In Pursuit of Excellence

I don’t believe in half measures. Or I do believe in half measures but in full efforts and maximum attempts.

One of my new years resolutions this year is to pursue excellence.

See I’ve gotten pretty good at doing the things I need to do. Adulting comes naturally when you’ve seen both your parents work on the ridiculous shit multiplied by four, as Dad was the only breadwinner and Mom was the only house wife. One supported the family with consistent hard work and world-renowned professional success. The other ran the house with an iron fist, a mother self-overburdened with love and gripped by childhood fears.

So here I am, keeping a regular schedule of the shit I need to do; work, cleaning, cooking, exercise, writing, event planning, PMP, Ironman, learning Spanish, book edits, blog posts, tracking process.

But there’s more! [Billy Mays says so]

To pursue excellence, I gotta work harder at the individual things.

There’s a self-satisfaction that I can’t explain when you’ve done your best. When you can proudly look backwards at the work with a half-smile. When your hands ache from effort, and your feet hurt from standing so long. When you blessedly want to sleep, but right before your breath turns regular and even, you remember that you don’t need an alarm because you’ve finished the things. And tomorrow morning, to sunshine and coffee, you can think about what opportunities you’re going to tackle next. The impending effort and looming challenges taste of anxiety and fear but tempered by the confidence that you’ll overcome, succeed, and push on; leaning in to the radiation of excellence earned.

The beautiful serenity of trusting your future self by presenting your present self.

On the other side, I’m still learning to accept failure. This might be the hardest part. See you don’t always get what you work for. I know that starkly. Birthed by the outstanding privileges I have, not nearly anything I’ve done yet is quite earned, and everything I have is much smaller scale than the delusion of grandeur will allow to accept as my legacy.

[Ha, the narcissism is real tho]

See when you fail. When the things that you try don’t give you quite the same level of post-progress satisfaction. And you still have to wake up and schedule the next week of activities and extracurriculars around the adulting and chores. That’s just depressing. You didn’t get your dopamine pay off, why even try again? Why not just chill out this week, smoke a bowl and watch that fucking Euphoria everyone is talking about. Or eat an edible and watch Into the Spiderverse again? Short term cycles rather than long term investments.

The truth is, that’s were the rational brain has got to kick in. All failures are necessary. All experience gained is worthwhile. Trust the process, don’t get bogged down in this week or next week. Focus on the next half hour. This quarter. And the next ten years. You will make the accomplishments you need to. But I can guarantee the road won’t be easy or even.

Lean in.

Chase the stars.

Fight for the greatest things that you can think of.

They won’t be as shiny as you fantasied once they’re in your grasp. They’ll be pocketed and scared, tarnished and dirty. That makes it more tangible. It’s real when it’s been worked. And veneering is the easiest part! They won’t ever know from the distance anyway.

You keep what you earn. Failures, successes; all of it is experienced, then it’s yours forever.

Strive for greater, you Anime protagonist. You’ll catch yourself if you fall. Your friends will pick you up and dust you off. Brace yourself against the storm, steady your feet against the sway, and push on.

Look around, everyone’s doing the same, against headwinds you could never see. I’m pretending I’m flying, like that Brother Bear scene, leaning into the sail, dressed in whatever I found in the thrift, hopefully not covered in dust.

Excellence doesn’t mean perfect. Perfect is unachievable or at the very least unsustainable. Excellence is doing your best, with your maximum effort, in the instance of the action. Excellence is making good decisions to put down the phone to turn away from the computer and to devote a solid 15 minutes at the task at hand. [Or just go to bed. Now.] As those decisions become easier, you’ll be well on the way to your goals.

Find your excellence. As you do, you’ll find it again and again. Within those excellent habits, you’ll catch the fleeting perfection. You can’t ask for very much in this life, but you can have your moments. And that’s all you can ask of perfection, just a moment.

This is the way. This is the only way. Forward. On your own. There has only every been one way out of the labyrinth. Through.