Doing Your Best

Doing Your Best

My mom used to say to me, “All I care about is that you do your best. If that means that you don’t get an A, that’s ok with me.”

Though I took it to heart in some respects, I strove for that A and the affirmation that little letter represented. This was often at the expense of other important things in my life. Only after living a little while, did I realize that there are other important things to strive for: relationships, taking on important responsibilities, gaining experiences.

The school environment is artificial in many ways, for good reason. Outside the classroom, education can get pushed to the background as survival growls in our faces everyday. Parents guard their kids from this monster to equip them with the education that will help them to deal with it in the future.

I’ve always been a sprinter. Fast, efficient, but only in the short run. What I ended up doing was sprinting for the goal I set before me while putting everything else on hold. Essentially I could get the “A” I set out for, but was failing in many other areas of life…usually the ones that had no grading scale. Eventually, I began to see that what I was craving was approval and that though that was an effective motivator for me, it wasn’t the highest goal in life.

My senior year in college, I had a professor who expected much. I was challenged and a not a little intimidated. I took a “no excuses” attitude with myself and vowed to do my absolute best in his classes. But then in my last semester, during work on my final research paper, I got slammed with a terrible illness. No car, I didn’t have the ability to run around to doctors to figure out the problem. I just tried to plod on through the misery. I don’t know how, but I would make it through an entire week of classes just to suffer through hours of violent nausea on the weekends. I’d lay in bed motionless until class on Monday morning, and then drag myself out of bed to face another week.

After six weeks, I knew I had to talk to the professor. The illness was affecting my paper, my attitude, attendance, and I knew I needed help and understanding. I remember meeting with him, literally shaking as I told him the problem. I hated making excuses for my lack of performance. Then he surprised me with his response. I can’t quote him exactly, but this is what I remember, “I wish you would have told me this earlier. I could have worked with you. It’s helpful to know what is going on with someone personally.” That moment, my attitude began to change. I began to allow my life to enter my education and to see them as a united whole. My needs as a person were not to compete with my work, but to be a part of what makes my work mine.

I know it doesn’t work this way in the classroom, but in my life, I see an average of a C in each area as an A overall. I now realize that a grade is no reflection of how valuable a class is to my education. A grade is not a final pronouncement on my worth, but a tool to use to gage progress and effort.

I didn’t graduate with highest honors, but overcoming great obstacles and finishing well made the honors I earned high enough for me. I stood proud of my work, cherishing what I gained from my education. I’ve accessed and added to it everyday since…sometimes getting an A and other times just learning something along the way.

My kids and family became my great equalizer. The constant need for attention and physical care forced me to give up my sprinter’s pace of burst, crash, burst, crash, and adopt a more sustainable model of living. This has forced me to let go of things that I used to strive for. A clean and orderly house when people came to visit, looking like I was put together, helping the people at church when they sent out the guilty vibes and it would help me “gain points.” I had to let them all go. My children’s health and well-being was more important than a perfect house. Getting them to the doctor trumped the junk mail being sorted through.

So now when I wade through the piles of things that need attention to spend energy on the people that need me, I give myself the “A” for life. I’ve earned it by allowing myself to average a “C” in all important areas and take a “Withdraw Fail” out of the electives for now. There will be time for them when the children are bigger.