Better Than Your Best

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Please feel free to use these prayers for your own use in whatever context you feel they are appropriate. 

Invocation

Lord,

Help us to remain true to the self-evident truths so long ago proclaimed but existing from the beginning of time, that we are all created equal, and that we are endowed by You as our common Creator with certain unalienable Rights.

Imbue us with a renewed enthusiasm and respect for these, our mutual rights of life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. Cause us to know without doubt that from these rights issue forth genuine responsibilities to work for the common good so that all can truly experience the true fullness of freedom.

We pray the presence of Your Power to be within and among us this evening as we seek to manifest these truths within our individual hearts and within the soul of our nation.

We seek Your guidance as we again pledge our allegiance to the timeless proclamation of individual liberty and our uncompromising independence from any tyranny, foreign or domestic, that would seek to deprive us of any of it.

Steady us in these turbulent times, Lord, so that we will never waiver from our reliance on our faith in Your unyielding love for each of us.

Benediction

We now depart in Your love and with Your peace. But we are no longer the people who earlier gathered; we are now the people who leave to live with renewed passion, filled with infinite power and divine wisdom to be co-creators with You to make all things new.

We leave with deeper commitment to embody the words of the one in whose honor we have gathered this evening:

“With malice toward none; with charity for all; with firmness in the right, as God gives us to see the right, let us strive on to finish the work we are in . . .”

By Ken Wallace

 

Do you have a clear-cut idea of what you expect to be done?

Have you planned what to say before giving the instructions?

Have you taken into account the individual’s preferred communication style and tailored your delivery?

Have you checked your vocabulary for words and phrases the individual may not understand (and eliminated or changed them)?

Do you wait until you and the individual have adequate time and attention to give to the instructions?

Have you planned what to do if the individual is uncooperative?

Do you explain the big picture so the individual understands the “why” as well as the “what”?

Do you ask the individual to repeat the instructions as he or she understands them?

Do you discuss what decisions the individual can make on his or her own and when he or she needs to check with you?

Before you end a meeting, are you sure the individual knows exactly what he/she is to do, how he/she is to do it, and when?

Have you set up interim status reports if appropriate?

Do you give the individual feedback (positive and negative) after completing the project?

Do you assess your instructions and change them in the future if misunderstandings arise?

Near Colorado Springs on a narrow forbidding mountain road is a sign that reads: YES YOU CAN!

Drivers wrestle with unbelief, but when they finally believe and try, they find that they can.

Believe in yourself, believe in your work, and believe in your ability to do that work well. Don’t ever sell yourself short to be able to succeed in the long-run. You have only to believe you can and then say “YES I CAN.” Then, before you know it, you’ll be saying, “I DID IT!”

William James wrote: “Our belief at the beginning of a doubtful undertaking is the one thing that insures the successful outcome of our venture.”

Here’s a tricky question: Do you believe this?

Ken