Setting honest and loving standards helps us to live a life of authenticity where who we believe we are is congruent with how we live our life every day. Setting challenging standards helps us to live each day striving to produce our best results. We live up to the standards we set and that helps us stay committed to reaching our maximum potential. Setting healthy physical, emotional and mental standards help us greet our days with energy, enthusiasm, love and joy as we set out to be our best version for that day and every day to follow.
Setting healthy standards are the guideposts for improvement in life.
Our lives are a cycle of growth, reward, and rest. We thrive when we move through this cycle with commitment and focus and make many, many, adjustments. At each summit of an accomplishment, it’s time to set new goals. Strive to learn new skills and capabilities or do what we know better and with higher quality output.
It’s a worthy effort to take some time to evaluate our standards. Do we want our life to be fine, typical, comfortable? Or do we want our life to be spectacular, engaging, stimulating or at the very least thriving in what we do every day?
For this particular mission, I’ve discovered that changing our standards is like preparing for battle. Truly so! And if we hear a calling, from deep within us, to do more, be more, achieve more, then here are some ideas to explore as we create a new acceptable level of performance to embrace our potential.
Bravery:
It requires bravery. When we decide we want to produce better quality, to perform at a higher level, we have to be brave and step outside our comfort zone. It has to happen if we want to produce results different than what we’re currently doing.
Awareness:
We’ve got to get painfully honest with ourselves. Dial into our self-awareness because this is where we’ll find the answers. Within each of us lies the truth of our reality and we have first-hand knowledge of what we’re doing well and what actions we’re completely “tanking”. We need to take some time to reflect and listen for the answers we know better than anyone else.
Sometimes it’s hard to be blunt with ourselves, and I seriously warn you not to dwell in self-criticism for long. It’s way too easy to get lost in the fog of too high expectations and mocking judgment. But when we’re not producing better output, we’ve got to locate the input that needs to be changed. And, brace yourself, there’s usually more than one change needed. Yikes! Don’t get down on yourself if this is the case. Take one truth at a time and slowly begin the work to improve it. What advice would you give to a friend, such as yourself, seeking better standards?
Benchmarks:
At this point, we need to set a benchmark to produce new results. Our new acceptable standard of performance. Be careful not to set it at an unattainable level that requires skills you’ve not yet developed. This is self-sabotage and you deserve better than that! Self-sabotaging our goals insures that we’ll break down to the point we want to quit. For this reason, I set my goals higher than I believe I can achieve to be committed and push myself to reach beyond my current capabilities and I’ve found it does bring out the best in my performance. I typically achieve higher than I would have if my standard had been set lower.
Another key is to set benchmarks that bring rewards sooner than later because successes build confidence and self-esteem, fuels motivation and commitment to continue our pursuit of higher standards and output. Upon completion, it’s important to keep our momentum going and by again raising our standards and asking a little more of ourselves, in reasonable increments of course. This helps us to stay engaged with our vision.
Planning:
It’s super helpful to plan and prepare “how” we’re going to reach our benchmarks. Jim Rohn, who is a master in teaching how to reach success, suggests a few simple things such as: It’s important to develop the right plan for us, establish times to spend on it, take time to reflect each week and make adjustments, and keep a journal of our progress.
It’s easy to forget ideas or corrections if we fail to record them. As unique as we are as people, creating a plan to keep us motivated will vary as well. When we find a way to incorporate our plan into the natural flow of our day, it’s easier to make it happen.
“Our goals can only be reached through a vehicle of a plan, in which we must fervently believe, and upon which we must vigorously act. There is no other route to success.” Pablo Picasso
Failure:
Let’s not forget that we’ve got to welcome failure and make it a friend of sorts. Failure highlights what we’re lacking in skills, what we’re doing wrong and needing correction, or what task is pivotal to do better for success and what may be needing more of our energy and attention to propel ourselves forward. Failure doesn’t suggest we need to stop but what we need to adjust in our attempts.
If we’re at a point in our life where we’ve enjoyed a fair amount of success and believe we’re capable of more, or if we’ve never made any significant achievement at all but we know we have it in us, it’s time to set new standards to create a new outcome. It’s within all of us!
Be positive. Be committed. Be intentional. These are key ingredients for our attitude as we commit to raising our performance.
Keep it Simple,
Just Teri
jtjustteri.wordpress.com 