I’m Tired of Being a Work-in-Progress
The other day, I did something silly and ineffective for the umpteenth time in my life (details not important). I caught it quickly. As I recognized the familiarity of the behavior and the negative Gary feeling, I said to myself, “Oh well, I’m a work-in-progress.”
I’m conflicted by that phrase. On the one hand, it is a positive recognition that I’m continually improving, and rapid recognition of ineffective behavior is progress. On the other hand, I always feel that saying this is a bit of a cop-out. For all the years of study I’ve done, the time and money I’ve invested, shouldn’t I be more of a finished work?
As I was contemplating this, our friend Michael sent me an article, The Wisdom of No Escape, by Genpo Roshi:
“I’m not OK. You’re not OK, but that’s OK. It has taken me more than 40 years of Zen practice and a great deal of inner searching and life suffering to be at a place where I can say this and mean it from the bottom of my heart.”
It is okay to be a work-in-progress and to live our lives as they are supposed to be. As long as we are living and breathing, we must focus on inner searching and maintain a desire to improve our lives constantly.
Continual product improvement process and living the journey
Almost thirty years ago, as I began mentoring and coaching business owners, my coach told me to recognize that all great companies have an ongoing and continual product improvement process. He said that if I wanted to be great at my work, I also needed to continually focus on improving my product – me.
Last week, our friend David gave me another piece of wisdom on this topic. When asked about their growth work, he said people tend to say, “I’m on the journey,” when they say, “I’m living the journey.” When we are living the journey, we focus on the “living” — the most essential part of any journey of self-improvement. It’s through living that we learn from our ineffective thoughts. Through living, we know the practice of recognizing these thoughts and shifting them to be more effective.
Suppose you are also a work-in-progress, congratulations. Be grateful that you are committed to developing a deeper awareness of how to be the best, most improved you. Any discomfort of not being a finished work is part of the learning. As for me, I’m working in progress, and that’s OK.
Keep progressing to imperfection,
Gary
