Open Question: Living Up To Your Potential

6 Responses to “Open Question: Living Up To Your Potential”

1. Hannah S-Q says on 8/13/07 at 5:09 pm:
   

   Seems like something you’d feel. I don’t think it’s totally possible to live up to your full potential without burning out, but you can be living what you love and doing it with passion, which I think is almost more important. It’s closely related but not quite the same. I always hated that ‘you’re not living up to your potential’ commentary. I think that’s the kind of thing you hear pageant parents telling their kids. I prefer ‘living true to yourself’ or ‘giving your all’…it’s more positive and less demanding.

   Of course..I think it’s good to have periods where you’re working really really hard on something, but I think the pressure of what isn’t or is your potential is a lot to handle, considering everything.

   Just my humble opinion…

2. Piya says on 8/13/07 at 6:43 pm:
   

   You would need to first deduce exactly what “potential” meant to yourself — if it was something other people saw, or if it was a measuring stick you held up to yourself. Because there’s really no way to fulfill everything you’re capable of: you might be a wonderful FBI agent AND a damn good artist. Therefore you’d have to ask yourself, What would I be happiest doing? and I know for sure I’d be happier being a car mechanic than an accountant in an office.

   I don’t know what my potential is, but I definitely have a life goal here, and that life goal is to be happy doing what I want to do, being financially secure while I do it. So maybe it’s a life goal we should be worrying about — where we’d be happiest — rather than this “potential” idea. Because I think they are one and the same, I just think potential has a slightly negative connotation attached.

3. isthmus nekoi says on 8/13/07 at 8:31 pm:
   

   I believe it’s when you feel vital, alive and authentic. You don’t need to be incredibly productive and efficient to feel that way. And you won’t necessarily feel happy or comfortable either. (Maybe I think this way b/c I’m a gloomy Cap sun lol.)

   I also believe boredom is often the first sign you might be doing something wrong. That’s the Sag moon talking

4. Hannah S-Q says on 8/14/07 at 9:00 am:
   

   Clearly, Elsa, you are living up to your potential!

5. goddess says on 8/14/07 at 12:06 pm:
   

   meh-what’s potential, anyway? the best you can be, based on your standards and values? that changes every day, anyway. you’re at a different place mentally every day, physically, emotionally, have different environmental stimuli, different life circumstances and different perspectives.

   i consider myself doing well if i’m happy. that’s what tells me better than anything i’m using what i got to advantage, i would say. not if i like all the outside circumstances in my life (although that’s one indicator), but how peaceful i feel with my life.

6. wyrdling says on 8/23/07 at 4:46 pm:
   

   when the world throws new challenges at you rather than repeating old ones that you’ve still not figured out.

   i guess.

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