It was a busy school morning last school year. One of my big kids was talking to the little about life. I overheard an interesting conversation between them. Someone had asked my child to a school event. Someone who we think is fantastic. However, my child knew the person had asked someone else first, so they said no. I inserted myself into the conversation at this point and asked some follow-up questions like any nosey parent. After all, we all want our children to have all the experiences. My child looked at me and said, ” Mom, I wasn’t their first choice. I am not going to be their backup.”
How many times do we settle for something that isn’t our first choice? We tell ourselves, the backup will work out. As we get older, we settle and tell ourselves this story even more. This story often surfaces when we talk about our jobs, health, relationships, and many more areas in life. We choose the status quo instead of the status whoa. We tell ourselves this will work for now, or as a leader, we say, ” I think this person can do the job,” when often we know they are not a fit for the team. Or maybe we tell ourselves, I’ll start being healthier later when I have the time or whatever the next thing is you need to do because it isn’t your first choice. After a while of ignoring the first choices, people begin to beat themselves up about the choices we made. However, we often do doing nothing because we are too scared to change.
Does any of this sound familiar to you? Where in your life are you stuck in the “status quo” instead of the “status whoa” zone? I have taken the first part of the year to reevaluate what “status whoa” means to me. I am challenging myself daily to make these changes happen and have an accountability group to keep me on track. What does “status whoa” look like to you? What is something you can tackle today to bring more “status whoa” to your life? Remember, you are the architect of your own destiny. Feel free to tell me in the comments or send me a message. I love to hear what others are doing and encourage them on their goals.
