“Time lost is time lost. It’s gone forever. Some people tell themselves that they will work TWICE as hard tomorrow to make up for what they did not do today. People should ALWAYS do their best. If they can work twice as hard tomorrow, then they should have also worked twice as hard today. That would have been their best. Catching up leaves no room for them to do their best [or to improve] tomorrow. People with the philosophy of putting off and then working twice as hard cheat themselves.” John Wooden, Legendary Basketball Coach for the UCLA Bruins, from his book, Life Wisdom from Coach Wooden.
I tell my people all the time, “If you didn’t do [what you were supposed to do] today, you lost today.” You don’t get a do-over. You don’t get a ‘pause-rewind-repeat better’ button. You get today. And today had better be perfect! I love what John Wooden said about ‘catching up tomorrow leaves no room for improvement’. That’s a pretty deep statement if you think about it for a second. If you did everything today you were supposed to do, then tomorrow you can strive to improve upon what you did today. But if you sold out, and cut yourself short, then tomorrow you’re simply catching up to what you should have done today. That’s why this whole series of ‘Be Perfect Today’ is being written. To help you TODAY do what you’re supposed to do.
I told the team this morning, “I promised Elaine [Craig of Craig Production] that I would write a blog a day for 6 weeks leading up to the Emerald Cup. This is the 13th in a row. I’ve now reached the point to where I’m having to research topics to write on. What good quote can I find? What story can I tell that will help the readers lock into their mental discipline. Believe me, it’s not easy to come up with different topics every single day that, in essence, say the same thing…BE PERFECT TODAY. Sometimes a situation will present itself in my life in which I think, “There’s a great blog topic.” I’ve written on family, friends, team members, coaches, athletes…and I have another 4 weeks to go! The challenge now is to find that one topic each day which interests you, the reader. No one likes boring, especially me. I hate it. But I also know that there are many ways to tell the same story, and if I can find that one way that will help someone, then I’ve done my job.
In school I had to read and research many books and articles to write papers. I found that some articles bored the death out of me, whereas others held my interest. Both sets of articles presented the same information, but the way in which they were written were totally different. I’d search out other writings by the same author/authors of the good articles because I knew my interest would be held.
My goal is to hold your interest daily by saying the same thing over and over but in a different way. Coach Wooden did that. Phil Jackson did that. All great coaches did and do that. Let’s face it, how many ways ARE there to say, “I need you guys to go out there and give me your absolute best today!” C’mon…these are elite athletes at the peak of their game, so the coaches have to get creative in what they say.
Today I yelled at my team. I mean YELLED. I told them that I was tired of substandard work, and if they wanted to do it their way, then I may as well call the team thing off. I wasn’t nice, at least the first 20 minutes. The reason I did it was simple. Shock value. I needed them to raise their own awareness of how they were ‘settling’ for less than their best. As I told one team member, “You have to get out of your own way, because right now your mind is blocking your physical transformation. All I hear is excuses. I NEED EXECUTION! And I don’t need it on YOUR terms, I need execution on MY terms.”
Towards the end of our mental training, I softened. “Guys (meaning guys and girls), I believe in you, honest, I do! And I see greatness in every single one of you. But I need YOU to see that same greatness in yourself. I need YOU to start looking at that reflection in the mirror and say every morning and night, “YOU are FAR better than what you’ve done up to this point. YOU can do more. YOU can be better. YOU need to stop settling for less than your best because if you don’t DO better, you won’t BE better.”
Coach Wooden also said, “God made only one Lewis Alcindor (a.k.a. Kareem Abdul-Jabbar), one Billy Graham, one Bill Walton. The rest of us didn’t receive as much potential as the highest achievers, but each of us can still become successful. We might not become as significant as we aspire to be, but we can become the best WE are capable of becoming.” The way that happens begins with today. Be Perfect Today.
Doc
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