…my temporary assignment.

“If you aren’t in over your head, how do you know how tall you are?”   

― T.S. Eliot

There is no better way to announce your expectations regarding performance and display your intention to succeed than to go “all in”.  To fully embrace the unknown of the moment and intentionally “be in over your head”. 

Just plunging in – come hell or high water – speaks to a level of confidence, courage and intent  that is born to overcome any challenge that presents itself.  A limitless passion to achieve, intention to become and devotion to fulfill the cause.  Truly potent responses to a circumstance or occasion that you sense is ripe with both risk and opportunity.   

Sure, there can be that initial shock, the exhilaration that always accompanies the initial act of “jumping in”. But that too will pass, and the distance between the top of your noggin and the challenge begins to change.  Perhaps it is the depth of the challenge that is diminishing. Maybe it is the recognition that you are really in your element. Where you are supposed to be. 

In fact, you are truly rising to the occasion. For it is your response to each and every challenge  that will always control and enhance your stature. 

So don’t spend your life playing small.  You should always be playing big. Your current frame should never command the limits of your ambition – nor your doubts –  the trajectory of your life.

You are much taller than you could ever imagine.  

So just jump right in.  

“Play over your head.” 

“I am only one, but I am one. I can’t do everything, but I can do something. The something I ought to do, I can do. And by the grace of God, I will.”

Edward Everett Hale

There might be times or situations where things can seem overwhelming. That can be the nature of adversity. It is meant to test you, to elicit a response, in thought, word or deed.

True, you cannot do everything. 

But there is one thing you are always capable of doing, no matter what: your best. And even if you fall short, you will never regret how you embraced the effort.

You are obligated to do your best, because you are built for it. 

It is already in you. 

It just needs to be called forth.

Without regret.

“Everything you want is just outside your comfort zone.” 

 Robert Allen

If you think about it, there can be no growth without some discomfort. To become “bigger” you must exceed the confines of your current boundaries. Pushing yourself up and out.

To become a better athlete, you must work out and break yourself down to enhance your physical strength, increase your speed and raise your stamina. Speaking from experience, that brings some hurt.

To become all you can be academically, you must study in an intentional and intense manner. There are honors classes and graduate courses. Projects, clubs and societies. Endeavors guaranteed to take take you out of your comfort level – but essential to open the door to opportunity, towards a degree, certificate and your life’s vocation.

To embrace all you can be artistically, you need develop your expression. You must create, discern the result and begin again, again and again before it develops a resonance within others. Failure must be an option if you intend to ultimately achieve what lay within.

And to become a better person, you have to learn to give up yourself and “leave it on the field”. Especially as a member of a team, you must learn to set aside some of the things you might want, need or dream of so that the whole can become what it is intended to be at this moment. The sacrifice needed to release potential and spur achievement.

Whether muscle soreness, mental exhaustion, or the uncertainty that can accompany sacrifice, each can be tough adversary to face and overcome.

And all reside exclusively just outside of your comfort zone.

It is a choice.

Remain confined.

Or break out and grow.

“Paint a masterpiece daily. Always

autograph your work with excellence.”

Greg Hickman

Each day, you have an opportunity to be extraordinary – to “paint a masterpiece” if you so desire.

However, circumstances or events can distract or get in the way and expediency can step

in and overrule effort. Losing focus of your goals can cloud your judgement, weaken your commitment and dissipate your sense of self-discipline.

You weren’t put here to be average, to just get by and leave all of your abundant talents

and gifts to lay fallow. Every moment is an opportunity to leave your mark: to autograph your work with excellence.

Cast a long lasting impression, have an impact and be what you are meant to be:

Extraordinary.

“One of the illusions of life is that the present hour is not the critical decisive hour. Write it on your heart that every day is the best day of the year. He only is right who owns the day, and no one owns the day who allows it to be invaded by worry, fret and anxiety. Finish every day, and be done with it. You have done what you could.”

Ralph Waldo Emerson 

To write it on your heart is a pledge. To take an oath. To commit. And once committed, to own it. 

So let me ask you: “Where is the sense in holding in, holding on or holding out?” There can never be an inkling of thought granted to waiting for the “right moment”. For once you do, it is a lock that it will have already passed. Fretting over what might have been or might be is a waste of energy, effort and time. 

It takes you out of where you are now: today. 

Consigning your thoughts, words and deeds to “enduring” the so-called “fates” or embracing “conventional wisdom” can only lead you astray. Right down a path where things will undoubtedly happen to you. When in fact, you should always be the one happening to things. 

Give some serious consideration to what Mr. Emerson proposes. 

Every day can be the best day of the year. And if you do live it right – they should be. One right after the other. So write it on your heart. Bind yourself to that oath to own each and every one of them. Pledge your sacred honor to make this the best. 

Just until the next one.