When I was a boy my parents
encouraged me to “be the very best.”
Back then, only the best got a trophy!
Nowadays the Wheaties® cereal
box mantra has changed to “just do your
very best” and all the teams get a trophy just for playing. It’s
been a source of discomfort for me for years.
Now before you jump on the
“promoting self-esteem” band wagon, let me say that I do not believe a young
sand lot baseball player has failed unless he or she makes it to the World
Series. But, I keep remembering hearing
an interview with Olympic gold medal gymnast Mary Lou Retton in which an
interviewer said: “We honestly didn’t know you had it in you.” Smiling, she responded, “Me either.” Mary Lou didn’t stop at some definition of
her personal best—she went beyond. When
the customer service director of a client company spent a night at a
Ritz-Carlton Hotel, she returned saying, “What we thought was A level service
is only a C+. We need to get much better
and we didn’t even know it!” Are you
striving to be the very best or are you settling for what you think is your best?
Comments