Tonight our intramural basketball team played in a semi-final game with the chance to go to Assembly Hall for the championship. We made it to Assembly last year, and we lost a close game so we were pretty pumped up for this game so that we'd have the opportunity to redeem ourselves. We were down by 6 at halftime, came back to take the lead in the second half, and then found ourselves in a tie game with 20 seconds to go. We lost on a last second fade-away jumper.
It was frustrating because I was guarding the guy who hit the final shot, and I missed a free throw on our last possession that would have given us a one point lead. After the game I thought about the final sequence and thought of quite a few things I would have done differently in retrospect. I was mad, and I figured that maybe if I had done a few things differently we would have won the game. Then I realized that it really doesn't matter at all, and I have no reason to be upset. It's over now and I can't do anything to change the outcome. Even though we won't have another game there are a lot of other things going on in my life that I'm even more motivated to accomplish. For example, I've made a commitment to keep this blog updated at least 2-3 times per week. Lately, I haven't been reaching that goal because I've been busy with school projects and other day-to-day assignments. Losing that game has inspired me to write and work harder on my blog.
I think it's important that everyone adopt this type of attitude within your career. Quite often I hear about friends who have had a job interview, and then didn't get the job. That's disappointing but it should motivate you to improve your interviewing skills and do better on the next one. However, a lot of people try to rationalize with comments like "the interviewer asked stupid questions" or "the company made a mistake by not hiring me." Instead you should be telling yourself "since I didn't get that job I am going to work harder to get the next one." Find a way to take setbacks in stride and get inspired to make an improvement in something else.
I saw this from Brazen Careerist. Great example! Too many times I've let obstacles kill my motivation, but you're absolutely right. Without obstacles there wouldn't be motivation to do anything.
Posted by: Valerie M | March 05, 2009 at 10:21 AM