Friday, November 5, 2010

The Blogging Challenge - Small Moment

In a large organization sometimes its easy to feel lost, like you are nothing more than a widget being moved or placed without thought or control.  Mandates and  missives come at you from every direction and cause you to make mistakes or miss things.  You become part of the machine.  I hate this because often my mistakes effect the very folks I'm trying so hard to protect and I never want what I do to define who I am. 

I got frustrated this week - it happens.  The good thing is that right when I felt the worst I ran across a book I've had on the corner of my desk since the summer,  The Big Moo, by Seth Godin.  The first thing to hit me was the subtitle: "Stop Trying to Be Perfect and Start Being Remarkable". Hmp! Major life reminder right smack dab on the front of the book! I flipped the book open to find these words: "Who You Are Is What You Do"; I read on to Mr. Godin's reminders that I am not a cog, but rather a valuable asset to others, capable of impact and leaving a legacy and then to his challenge - "...you're remarkable.  Now, hurry.  Don't let yourself (and the rest of us) down."

Don't worry - I don't plan to.  I'm a Purple Cow in a brown cow world...

6 comments:

Paty Savage said...

What a great blog post! I love Seth Godin; I heard him speak at a conference last year and he was wonderful. Thank you for reminding me to not be a cog. I'd much rather join you as a purple cow! ~Paty Savage

Melanie Holtsman said...

Thank you for allowing those of us that work for you to BE purple cows. There are many other educators around the world that feel stiffled and are not allowed to be remarkable. We work at a remarkable place, with a remarkable boss and remarkable faculty and staff. We are lucky, lucky, lucky people!

Anonymous said...

I will never be perfect, but working with folks like you and our faculty help me to try to be remarkable. Very had to do, but much better than having to be a cog. :)

Dee Dee Tamburrino said...

Susan, I'm not the "cog" type and neither are you. The one thing I love about you is that don't micro-manage our every breath.

Thank you for giving me the freedom to be me so that I can fulfill my calling in a remarkable way. I will never forget the day you walked me up to the music room seven years ago and said, "Do with it what you will." That was pretty remarkable!

Anonymous said...

I often tell students that if they plan to be perfect, they best plan on being disappointed as well.

Best to plan on making a great impact in some way that makes the lives of others better (quite "remarkable").

I think that every person at CCE tries to do just that, and I know we succeed quite often. When we don't, we try again at the next opportunity.

Peace,

T-Cubed

Anonymous said...

This sounds like another book I need to put on my Christmas list.
C. Montero