Who Says We Need To Keep Up With The Joneses???

Here's a thought...

While you are going about your day today, whether in your office or running errands or safely tucked at home, if you find yourself performing a task, try to keep this in mind.  You are an intelligent, capable, unique person and the ideas you come up with are important and should be trusted. 

It's far too easy to begin anything you set out to accomplish, whether it's as simple as arranging flowers in a vase or as complicated as assembling a new business campaign for your company, then at some point start to second guess your strategy. The flowers look clumped together, the business plan that seemed so groundbreaking initially suddenly feels foolish. This can be compounded by our unfortunate tendency to compare ourselves and what we offer to what other people around us are doing. Even more intimidating can be setting the bar so high that we find no hope of an outcome that could exceed expectations, much less compare. (Think of the time you tried to bake a cake and ice it according to the directions and Martha Stewart-esque photo in a magazine. If you are someone who can accomplish this sensational feat, I applaud you! For those of you less savvy, like me, you know what I'm referring to here.)

Because it is almost impossible for your mind not to acknowledge where it stands in the pecking order of life regardless of what is at hand, consider allowing yourself to go ahead and see the real picture in order to pacify its curiosity. Then immediately rally around yourself and take charge. Whatever it is you are doing, be passionate and proud of what you have to offer. Who cares if Suzy always looks impeccable and can cook an award winning spread at Thanksgiving as well as run her ad agency with flying colors or Bob always makes the wittiest remarks in the boardroom, always getting the bosses approval?

You must stick with what works for you, no matter how tempting it may be to switch to someone else's tactics to get ahead. Sure, it's fine to learn from others and gather information and ideas from a variety of sources. However, ultimately, you must be true to yourself and develop your own individual style in life. There is no such thing as perfect. Everything is subjective. Art, fashion, industry, science, you name it. Perfection, like beauty, is in the eye of the beholder. One person's perfect or beautiful is another one's... not so much...

The important thing to remember while you are performing whatever task it is, simple or complicated, personal or professional, work to the best of your ability, on your own private scale. Measure up to the standards that matter to you, and in doing so, you will show the world how divine you are, because you care about yourself and what you have to offer. 

And those flowers you arranged that you worried looked sub-par? Look again. If you put your heart into it, the outcome reflects the one-and-only you...