Admit it, you know you’re good at a lot of things. You do them every day on auto-pilot—making decisions on the fly, helping someone learn something, creating a delicious dinner. Zipping through a project, job, or errands because you reverse-engineered the whole gig. You’re pretty reliable except for the occasional misunderstanding or overdone steak.
Now up-level the admit it and own it. Where you are more-than-good—you’re full-on, bad-ass excellent.
This is all awesome and normal. It’s what happens as we gain decades—we achieve mastery.
There can be a downside, the Excellence Trap. This is where you move through a day checking things off the list, doing your job well, meeting all the obligations, and at the end of the day, how do you feel? Complete and satisfied? Maybe, and for many of us, we feel incomplete, maybe fuzzy—what did I do all day? That’s it—the Excellence Trap.
What’s the alternative, the up-level? How can I do my thing and feel more complete? The answer might surprise you—you have to make a shift from doing what you’re good at into doing what brings you joy.
Here are a few prompts to explore this. You can make lists, journal, and/or talk about these with people who love and get you.
- I feel scarcity and obligation when I…
- I absolutely love doing these things…
- I feel abundance and joy when I…
- People know me for being at my best when…
The first prompt may point to your Excellence Zone or even your Competence Zone.
Now look for overlap in the last three responses. These point to your Genius Zone or Spiral—where time flies, you feel joy, you have a sense of purpose.
This is ongoing awareness of monitoring and titrating how we “spend our time.” It may take awhile to arrange life so you’re living more in the Genius Zone, and that’s my invitation. Be the bad-ass genius you’re born to be, finishing the day with a sense of harmony.
For more on this, see Gay Hendricks, The Big Leap and The Genius Zone.
This has been a frequent topic lately in coaching work. Contact me today if you want to explore regular coaching. We start where you are, and together determine steps into where you want to be.