A Life of Wonder

A good friend of mine ran a race and finished dead last. Honestly, I respect this even more than if he finished 1st. The force of will to continue, despite judgement, the inner strength to preserve is incredible to me. Knowing that you will finish last and continuing to run anyway, that takes courage. I am also not sharing this metaphorically. We all know there’s enough motivational bs out there. This is a story that I know is true and that I can turn to.

Recently, I got into a debate with an executive coach on Twitter. We were discussing goal setting, and she wrote, “I think that everyone loves to win at *something* – to be really capable, feel absolute domination in that moment, and just smash one thing out of the park – to feel pride in seeing what they can do, and to plant their own flag in this world with their influence.”

I responded by noting how she, in this and other tweets, characterized success in strong, “yang” language: smashing, dominating, planting. Notably absent from her description of success were the grace of “yin” language: fluidity, grace, inner worlds. She informed me that “zen” isn’t really her style, which, of course, is a dismissive way to shut down dialogue.

I refuse to believe that “high performance” is about only about smashing things, and that the only way to win is to dominate yourself and others. There is much more to winning than coming in first, at least, that is true of all the races I care to run in, and there’s much to be learned from the honor of the man who finished last.