by Michael Plank
We have a series of questions we ask around the dinner table or before bed with our kids every night. One of them is: “When did you do your best today?” We started asking that because we want our kids to build confidence and pride in themselves, we want them to be able to reflect on successes that they created, and we want to model for them what it looks like when we recognize and celebrate our own successes as parents. We want them to learn that doing your best is important, because it is.
They’re 10 and 4 years old. Their worldview is pretty simple still. You can handle more nuance than they can. So here it is…
Doing your best is great.
But not every day is going to be your best effort. Whether you’re talking about training or work or home maintenance or parenting or your relationships, not every day will be your best.
Some days, a mediocre effort is all you can muster. Some days, you don’t even have that and all you can really do is just show up. You walk in the gym, or you clock in at work, or you give a kiss good night and that’s about all you’ve got in you.
But you know what?
Sometimes that’s good enough.
Because the road to success is not actually paved with unbelievable, show-stopping, beaming-with pride moments. Those are in there, for sure. But the vast majority of that road is paved with boring, consistent, everyday efforts. It’s paved with days where you keep showing up, even though you’re busy, even though you don’t want to, even though you’re not “feeling it,” and you continue to put in an effort that is just good enough to keep you on the path.
But that’s ok.
Because the 30-days-to-life-changing-results challenges that social media is absolutely full of are way, way, way overrated. People overestimate how much they can accomplish in a month. But they dramatically underestimate how much they can accomplish in five years. It’s not about doing something amazing for 30 days. It’s about doing something that’s “good enough” for the rest of your life.