Setting the Bar

Each of us establish a certain standard of excellence or expectation or morality. We know, internally, what is right for us (and, we suspect, right for others, too). That standard may have been inherited from parental upbringing or from study or from one’s religious background and training, but we all have a “standard” of behavior in all we do and are.

That standard is constantly being challenged. There are always situations that seem to be exceptions, people who question the validity of what you do or won’t do, occasions when it is, simply, easier to go with the flow. Don’t.

Setting your own personal bar is of vital importance and refusing to violate your principles is what makes you who you are. Hold the line. Don’t compromise on things you have always believed to be of basic importance. Keep  your standards high and, when you have an opportunity, try to even raise them a bit.

This is not to say that standards and values don’t evolve. Most certainly they do. But that should never be because of pressures to make you conform. Change the bar when you have thought through the issues and consciously have decided to do so.

It’s called “character.” We all need it and need to desperately maintain it.