Since my earliest days of being in organised team sports, I was satisfied merely making the team. It’s not easy to admit this. I’m certainly not proud of that contentment.
For years, I would show up to try-outs for baseball, basketball and football — the triune of American sports — and put in just enough effort to make the team. A few days later when the list showing who made the cut gets posted, I would look towards the bottom to see if I once again made the team.
Seeing “Tommy Weir” on the list was enough cause for a little internal celebration.
I’m not sure why I was content with just being on the team, I certainly wouldn’t be anymore. Maybe it was being able to wear the uniform, being part of the “in” crowd, or that I didn’t believe I was good enough to be more than a bench warmer.
When you’re content just being on the team, you don’t have to work as hard as star players do. You know you won’t be playing in a game, so you can exert just enough, but not too much, effort so the coach won’t throw you off the team.
When I think back on this, it reminds me of people who are content with their job. They work hard enough to just keep it.
But this all changed when Coach Monken, my high school football coach, believed in me. More importantly, he helped me believe in me.
Because of his belief, he convinced me to voluntarily show up after school every day, in the off-season when we didn’t even have practice, to get stronger and faster, in preparation for the next season. We spent time in the weight room, running sprints in the hallways, and doing drills in the gym.
During summer before the official start of practice, I met him on the field at 7am for an exhausting two hours of drills.
I quickly realised that being content was far below my ability.
He wouldn’t accept my mediocrity and pushed me to be better than I ever dreamed. His belief, which translated to mine, led me past contentment with being on the team, to become a starter. Thank you, coach Bill Monken.
As I think about what coach Monken did in my life, it leads to two questions: do you want to get better? And if so, who’s bringing the best out in you?
If you’re like I was, stop, don’t ever be content with what is or accept mediocrity. Good enough simply isn’t good enough. Research in performance psychology claims that most people settle for being just “good enough”, which is why most people become average.
When you feel that you’ve gotten as good as you need to, you begin to run on autopilot. But there is no such thing as good enough if you want to be a starter.
Success means that you need to work harder than everyone else. You may be tempted to respond with the cliché, “Work smarter, not harder.”
Working smarter is good, but harder is necessary to separate you from the majority who accept good enough as good enough.
I get really tired of hearing people preach about why they can’t accomplish something. It’s a waste of effort to come up with a laundry list of excuses blaming others, circumstances, and a lack of opportunity, when the real cause is a lack of belief.
The perfect environment doesn’t exist, so stop waiting on it. You’ll never have enough money, it’ll never be the right time, and no one will ever knock on your door asking you to make your dream a reality.
The world is full of people who don’t believe in you and who’ll tell you why you can’t do something. But you have a choice: listen to them or ignore them.
Belief is your choice. The question is will you believe what they say or in yourself?
From Coach Monken, I learnt how important belief is. I was fortunate that someone believed in me.
Who believes in you? Who’s bringing out the best in you? If you’re struggling to answer this: get new friends, hire a coach, and learn to believe in yourself. Build your belief!
— The writer is a CEO coach and author of “Leadership Dubai Style”. Contact him at tsw@tommyweir.com
