Following on from last week – what standards do you follow? Other people’s or your own?
Is it a truth that your life will be a lot better if you define yourself in terms of your own standards and values and not what other people think about them.
They are your standards, not someone else’s. If you set your standards based on what others hold to then you inevitably lower yours.
You have to have high standards to get what you want and deserve in your life. Never apologise for having high standards for there are many people out there looking to you. In setting standards, you must be willing to take some risk because if you hold back from achieving them, you are risking even more!
Many people who have had parents who set impossible goals for them, goals that they just needed to reach when they were children have the hardest time with this. Because in most cases, they will in turn set impossible standards of living for themselves.
However, it is worth noting at the same time, setting low standards for yourself, is on the opposite end of the spectrum and is not recommended either. It is important to set high standards for yourself, ones that you live by and ones that will help you in all aspects of life.
Besides, it’s a real morale booster and makes you feel good!
Sometimes, you may need to adjust your standards to adapt to specific situations you encounter on your journey because it’s not going to be plane sailing. Life isn’t like that.
Occasionally, you are going to be faced with difficult choices which are going to test your standards.
But eventually, you will be where you want to be by just setting those standards in concrete.
This again is Possibility Thinking. And, Possibility Thinking is another form of Creative Thinking.
Children are used to looking at objects for what they can be, instead of what they are at face value. As adults, as we experience more criticism and feedback, we become less open to playful and creative thinking. We get embarrassed more easily by our ideas. And, in turn, we lose our creative freedom.
It is a matter of saying to yourself, “What if?”, and let your imagination go to work. Seeing in your mind’s eye the actual event taking place, the results happening. This is a powerful concept I don’t use enough and this week was a good reminder to get back into practicing it.