Were you ever told to do your best when you were growing up? It’s a phrase that is thrown around randomly, and most of the time it is said to a child because he actually isn’t that good at what he is attempting to do.
“Just do your best honey,” is the parental equivalent of, “Yes you are terrible but if that’s all you have to give, then it’s good enough,”
One of my all-time favourite books is The Four Agreements by Don Miguel Ruiz. Every agreement is simple and yet so powerful that mastering even one could change your life in any number of ways.
The agreement I think that has the most power, at least for me, is the fourth one – Always do your best. Because that is changeable, isn’t it? One day my best could achieve everything I set my mind to, and another day my best might be just enough to cope and survive.
And that’s okay. That’s the whole point of it. Your best doesn’t mean comparing yourself to someone else and trying to do better than that person, it means giving 100% of your effort and energy to whatever task you perform.
The idea is that if you know you gave your best, you should never feel bad about how it turned out.
If you don’t hold back, then the results you produce are the best of which you are capable of in that moment, and that is always enough.
But how often do we actually do our best? Fear and worrying about what other people think of us can cause us to operate within limits, to never fully put ourselves out there because then we know we could have done better.
And that just doesn’t make sense. It is an absolute waste of time. And time is the one thing that we need to use as much as possible, not squander away.
It is in limited supply after all.
So for today, and today only, do your best. Give it your best effort so you can say at the end of the day that you put it all on the line.
Stop cheating yourself of your greatness and let your amazing talents shine through.