Our Best is Yet to Come

 

"When the required minimum becomes your chosen maximum, the sum of your life is mediocrity." ~Anonymous

Try as I might, I could not determine the source, the author, of this quote. It was shared last Sunday by Karen Wing, a beloved member of my Artist's Way twelve-week creativity group as a final footnote to the good work we'd done individually and collectively, and it hit me hard. I knew I wanted to devote a column to unpacking its meaning.

Then to follow up, almost intuitively, another long-standing member, Pamela Salisbury, texted me an article, 7 Reasons Why You Will Live a Mediocre Life, that supports this bold claim. (I have linked it here: https://bit.ly/3v7sGMl.)

Perhaps the first thing we should do is define the word itself. 

“Mediocre is a word that describes something ordinary or less than average. It is not generally a positive word. Saying that a person, thing, or event is mediocre often suggests that it could be much better with a little more effort. Many people and things can be described as mediocre.” ~Macmillan Dictionary

Mediocrity is almost always rooted in fear: fear of standing out, fear of what others will think, fear of failure; and/or laziness, lack of imagination, not wanting it bad enough, and toxic associates.

I just finished reading a wonderful work for one of our 2023 Monthly Muse Book Clubs. It's called The War of Art: Break Through the Blocks and Win Your Inner Creative Battles by Steven Pressfield. (You can check it out here: https://bit.ly/3WuU1nM.) Pressfield posits that mediocrity hurts us all. Here he is on the last page of The War of Art:

“If you were meant to cure cancer or write a symphony or crack cold fusion and you don’t do it, you not only hurt yourself, even destroy yourself. You hurt your children. You hurt me. You hurt the planet.

You shame the angels who watch over you and you spite the Almighty, who created you and only you with your unique gifts, for the sole purpose of nudging the human race one millimeter farther along its path back to God.

Creative work is not a selfish act or a bid for attention. It’s a gift to the world and every being in it. Don’t cheat us out of your contribution. Give us what you’ve got.”

Why should I care? Why should I care whether you reach for the stars? Why should I care whether you wake up every morning pumped to give your creative life its due? I care for the same reason I choose to hang out with sober friends. I care for the same reason I hate small talk. You and I are so much better than average. You and I have so many more intellectual and creative functions to express. Show up and tell me your idea. Show up and brim over with enthusiasm, with passion. Show up and together we will devise a way to make it happen. Let's do this. Let's be our best brilliant unbridled selves this year.

If not now, when?