Being good at something is a tricky thing. Are you good at something because you have natural talent, or have you worked hard at it? Either way, there is work involved. Tiger Woods is a natural at golf, but he still trains, hard. I think everyone has some degree of natural talent in something. I’m definitely not wired for being good with numbers but working with words comes easily. We all have something that we can do better than other things. But how do you go from good to great? I’m finding out that it’s a lot of work.

You want to train dolphins, teach high school math, or be a five-star chef, you need to work your craft. There’s too much mediocre work being done because it’s easier to just be good. But good next to great become mediocre in a heartbeat. Why settle? Why not be the best at what you do? Don’t think it will be easy. You’ll give up TV time. You’ll give up hanging out at the mall or Starbucks. Find people better than you at what you want. Pick their brain. Get your hands on books. Go back to school. Put in the extra hours. Learn where your weaknesses are and fix them. Just remember to stay humble when all the hard work kicks in.

Good just isn’t good enough when there’s potential for so much more. The next level might push you to a breakthrough you never saw coming. Being excellent is a worthy goal. You can do it if you decide to. And here’s the kicker – give it to God and let Him put the extra glow on your efforts. He’ll give grace to fatigue, time balancing, challenging new ideas. He wants you to shine, but you have to put in the effort. Don’t you want to find out what that looks like?