Why? Why do we spend so much time and effort in overcoming and improving the areas where we are the most weak? For some reason, starting with elementary school, we are directed toward “areas in need of improvement”. Job reviews, school report cards, and our mother-in-law, consistently zero in what we can’t do instead of celebrating and encouraging what we can do.
We buy self help books, take continuing education courses, sign up for seminars and workshops all in the name of “becoming the best we can be.” But who gets to define what “best” is? So what if I’m not Martha Stewart, Audrey Hepburn, Oprah Winfrey, and Diane Sawyer all rolled in to one?
Is there some law out there that says we must be good at everything? Is that the ultimate goal of our lives to have our epitaph read “she finally got everything figured out”? If we are good at everything (as if that was even possible) there is no room to be great at anything.
Of all the women mentioned above, none of them are good at everything. In fact, they found out what ONE thing they are good at, and pursued that to the exclusion of all else. Martha Stewart is not trying to craft herself as a great interviewer. Diane Sawyer isn’t trying to be known for her organizing skills.
If we are good at everything, we wouldn’t need anyone else. If I could repair the car tire, make the meals, balance the checkbook, build a website, install new home wiring, raise the kids and everything else that needs doing around the house, my husband would be redundant. Instead, we each contribute our strengths, filling in for one another’s weaknesses and work together as a team. As it should be.
We are all created with unique gifts and talents that are different from other people’s gifts and talents. By coming together in unity and sharing our strengths, we fulfill one of God’s foremost commands to be in unity as He is in unity with Christ and the Holy Spirit.
Being the best we can be means being the best YOU, you can be. Build up your strengths, focus on what you have been gifted to do and be grateful for the people in your life who have been gifted to do what you can not.