Is Performance Your Only Pride

In this New Year, many of us have noble goals such as, to stop smoking, to continue a college education, to learn snowboarding, or even, to take the dog to training school. And how proud we are when we excel at the new skill or the dog learns to sit successfully! However, how many of us are asking ourselves where we find pride in our lives? Is your individual demonstration of pride only through a level of performance that keeps you trapped in the pursuit of perfection?

Let’s explore how the ‘pride of perfection’ can keep you in locked in a perfectionist behavior this coming year. Do you find yourself thinking that you won’t ask for help at the office because no one can finish this project better than you? Or, do you think your work colleagues never put in enough effort or hours in the office? Do you hear rumors that you are too inflexible in your working processes? Outside work, do your friends and family avoid asking for your assistance because you judge their performance as never good enough? Any of these incidents can indicate that you may be feeling the sense of pride only through an exaggerated level of performance or spending excessive hours in the pursuit of pride. Taking pride in your work ethic, your child’s school grades, even your dog’s new obedience behavior are all majestic in achievement.

If you think your pride is only demonstrated through your performance, ask yourself these questions:

• How do you respond to colleagues at the completion of a project? Do you make statements such as, “That’s fine, but, or, If you had only done this way!”
• Are you often critical of the tools you provided with to work on professional tasks? Do others observe you saying, “This will never work! It’s fruitless to even try working with this!”?
• Do you offer help to others with a sense of superiority?
• Does your family often exclude you from joint activities because you have a track record of working on the weekends? Are they disappointed when you continually do?
• How many times in the last year have you chosen to spend excessive hours on a project that could have been completed in customary business hours?

“Let him who would enjoy a good future waste none of his present.” Roger Babsonn