Be A Better Me

At the top-centre of the whiteboard in my home-office is my current prime theme. It is intended to be short, mantra-like, and the broader perspective to which my other activities and goals should ideally contribute.

The year before last, it was “Find My Voice”, and during that time it encouraged me to blog more (benseymour.com/writing), to start speaking at community/developer events (benseymour.com/speaking), to co-found a new developer meet-up in Teesside (NE-Dev), and to write my first book “Practical Responsive Images”, which was published by Five Simple Steps last year. I also set up a Code Club at a local primary school, and have recently started Code.Parents() which is aimed at people with little or no prior computing experience, who would like to be better prepared to encourage and support children in starting to explore coding.

The theme that followed was “Be A Better Me”, and this encouraged a variety of different behaviours such as being healthier in my habits, both inside and outside of work. I wrote about some of these in “are you sitting comfortably” and “you can’t manage what you don’t measure”.

It is maybe in part due to this mindset that a particular piece of writing “The Better You” by Jack Cheng may have resonated so soundly. That and because for many people the New Year is a time to come at their habits with renewed vigour, and hope that they may become routine.

The Better You is not perfect. But the difference between you and the Better You is that the latter reacts a little faster, with a little more willpower. **They practice their virtues a little more often and succumb to their vices a little less often**. **They rein in their procrastination a little quicker**. They start their work a little earlier. They know when to take a break a little sooner.

The Better You is your believable possible. Your believable possible is your potential in any given moment, the person you know at your very core that you are capable of being at this instant.

…….

The Better You is not a fixed, singular being. **The Better You springs new from each moment, is born and dies with each action you take**. Each action creates a new set of possibilities. The Better You is an alternate dynamic present, rather than a fixed, static past.

Measuring yourself against the Better You is no mere matter of racing to beat the person you were the day before. Instead, you’re racing to keep up with the person you could be right now.

I read this full article at the end of “Maximise your potential” by 99u, but also came across the full text at the following site: http://www.standupcomedyclinic.com/measuring-yourself-against-the-better-you/