All things considered, your ultimate objective is to feel good. You buy most of the things you need, because you believe that they will make you feel good. You hang out with the people in an effort to feel good. Everything that you do is done in an effort to feel good.
The problem here is that you are often left disillusioned. Once the shiny new car is bought and stands in the driveway. you find that the feeling that you thought you would get vanishes. Same with the big house that you worked so hard to get.
There is however a way that you can get that overwhelming feeling of fulfillment that makes you feel good all over and that is the pursuit of excellence. Feeling good over what you physically own is shallow, but feeling good over what you have accomplished is deep, lasting and cherished for a lifetime.
This feeling of fulfillment happens when you have set the bar a few notches above what you thought was possible for you and made it over the top. You then know that you’ve outdone yourselves and that is the sweetest of all victories.
There is nothing inherently wrong with owning expensive houses, cars and boats. However, unless these acquisitions are the end product of service rendered or value provided, chances are that they will not offer the sense of fulfillment and satisfaction necessary for the lasting sense of feeling good which was the primary objective.
One of the fundamental human needs is personal significance. Whether you are aware of it or not, you need to feel important, that you are someone, that you matter. This cannot be achieved unless you have the feeling that you are all that you can be and that you are expanding and growing as an individual.
To have that sense of significance you need to feel in control of most aspects of your life and that means growing faster than outside influences and circumstances. In other words, to fulfill the need of significance, you need to be able to fill your present place and that you are in growth mode getting ready to fill an even larger role.
The happiest people are the ones striving to achieve. It is the athlete in the pursuit of a place on the podium. It is the author trying to write a best seller or the artist who want to touch the world with his creation. They are creating their lives and not simply reacting to outside circumstances.
Now you know that, feeling good is the ultimate objective and you now know that this can best be done through the pursuit of excellence.
To feel good you need to constantly elevate the bar and meet the challenge. There is no sweeter victory than the ones that you have over yourselves and that can only be done through the pursuit of excellence.