There’s so much competition in the world; and many individuals and even organisations, sad to say, assume that the way to the top is to beat others to get there. Some have even made surpassing the performances of others as their primary life or career goal. What they have failed to understand is that life has space for everyone. And of a necessity, everyone must be able to contribute his or her best for life itself to be at its optimum for all. There is enough room for everyone to flourish and people excel in life not because they beat others but because their works are outstanding.
Callings are meant to be collaborative and not competitive; and each work or career option is meant to complement the other and not conflict with it. If we all agree that we are here to contribute our value in making this world a better place, then it should be clear that whatever we are doing should not be about putting others down but rather to lift them up so that the overall agenda of making positive impact is realised by all. This goes for career choices within the same sectors as well as across industries.
There are so many needs to satisfy in the world such that we should be busy seeking how each of us can make a difference. When we make it our focus to tail someone else‘s performance, we limit ourselves to a myopic view of life and we will never really be able to do anything significant because we won’t be about solving problems but satisfying our own inordinate ambitions.
It is one thing to seek to provide better services or improve on the lapses of others; it is another thing entirely to watch out for the failures of others or to deliberately seek their downfall. The former is okay so long as your aim is to produce goods and services that will maximise customer experiences. Most endeavours that set out to disenfranchise others do not make it on the long run because they have no real interest in satisfying customer needs. So they experience burnout from running on superficial zeal.
We have different skills sets and no two individuals have exactly the same personal and productive capabilities. So there’s really no basis for comparisons because even though we may do similar work, our approaches, styles, inputs, views and what have you will result in different realities. Each individual is unique. What we should try to avoid are work conditions or choices that limit our ingenuity and frustrate our creative capabilities. We should also resist the temptation to believe that others are better than ourselves because they are flourishing in their elements. We are all gifted in different ways.
If we all come to terms with the fact that everyone’s input is needed to make life better for all and that each person’s gifting and work is to complement others’ to achieve this, then we will fully release ourselves and our personal and productive best will emerge.
There’s a more fulfilling life for you out there; reach for it!
TS
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