We often hold ideas about what makes an impact. We think things like, “if I become a teacher, then I’ll have an impact in kids’ lives.” But is it really an impact?
We find that certain professions hold a greater potential for an impact. Yet this potential isn’t always realized. Just because you’re a teacher, therapist, nurse, etc, doesn’t necessarily mean you’re having a positive impact.
In any profession, it’s possible to just go through the motions, and not really make that great difference in people’s lives. The profession isn’t automatically impactful.
I was in the hospital a few years back. A nurse pushed me around to different stations so they could perform a series of tests. All they way through the maze of corridors, one test after the other, the nurse complained. First it was the economy, then it was politics, then it was the nursing industry and other staff. On and on it went. I tried to cheer her up a few times, but I was tired, not feeling great, and I gave up. I felt worse after my encounter with Negative Nurse Nancy (not her real name) than I had before. I wouldn’t rate her has having a big positive impact.
With some professions, it may seem that you’d have to really be screwing up to miss making a difference in people’s lives. Yet, the impact can elude us even under the best of circumstances. Let’s take teaching for example. It’s possible to present all the material, have kids pass the test, and yet a month later they can’t remember what was taught. And, for example, the next time one of the kids needs to double a recipe and can’t, it’s clear that application of what they were taught is lost. This type of result probably isn’t what the teacher was going for.
In any endeavor, the key to instill a legacy in someone’s life is to get clear on what you’re going for. If you are a teacher, what do you want to see different in your students? This could look a lot of different ways. Do you want students to master your subject so they subconsciously apply what was learned? Do you want to be the teacher that believes in students and instills confidence? If you’re not going for anything in particular, you’ll hit this target too.
In whatever you are doing, what are you going for?
Once you know what you’re instilling in people, you can evaluate and tweak what you are doing to get the results you want. If you don’t know what you’re going for, you’re going through the motions, just being busy.
