Reflect and Return (to the Process)

Much of what makes significant pursuits successful, whether they are athletic, musical, literarily, or otherwise, is a heavy commitment to process. Despite magnificent results, it’s almost as though the accolades and fanfare is but a brief punctuation at the end of a long run-on sentence of toiling, crafting, refining, and redoubling of effort.

In the New Year, reflection is popular. Results and outcomes, good or bad, consume our focus. Reflecting on the year and planning goals and aspirations for that which is about to come is en vogue. I caution you, the reader, to partake in these rituals. They provide context. Even the clockmaker, who’s head is buried in the fine inner workings of his product, head lamp on, his focus drilled into his magnifying glass must look up every now and then from the miniature world in which he works to check in with the big world around him. What time is it? Has a customer rang? Has night already fallen?

I must remind you, however, that while brief moments with your head out of the sand are important for context, everything you want occurs only back inside the process. Don’t forget the New Year is an arbitrary date to do such reflection. Resolutions are generally awful ways to get things done, anyway. I’d bet that no massively successful career, love affair, or artistic expression started on January 1st. Don’t buy into the hype. Setting goals is easy and so is looking in the rearview mirror. The process is the real challenge. The sooner you can get back to loving your people, getting your hands dirty, and chiseling away at your life’s master piece, the sooner you’ll have something to show for it.

 

Logan Gelbrich

@functionalcoach