Apr 01 2009
Who sets the standards you live by?
Are you continually struggling to
accomplish what is expected of you?
If so, stop to think for a moment:
Who holds those expectations?
This is a two-part post
The first part is on another blog,
but not necessary to read.
Click here if you want to read the first part.
In many ways, I am grateful for my dad’s strict rules and high standards . . . it made me personally strive to set goals and work hard to reach them. To this day, the satisfaction of a job well done is very important to me . . . more important than the money earned for the job, although money is a measurement of the success.
One of my former bosses was very influential in my life. He was a professor who freelanced as a management consultant/motivation speaker . . . a dynamic man who really enjoyed his life since he had a passion for his work that seamlessly flowed into his personal life.
The greatest lesson he taught me . . . you must love what you do for a living or else it is not a life that is worth living . . . you must be smiling while you work. He also taught me about appreciation.
He was an awesome boss . . . very much like my dad as far as setting high standards and expected near perfection from me, but there was a difference in his approach. Work was fun and he constantly nominated me for awards, bonuses and extra pay raises . . . there was a reward for the hard work. In turn, I expected more from myself than he did because I wanted to be worthy of those rewards that represented a job well done.
In retrospect, he and my dad expected the same high standards, but took a different approach, producing totally opposite results from me. One approach motivated me to achieve, the other approach turned me into a resentful and rebellious young lady, yet very ambitious and driven.
I’ve written about my dad before and how we never made peace . . . he was nasty to me even on his last days on earth . . . he was just a miserable man and obviously resented my presence in his life. It has taken me a long time to realize that I didn’t do anything wrong, I wasn’t a failure . . . it was my dad who miserably failed at life.
Set your own standards,
take pride in everything you do
and be true to yourself.
Don’t allow someone else to raise the bar
and make you feel like a failure.
This is what I wish I learned as a
little girl, but learned as an adult.
Right on -
I couldn’t agree more!
I was truly just thinking about this …
My oldest son Dillon went to college to get a degree in graphic communication. (Mostly to make mamma (me) happy.) And it did. But along the way, he fell in love with Tattoo Art. And he decided to pursue that as his career. He is madly in love with what he does and is actually quite good at it … thus making really good money.
What my long story is trying to say -
He had to decided what makes him get up with a smile on his face / not the momma. Thus leading to daily happiness on his part
Great post, Gina. Isn’t that something how your father and former employer were able to motivate you in different ways? I’m so sorry that you never did get to make peace with your dad.