YOU AT YOUR WORST
Everyone wants to be their best when it really matters, including you I'm sure. And I’m guessing that your best is pretty good, too. In fact, you at your best may be really good. When you get on a roll, when you find your rhythm, when everything lines up and you’re performing at your peak? I bet that you is hard to beat. That’s a fun vision to create and one that probably drives you to keep working and improving, to keep raising your ceiling and making your best even better.
It’s fun to think about your best. It’s fun to perform at your best. But I’m guessing you may know from experience that most days, it's hard to actually be at your best. That picture of elite performance we create in our mind rarely lines up with reality. Most days it’s hard to get on a roll and hard to find that rhythm. Things don’t go the way we want or the way we expect. In fact, sometimes the reality of our performance can be downright ugly. And while it's true that you at your best is hard to beat, it's just as important to evaluate this version of yourself, the one that’s forced to compete even when things aren't ideal. If you’re serious about winning, it’s worth considering today. How worthy of winning is you at your worst?
Answering that question requires you to move beyond what your A-game has to offer and to evaluate the areas that matter even (and maybe especially) when you don’t have your A-game. Do you have a motor that keeps running full throttle even when you're frustrated or disappointed? Do you have the toughness it takes to stay in the fight, even when giving up seems like the more attractive option? Do you have the competitive spirit to dig in and find a way to get the job done, even if it’s not pretty? Do you treat the people around you well, even when you’re struggling? What I’m asking is, are you committed to doing what champions do, even at your worst?
It’s foolish to argue that winning doesn’t care about how high your ceiling is. Who you are at your best matters. But it’s also foolish to assume that winning doesn’t care how low your floor is, either. If you’re really serious about winning, then who you are at your worst matters, too. That’s because winning doesn’t wait around for you to get on a roll or find your rhythm. It doesn’t care if today’s just not your day. Winning requires you to step in the arena and compete with whatever you've got. You can still win on those days - with less than your best - but only if you at your worst is good enough.
Now don’t get me wrong. Maintaining your effort and mustering up some toughness doesn’t guarantee you the outcome you want. Neither does your commitment to competing or to treating the people around you well. But they do put you in the best position to succeed, and they serve as evidence that, even at your worst, you are in fact someone worthy of winning.
What I’m really asking you to do today is to re-define what earning success looks like for you. You can and probably should keep working to raise your ceiling - keep working to make your best even better. But maybe it’s time for you to take a different approach to your improvement. Maybe it’s time to recognize that it isn’t your best that’s not good enough. Maybe it’s you at your worst that needs to get better.