, following the same routine every single day. We travel the same roads, go to the same places, and interact with the same people. On the plus side, there is a certain a level of comfort that comes with the repetition of our daily lives. We’re able to go through the motions with very little mental input; running on auto-pilot, as it were. Unfortunately, repetition can easily morph into monotony.
What you are aware of, you control.
The muscles in our body respond to stress, tearing themselves down and building back stronger in preparation for the next challenge. If our muscles do nothing but face the same level of stress each day, they quickly reach biological equilibrium, maintaining just enough strength to get us through our normal routine. If we were suddenly faced with an emergency situation, where an unusually large amount of strength and endurance are needed, we’d find ourselves unprepared to meet the new challenge, and likely fail miserably.
The same can be said of our mental abilities: If we always skate by with minimal effort, we should expect minimal results. In order for our mental abilities, intelligence, interpersonal skills, and business acumen to improve, we must be willing to do something other than what we already do.
We must be willing to put in the extra work required to be exceptional.
Abraham Lincoln once said, “Give me six hours to chop down a tree and I will spend the first four sharpening the ax.” We must remember that we alone are responsible for sharpening our ax. If we don’t take personal responsibility for bettering ourselves (reading a book, listening to a podcast, taking a course, etc.), then our ax will never be sharpened, and we’ll never be able to cut down that tree.
Being better than average is a direct result of doing more than the average. As the New Year fast approaches, I hope we all resolve to become sharper versions of ourselves.
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Thanks, Joe
