What is Greatness?

Lately, I have been asking myself: what is greatness? The simplest way to say this is that it’s bringing your A-game to your life. Well, that sounds like it’s simple, but I think it can actually get a little tricky when we start to ask ourselves: how do we really do that? Let’s look at some of the problems that have been running around my head lately. 

At first, you might get fired up by this idea. You might go, “yeah! Let’s go hard all day, every day!” That might work for a while, but eventually you will run out of steam. You will start to bring less and less energy and motivation to the table, and eventually you will give up. I’m not saying that because I’m a pessimist, I’m saying it because I have been there. The work feels less rewarding and your drive to get it done starts to dwindle. It’s just how it is. You could try to argue that this is where discipline should kick in. To a certain extent, you’d be right. But even then, the body can only take so much before it breaks. To avoid that break, you need breaks (see what I did there?) and to recognize this need, you have to have wisdom. 

So, if wisdom is needed to bring your A-game, we should probably understand what it is, right? The easiest way to explain this is to say that wisdom is using our experience and brains to help us do our best work. It’s learning about burnout before we start hitting life as hard as we can. It’s asking other people about what they would have done differently in our shoes. It’s understanding as much as we can to help us do things efficiently so that we can make the most of the energy we do have. 

This leads to the obvious question: how much energy do we have? I think the best way to answer that is to say that it’s more than we think, but less than we should assume. Dang, was that answer weird enough? Let me explain. There’s something wrong with being scared of running out of energy. We shouldn’t be afraid to find the place where we want to tap out. Odds are, if we live in fear of over-committing, we are guaranteed to under-commit. Fear pushes us too far in that direction. 

On the other hand, every one of us only has so much energy to spend. We should always understand that we can’t do everything. There will come a time when we must all say “no” to certain things, just because we can’t do it all. Our lives should be focused on the things that we commit ourselves to and the places we want to be in the long run. We should always be focused on the path we are walking and where it leads. And, you know what? Sometimes we need to say no to things just because we don’t want to do them. I’m not saying we should all be spoiled brats, but we should never forget to enjoy the lives that we have been given. And sometimes, enjoying your life is inconvenient. It can seem like a setback to the things you ought to be doing. But our ability to enjoy life is what makes the progress we do make, worth making. It’s what gives the whole thing life and drives it all forward. 

Wow, seems like greatness is complicated, huh? I guess the bottom line is to do lots of stuff. Understand even more, and always make sure that you’re happy. Eventually, it will all make sense and you’ll be well on your way to something cool. 

Until Next Time

May Peace be your Guide.