May You Have the Confidence to Always Do Your Best
The thing that I really like about this section of the song, Have it all by Jason Mraz, is that he doesn’t say “May you always do your best.” Instead, he wishes that you have the confidence to. It’s a subtle difference in words, but an important one. Without that confidence, the pursuit of “your best” can feel like an endless uphill climb.
I’ve watched my son do his best, do his best, and do his best until he wore himself too thin. At other times, I’ve also watched him set a far lower bar for himself than he’s capable of because he didn’t want the attention his achievements may attract.
As painful as it was to watch, I also knew that he learned it from me. He watched me push myself until I just couldn’t handle anything anymore, both physically and mentally. He also watched my debilitating perfectionism stop me from standing out because I never thought anything I did was good enough, and thus, a target for criticisms.
I’m finally learning that confidence + your best is the magic formula. You push yourself to do your best because you have faith in your own abilities. You push yourself to do your best because you know you deserve the best.
From the outside, it might look like you are doing exactly the same thing. But in the inside, it’s a completely different world. You’re no longer operating on “I’m never good enough”. Your confident self will know when to push hard for your best, and when to give yourself some slack. You’ll know in your heart that whatever you can handle is the best you can do in that particular moment. The amount of stress you feel will be completely different when you know you don’t always HAVE to do your best, but you want to do it for yourself.
So yeah! May you always have the confidence to do your best. This is what I wish for all of you.