YOU FILL IN THE BLANKS
Remember the word game Mad Libs you played as a kid? The premise was pretty simple. You were given a story that was filled with empty fill-in-the-blank spaces. Your job was to choose random words for specific parts of speech - a noun, a verb, whatever - and in doing so to create whatever kind of story you wanted. It could be silly, serious, or somewhere in between.
In many ways, each of us are playing an advanced version of that childhood game in the important areas of life and performance, including you here today. I don’t know where exactly it is you’re working to win, but I do know that your story will be filled with all kinds of ups and downs, highs and lows, celebrations and frustrations, and that ultimately you’ll be the one responsible for giving each of those moments their meaning and determining how they define your story.
That responsibility - and the opportunity that comes with it - really speaks to the power of our perspective. The famous American author and philosopher Henry David Thoreau famously said that “it’s not what you look at that matters; it’s what you see.” Thoreau was highlighting the fact that two people can look at the exact same experience in life, and yet see that experience completely differently. Stop and consider those moments that are a part of any winning pursuit - including probably yours - and the different options that are available for how we fill in the blanks.
We’ve both been forced to wait in order to get something we really want. I see the opportunity to bail, you see the need to get better. We both went for it and failed. I see that I don’t have what it takes, you see that you’re not good enough yet. That thing that happened was totally unfair. I see it as an opportunity to become the victim, you see it as an opportunity to win anyways. Neither of us feel like doing the work today. I see the chance to take the day off, you see the chance to demonstrate some discipline. The problem we’ve been facing persists again today. I see it as the reason we can’t have success, while you see it as the price that success requires us to pay.
There are a number of ways those we consider champions are unique and set apart, but I’m not sure any of those reasons are more paramount than perspective. Champions have a way of seeing things differently - especially the challenge and adversity that’s a part of their winning pursuit - and that changes not only how they think about those moments, but more importantly, how they respond to them. The recognize that it’s not what they look at that matters, but what they choose to see.
That’s the part about perspective that I really want to highlight here today, because that’s the part that really provides the power. I’m talking about the fact that for each of us, including you here today, perspective is a choice. If you want to see every obstacle as an opportunity to bail or every unfairness as a reason to fail? That’s up to you. But if you want to see those obstacles as an opportunity to validate who you are and just how worthy you are of winning? If you want to accept that unfairness as a necessary part of any meaningful pursuit? Then you have the power to choose that story, too. Ultimately, you are the one responsible for giving each of those moments their meaning and determining how they define your story. Just like you did when you were a kid, you fill in the blanks.
