Hi Friend,
I had so many people say so many kind things to me about my dad’s passing. It was unexpected and very nice. From Facebook to LinkedIn to emails, I was bombarded with an outpouring of love. I’m grateful. It’s interesting how combining death, parents, relational-dynamics and our own emotional fortitude resonates in so many different ways.
The process of coming to terms with each of them is worth robust introspection and discussion. I’m grateful that I was able to engage so many different perspectives and experiences. Life is amazing. It’s a constant learning experiment. Just when we think we have it figured out, something unexpected appears and creates whole new opportunities.
This week was very exciting because we got the final printed version of the Ownership Culture Blueprint. It’s something we set in motion at the beginning of the year and it’s already come to fruition. Monica did an amazing job designing it. I put some words together. The end result is really really spectacular! We are hopeful it is a useful resource for those wanting to shape their culture.
It’s quite satisfying to set an objective and actually follow through to completion. I’m not always great at that. I’m really strong about making decisions to move in a direction, but sometimes my commitment wanes and I don’t see it all the way to the end. It’s like some of us are starters and some of us are finishers. But for integrity sake, don’t we have to be both?
Choices & Commitments
I’ve been contemplating those two words for a couple of weeks now. I’m a really great decision-maker. I don’t make great decisions all the time, but I’m willing, able and ready to make a decision and move towards it. I like that about myself. However, I can create reasons in my mind not to stay committed to a decision. I don’t like that about myself. Of course the solution is having other people in our life who remind us or support us in sticking with something.
I’ve been alive long enough to realize one of the reasons we break commitments is because we think/feel one way when we make them and then think/feel a different way in the future, so we decide we no longer need to stick to that old choice. What we forget is that the thinking/feeling we have when we break a commitment will also change… and lord we may end up back thinking/feeling how we did when we originally made a decision.
Have you ever felt really good about breaking a commitment because the season changed in you life within which you made it?
I know, I know… the basic essence of a commitment is that it’s meant to supersede feelings and temporary shifts in thinking. By it’s very definition we stick with it, regardless of changing circumstances.
It’s like quitting.
Nobody is ever encouraged to be a quitter. Yet we both know sometimes you’ve just gotta stop. At what point, is unknown. We’re told that it’s “just around the corner” but how many corners do we need to take before we stop?
It’s the little commitments that matter most. Not the long, ongoing, big ones. The daily ones take precedent. I’m super grateful for people in my life who remind me of who I want to be every day. In our #BestDaily efforts, we realize we can’t do it alone.
Commitments, choices, continuing, even life – they’re not meant to be done alone. I am sharing with people in my life who I want to be, everything I want to accomplish and in what time-frame. That helps so much, even if they don’t ask me, I know I’ve told them.
Instigating Ideas…
1. Are there commitments you need to break? Or broken ones you need to remake?
2. Who knows the commitments you’re attempting? Have you updated them lately?
3. Is there a commitment you need to make to yourself?
In every area of my life commitments are a thing: Spiritual, relational, health, mental, knowledge, growing, emotional, aspirational, business, individually and so on. I want to be really awesome at keeping commitments. I’m practicing every day. When I don’t follow through, I’m not making excuses, but point out to myself the stories in my head that I use to justify it.
I’m great at reasoning!
I’ve written something about this a long time ago. When we change the word “commitment” to “promise” it takes on more of a sacred alignment. I think it shifts from the head to the heart. I’m much more head-centric, then heart-centric.
When considering my own funeral, do I want them saying “man Greg had a big head!” or do I want them saying “Come on, Greg really had a big heart!” As I continue to keep commitments to myself, I suspect that may come true.
I hope this week you do an honest self-evaluation of the commitments you’ve made and broken; Which ones to keep and which ones to entirely step away from. Ending a commitment is better than consistently breaking it. I hope you follow through to the end on the ones you stick with.