What Excellence is to me

What does excellence mean to you? Is a definition in a dictionary really the only definition of excellence? Every person perceives excellence differently. Everyone can achieve excellence in their own way, for example winning a State Volleyball Tournament, or even getting an A+ on a school paper. There are many ways to achieve excellence either by winning a title, just doing better than thought possible, or never giving up!

A great example of excellence is winning a State Volleyball Championship! To be able to achieve excellence you need to train hard everyday even when you know that no one is watching you. It takes complete commitment and learning from you mistakes. It doesn’t take just want to create excellence. You can create excellence within a team. Excellence isn’t being perfect, it’s pushing yourself farther then you thought you could be pushed. If you make a mistake and learn your excelling, because you know not to make that mistake again. When you create excellence within a team it’s more then just playing the game. Every person has to believe in each other and believe in the team no matter what players you have or how big your players are it does not matter. If you believe you can accomplish the never thought possible by beating an undefeated team in the championship game, that is what I call excellence. Excellence isn’t always about winning the title, it can be about taking the risk to excel. Excellence is a great thing but sometimes taking the risk to excel is the toughest part.

After reading “The Crooked Tree” by Benjamin Hoff he used an example of excellence that really shows the risk you take when trying to excel. A cat is good at catching its prey, it was born to catch its prey. But when a cat is focused on its prey it’s making itself vulnerable to be caught by a net. This shows that you may be excellent at something but taking the risk to go outside of your box makes you vulnerable to the outside world. The cat has the ability to not be afraid and go for what it really wants. I think that everyone shouldn’t be afraid of the possibility to fail. If you fail by stepping out of your box and attempting what hasn’t been attempted you are already excelling. Excellence can be made into a win, win situation. Sometimes it’s just about not giving up and going for what you want! You can never excel if you fear failure. It’s always better to just not give up and go for it.

The most important factor of excellence to me is not giving up! Three knee surgeries in a year for me has taught me that you can not give up. Excellence can be achieved within you, within your ability to fight. Sometimes life throws obstacles at you and it is so easy for us all to just give it up. When the odds of breaking your knee cap are 1 in 1000, and it still happens to you. That moment would be a perfect time to quit! Maybe it’s your body fighting the odds. Making it through years of physical therapy is excellence to me. Committing yourself and keeping a positive attitude that you can get better and pushing yourself to rebuild. Not giving up is excellence, because we all know giving up is the easiest thing so when you fight and beat the odds. You are excellent!

The word excellence can mean anything you want it to mean. No matter if it’s winning the State Volleyball Championship, going outside of the box, or never giving up. There are many more definitions to excellence this is only what it means to me. What is excellence to you! Have you excelled in your life. Maybe you think that you have yet to do something excellent. You might have already excelled in your life, it might be time to stop and think about what you have done!

References

Hoff, Benjamin, "The Crooked Tree", pg. 170, Seeing Metaphors

Ludwig, Mark Donald, "Look out for more Blairs", 2004, Quill Magazine ; pg. 34