When I talk about defining yourself and defining you as a leader that can become a difficult thought to make those decisions and then live them out. What if I don’t live up to my standard? Defining sounds so… permanent.
This morning, I was thinking about leadership (and life, really) and it hit me that I was, truly, thankful for a new day today. A new day symbolizes so much – a fresh start, a chance to start over, an opportunity to shape the definition of myself and my leadership, an opportunity to live closer to my desired actions than I may have yesterday.
For years, I spoke on personal change and that life was more like a moving picture than a snap shot. Doesn’t it make you grateful that someone doesn’t step into your life or business and take a photograph of you and that one photograph forever defines you?
It’s the same with mushing, business, and life. Each day brings us a fresh opportunity to define – or re-define ourselves, our day, and our future.
Yesterday, I talked about Paul Gebhardt becoming disoriented and doubling back to the previous checkpoint. Once he regained his bearings, he turned back around and claimed his 3rd top 10 finish. To me that is great news for all of us on our leadership journey!
We set the goal – the vision of where we want to end up as a leader – that becomes our standard, our “Burled Arch”. (Burled Arch is the name of the finish line in Nome) We race toward it – but if we get turned around or WHEN something happens along our leadership trail – we have the mindset that we can get up, dust our leadership off and keep moving toward the destination.
If I told you that I was going to give you an Alaskan Husky as a present and, then, handed you a Chihuahua – you would be a bit confused because the reality wasn’t matching the definition. You would be looking for something that more closely resembled that definition, wouldn’t you? So we define our leadership goal our “Burled Arch” and the days WHEN our leadership looked more like a Chihuahua than a Husky – we just understand that there is an ongoing process, today is a new day and we have an opportunity to live something that more closely resembles our desired definition.
Continue today to work on your definition of yourself as a person and as a leader. Take time to work on the desired ‘definition’ for life and business. On the days when it doesn’t quite match up – it’s OK – we get a fresh trail today – and a brand new one tomorrow.
Happy trails!
