Aiming For Excellence
 
  1. This topic applies as much to education, society, and personal development as it does to the business world.
  2. There are many necessary ways we as a people must be sure everyone is acknowledged, cared for and has potential to achieve in roughly equal ways.
  3. Equality does not mean sameness. Individuality must be recognized–each of us have differences and similarities to others. To some degree we all want things to be equal, but we don’t want everything to be the same.
  4. The reality is, not everything is equal. Special Olympics basketball games, rules and players are not the same as high school basketball or NBA basketball. They’re not the same and they’re not equal.
  5. Yet within each category (as in basketball above) lies the potential for excellence, for striving, for fulfillment, for talent, for excitement, for success, and so much more. From necessity we distinguish our differences and value them for what they are.
  6. In sports, academics, relationships, manufacturing, wine making, health care, business, and elsewhere, we reward and recognize excellence when it occurs. We encourage it. If we do excellent work, we get rewarded for it.
  7. Does anybody value the word cheap? Should people be proud of their cheap shoes, cheap jobs, cheap cars, cheap work and cheap surroundings? I doubt it.
  8. A danger is that in rushing to embrace all values, all viewpoints, all positions, all conditions, all differences, is that we neglect the people who purposefully work to raise the standards of conduct, work, artistic expression, human empathy and personal growth.
  9. Ideals and goals are set very high on purpose. We achieve excellence in striving to reach those ideals through hard work and persistent effort. If they were easy to reach, they’d have little meaning.
  10. Striving for excellence is conceptually a universal human distinctiveness, but in reality a far greater amount of human effort goes into regressive, fearful and self diminishing tendencies. To not push yourself makes you dead weight on society.
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July 7, 2007