The Challenges Of Excellence & The Mark Of Character

Though it is not necessarily an 'integral' tenet, as it has been around as long as there have been earnest human-beings seeking to make a valued impression on their surroundings, the call to excellence does bear a mention when it comes to 'Integral Work.' For one, there is the well-known tactic bourne of evolution that conspires to have sentient beings take the path of least resistance. If there is an easy way out it seems that sentient beings--be they in the form of a White-Tailed Deer or a White-Haired Executive--will opt for the path of lesser resistance vs. the taking of a more arduous path.

Unfortunately, when it comes to quality and the challenges that come along with pushing ourselves to grow and develop not just our character, but our multi-facted skills, there is an imperative that we go the way of the difficult. It is summed up in our 'going the extra mile.'

Where others might take 'short-cuts' in the hope of achieving the aim of excellence, those who know better realize that quality is often a struggle with the lazy, selfish, slothful, ignorant aspects of our 'self' that would prefer to only do enough so as to 'just get by.' Excellence, then, is really an ongoing psychological and spiritual struggle that places us in a position where there is a degree of conflict present. Perhaps it is a conflict between what St. Paul called the 'weak flesh' and the 'willing spirit. Though some may argue with those terms there is an indication of the inherent struggle that comes with excellence and an earnest striving to 'transcend inherited conditions and circumstances.'

In Buddhist terminology one might say that the 'weak flesh' of St. Paul is not unlike the various 'sheaths' that in the Pali Canon are said to make up the conditioned self. Those sheaths, in their aggregate form, keep for a relatively inert manner of existence that can be seen as being habitual and addictive in the most insidious of ways. Overcoming the inherited momentum of those sheaths (transcending the power of their persistent pull, if you will) is where true growth, transformation, evolution, and enlightenment are said to reside.

Pop psychologists and self-help gurus often point out that 'If you keep doing what you have always done you will keep getting more of what you already have.' If we want more out of life than what we now have (or, if we want less, i.e., less drama and suffering and poverty and pain) then we have to enact new ways of doing things. In order to do so we have to resist the inherited urge to conditioned ways of being and doing that just offer us more of the same.

For example, if we are eager for excellence and desire to have our person associated with words like 'quality' and 'skill' then we need to exert and extend ourselves in ways that we may have never done so before. We can't just assume that habit will be the way to go and leave it all to conditioning. Nor can we just assume that following others and 'fitting in' with the status quo and the mediocre masses is the way to go. We have to be willing to push against our own internal boundaries that have defined what is possible for us. We have to be that 'willing spirit' that has faith in the fruitful future for the ones who can beyond the averages. That is, after all, where our excellence and evolution reside--in our going beyond the average; in our doing what others are un-willing to do; in our exerting ourselves in unison with where our true passions happen to reside. For in that synchrony of personal passion and strident effort true success in Integral Work emerges.