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I can hear it all now: Kyle, you’re wrong. Kyle, you’re an asshole because nobody’s perfect. Kyle, you’re so ’90s. People are authentic now. People are raw and real and, by golly, we all make mistakes, you fascist bastard.
And my sharp-witted retort, that I’ve practiced in the mirror a thousand times, would be, “Leave me alone mom. I’m trying to write a blog.”
Now before everyone gets their delicate sensibilities all in a bunch, I need you to pay attention… because inevitably, a month from now, I will write a blog titled, “We all make mistakes. And you can hang your hat on that, people.” And I don’t want anyone to think I’m contradicting myself.
When did mediocrity become the status quo?
Here’s my point: when did mediocrity and the pursuit of averageness become the status quo? Somebody please tell me it was the introduction of Twitter and Facebook into Western civilization because, for reasons I can’t quite explain, that would just make good sense.
But I digress.
Does anyone remember when discipline and being challenged and, for eff’s sake, good old-fashioned winning was a thing we celebrated? I do. And don’t get this turned around. I’m the fella who suggested that if we shit the bed, we should own it. Meaning we all make mistakes, live up to it. But what chaps my cheeks is that so many people out in the workforce already have it in their head that since, in fact, “we all make mistakes,” then trying to avoid them is unnecessary.
Are we all on our way to participation trophy hell in a politically correct handbasket?
Try to wrap your head around this; my life is committed to the pursuit of excellence. (So, sue me.) I believe that everyone is made up of so much more than they give themselves credit for. I believe in being better spouses, better parents, and better citizens of the universe.
If we all run around like my last bookkeeper, shrugging our shoulders and saying, “Hey, dude, everyone makes mistakes,” then the world becomes a series of lost tax payments and unintelligible balance sheets. If the new gold standard is “Oh well, everyone makes mistakes,” then I have zero doubt we’re all going to participation trophy hell in a politically correct handbasket.
Take the proper time to royally rip yourself a new one.
To everyone regurgitating soundbites like, “It’s not good to dwell on mistakes,” I say pull your head up out of your safe space and let higher standards prevail for a change.
Here’s a radical concept: get pissed at your bonehead mistakes. Let it eat you up inside. Not forever. Just long enough to ensure, under no circumstance, will it ever happen again. Because being competitive and reminding yourself of what’s not acceptable are nature’s breadcrumbs to greatness.
Certainly, I’ll be the first to tell you to keep a handle on it. It can easily be a direct route to never being satisfied. But if you don’t take the proper amount of time to royally rip yourself a new one because you know you’re better than that, then you have no idea what it’s like to achieve something amazing.
Become a force to be reckoned with. Period. Why shouldn’t you? You’re as badass as the next guy. You’re as tough and smart and capable. I dare you to aim for the impossible. I dare you to believe that you can perform flawlessly. I double dare you to exponentially exceed anyone’s idea of what you are capable of. Trust me, it’s a beautiful thing.
Speaking from experience.
At the age of 35, I walked out of 6 ½ years of incarceration – no college degree, no connections. Hell, I’d never even sent an email. In less than a decade, I went from earning $10/ hour to being a highly sought-after sales executive. Not a “made up on paper” sales executive, a real, live one, Geppetto. I sold over $70M in new stage technology, I put two companies on the list of fastest growing companies in America, and I was instrumental in taking one to acquisition. In a nutshell, I self-developed a unique skillset of creating fast growth inside young startup companies.
How did I do it? Because I’m the smartest guy in the world, of course. (Wrong!) Because I wanted it. I mean really wanted it. I wanted to put the work in. Not 40 hours a week. Every hour of the week. And mistakes were unacceptable. Did I make ’em? You betcha.
But when I made mistakes, I didn’t just go off and lick my wounds, I agonized over the lessons inside every misstep. I took the necessary time to “dwell on it” because in my situation, I needed to catch up, I needed to be better than everyone around me, and I wasn’t going to lose a perfect chance to let life teach me the lessons that time never did. That’s how I did it. Period.
A little more “give-a-shit” is the difference between okay and legendary!
Look, I’m not saying everyone should beat the proverbial dead horse until they literally can’t get back up and into the game. What I AM saying is a little more “give-a-shit” can be the difference between okay and legendary. Oh, and for the record, that’s when people’s lives change.
So yeah, no getting around it, everybody makes mistakes. For sure, dude. But to some, our mistakes are a trigger to reshape and mold that primordial clay of competitive nature so that when we stand back and look at our lives, we see art, we see excellence, we see a thing we can be proud of. And some of us dismiss our mistakes as a silly inconvenience of life to quickly overlook because they are convinced they’re bound to happen… again and again and again and again and again and…
I think you get the picture.