As most of you know I am a former professional athlete. As I reminisce about my eight year career the most common comment I (and my fellow athletes) would hear from fans, media and coaches was to “Reach your potential.” When that draft pick, free agent or local high school phenomenon begins the season everyone waits anxiously to see if he produces. If he has an excellent season, everyoneis excited but the attitude is he should have because he was a high selection or top recruit. If he doesn’t pan out the entire stadium seems to be disappointed.
 
I can only speak for myself, but that expectation placed on me as an athlete initially created unbelievable focus but it also created fear, concern and anxiety because I never wanted to be grouped with those athletes that didn’t reach their potential. I never would want to be considered a disappointment. I mean after all what else do I have to do with my career than reach my potential. Reaching my potential became my job, a life style, my number one job in life is to reach my potential at work and at home.

Shouldn’t we all be obsessed about reaching our potential? You might not understand this but you actually have a lot of people watching you right now, your boss, employees, spouse and children are all watching you. In fact, they all have an opinion on how well you are doing so far. I mean I would love to evaluate your life myself, I would even the score from my playing days when you were hard on me and my colleagues, I would yell back at you. However, the good news is that it really doesn’t matter what I think or expect of you, it doesn’t matter what others think or expect of you the only thing that really matters is the expectation you place on yourself.

How high have you set the bar in your life? Do you put the same pressure on yourself to reach your potential? I want you to adopt the mind set that you expect athletes to maintain, reaching your potential is your job, it should drive you every morning when you rise and it should consume you all day until you fall asleep. Are you the best employee you can be? Are you the best business owner you can be? Are you the best spouse you can be? Are you the best parent you can be? You are the judge and jury, don’t just sit there….get back to work.