Doing Your Very Best Every Single Day

One of the biggest challenges of life is living up to our potential and doing our very best every single day. All of us have bad days, days where our effort is less than admirable, where our kindness runs short, where our drive seems weak, where enthusiasm is low, and where our performance is less than what it ought to be. In my opinion, a true measure of success is consistency—specifically consistency in effort. Those who are able to truly give their top performance day in and day out will progress, grow, and achieve results. So yesterday I had one of those “not so good” days and I hate it when I do because I know I should be better and that I can be better. So, below is a list of things I’ve found to be helpful in motivating me to preform my very best every single day.

Compete

Find a hobby that allows and encourages you to compete. Whether you enjoy a good game of golf or jogging or playing a musical instrument find a way to compete with yourself and/or others. Each time you run, keep track of how far or how fast you run and then try to do better the next day, if you play a musical instrument, perfect a piece you are learning. Good competition in my life helps remind me that I must work hard and put forth my best effort in every aspect of my life no matter what I may be doing. When I compete regardless of what it might be, I have found that it keeps my motivation high, helps me to feel confident, and often leads to success in other areas of my life. Competition seems to always put an extra hop in my step, extra excitement in my heart, and an extra degree of focus to my mind.

Be Discontented

One of the worst ways for us to lose our desire to be our very best every day is to believe “we have arrived.” Instead of believing we are great or have reached the top or can’t possibly do more, we should think again. Though we may have achieved some amazing things, there is always more we can do to be better. Rather than thinking we have arrived we ought to think I am grateful for what I have become or accomplished but I ought to be better. Those who live “discontented” with their results, regardless of how phenomenal they may appear will have more success at living up to their full potential day in and day out.

Have Goals

Along the lines of living discontented, we must have goals that motivate us to be better than we are and we must track our progress toward achieving these goals. Once we abandon goal setting and achieving, our ability to put forth our best effort in life greatly diminishes. I have found that good goals inspire me to be better, encourage me to push myself, help me to focus on my top priorities in life, and allow me to maximize my potential. Good goals that we are honestly striving to achieve will help us live at a high level each day.

Live with Urgency

Often we get relaxed and fail to seriously strive to improve because life is going well. What would happen however if you lost your job today, or the competition moved next door, or the stock market crashed? If we can learn to live with urgency and realize that we never know what tomorrow will bring, we will stretch ourselves every day to be our best. When going about our day, we must consider what would we be doing differently if the pressure was really on, and then act in that way. Doing this will help us reach our potential.

Have Favorites

In life there are things that instantly motivate us. It may be a favorite song or movie, it may be attending a ball game or a show, or it may be doing yard work or participating in a favorite hobby, or calling our closest friend. Whatever it may be, whenever you feel your motivation running low, go to these “favorites” and get re-energized. For me it is often simply exercising. When my body works hard my mind wants to work hard too and it helps me to get re-motivated for life. I also have some favorite songs and movies that almost always motivate me when enthusiasm is running low. Going to these favorites in times of need help me to do better every single day.

Know Yourself

Finally, there are many things that get us down, steal our energy, and rob us of our motivation. Whether it may be watching too much TV, shopping in crowded stores, surfing the internet, eating unhealthy, or a million other things find those things that cause you to lose your motivation and stress you out and then avoid them as much as possible. Once we are honest with ourselves and admit what hinders our ability to be our best, we can then improve our consistency in our daily effort by avoiding them. I have found that for me that too much time on the computer or not taking time to eat a good breakfast in the morning are demotivators for me. And knowing this has helped me to be my best more consistently.

Striving to do our very best consistently is not an easy task however following some of the simple ideas above can have a tremendous impact on our ability to do so. And in the end, I believe each of us has the power within us to do our very best every single day!