Over break, I spent some time reading books for enjoyment (Imagine that not a text book). One of my favorite books was given to me by Kerry. It was a book that focused on observations and reflections by John Wooden. For those of you that don’t know who John Wooden is, he is viewed as being the most successful college basketball coach of all time, winning 10 national championships in a 12 year span at UCLA. His observations were on the court and off the court observations that can help us all to be successful. Coach Wooden defines success as doing the absolute best you can do with your abilities. He is not concerned with what others do, finals scores, or reaching specific targets. If we all do our absolute best the rest will take care of itself.Coach Wooden talked about making each day your masterpiece. He shared the following story. “When I was teaching basketball, I urged my players to try their hardest to improve on each and every day, to make that practice a masterpiece.” Too often we get distracted by what is outside our control. You can’t do anything about yesterday. The door to the past is closed and the key has been tossed in the trash. You can’t do anything about tomorrow either, it hasn’t come yet. However, tomorrow in large is determined by what you do today. So make today a masterpiece. You have control over that. Don’t worry about the education our students received in years past, the lack of parental guidance they may be getting, or their past EOG scores. We do not control those things, all you control is your effort.
This rule is extremely important in life. If we all apply ourselves to become a little better each day, then over time we will become a lot better. This begins with making each day count and knowing you can never make up for a lost day. If a player appeared to be taking it easy in practice coach Wooden would say, “Don’t think you can make up for it by working twice as hard tomorrow. If you have it within your power to work twice as hard, why aren’t you doing that now?”
Think about our jobs. We have to deal with so many things we have no control over. Take responsibility for what we do have control over, our effort. Do not take a day off, teach with a sense of urgency and do not become complacent. Just because we reached our goal last year does not mean we will reach it again this year. Great effort from each one of us will be needed. If we all improve a little each day then the results will be incredible. Win or lose all I ask of you is do your best every day, make each day you walk into this building your masterpiece. Welcome back now go paint your masterpiece.
