No one bats 100 percent all the time

 

Roman stoic philosopher, Lucius Annaeus Seneca, was a wise man. He once said, “. . . a gem cannot be polished without friction nor a man perfected without trials.” 

No one saw it coming. Aye, no one had ever imagined that g.o.a.t. [greatest of all time] UEFA pro-licensed Manchester City FC manager, Pep Guardiola, could lose six premier league games in a row under his watch. That Guardiola is the best manager of his generation is a no-brainer. But the statistics alluded to above set the worst record of his football managerial career. Thumbs up. Pep has had an illustrious career and is respected as the most decorated football manager of modern times with 40 enviable trophies and accolades under his belt. In his eight-year touchline spell with the team, Pep has won a record of fifteen trophies. Manchester City FC won a treble in 2023 and crushed every other team in continental Europe and on the world stages. The team has won it all. Yet, it suffered six absurd defeats, consecutively, at the hands of minnow teams. Whoever said that no one bats one hundred percent all the time was right. 

Eagles are renowned for their fortitude, immense power, and grace to brave the worst storms and scale the loftiest skies, feats unrivaled in the bird kingdom. Yet, they have a terrible weakness – eagles are diurnal. They are poignantly herculean during daytime only but fallible at night. 

England cricket captain, Ben Stokes, is considered the greatest cricketer of modern times. He is the epitome of the game. Yet he does not bat 100 percent of his throws all the time. Cristian Ronald is a five-time Ballon d’Or winner. He has won every trophy that was there to compete for in football in the countries where he has played the game. He keeps converting talent into trophies and breaking records. He holds the record of "top goal scorer" of all time. If you were to sit down with him and listen to his story, you would be surprised - the venerated football legend has had bad days too. He has missed scores of penalties, blanked clear chances, and unbelievably hit the woodwork from the scoring range many times. 

Jack Welch is admired as the greatest and most celebrated CEO of his time. He transformed General Electric (GE) from a complacent regional business into a global powerhouse and profitable establishment. Welch is famous for and synonymous with a revolutionary corporate strategy which he coined and introduced in the 1980s. Today, five decades later, his strategy is still novel, and popular, and is modeled by business executives in C-suites and directors in boardrooms across the five continents. In transforming GE, he initiated the idea that all operating units should be either number one or two in their respective lines of business. Additionally, he turned GE into a lean and agile multinational - accomplishments unparalleled in modern business philosophy. Yet the idolized industry titan had a delicate Achilles heel – Welch was characterized as impatient, blunt, and ill-tempered. In a mix of impatience and rage, as a manager, he is said to have blown up a factory. This certainly put his leadership style in acute jeopardy. 

My dear reader, I hope I am communicating some message to you - no living organism is triumphant all the time. Embrace failure. We all have weak spots. Show me someone without a flaw and I will show you a snob. Embracing our weak spots helps us to convert them into strengths. 

They might have referred to you as a genius. Maharaja. Sage. Pundit. Mwalimu. Mheshimiwa. Bingwa. Maestro. Guru. Legend. Wunderkind. Mystic. You might have broken records in your industry and set new ones, maybe even a bar or two higher. In the history of your organization, you might have grown business the fastest. They might have put you on a pedestal as a pioneer of a certain initiative in your organization, community, or country. You might have appeared on the front page of a national newspaper. They might have put your picture on the front cover of an industry magazine. Or they might have named a street in your honor. Vanity. Vanity. Vanity. The key point to tattoo in your brain and etch in your heart and humble yourself, dear reader, is that despite being referred to as the maharishi or sage of your craft or field, one thing is certain – you still have weak spots. Occasionally, you fail to execute purposely in your endeavors. You sometimes fall short of the mark. At times, you run out of brilliant ideas. Once in a while, you are grumpy. From time to time, you feel insecure and unworthy to live in your own skin. Trust the process. It is normal. Very normal. Do not hang yourself up. Accommodate the flaw. Accept it as a red flag [for you] that something needs to be fixed [by you]. That something needs to be worked on and improved within your realms. 

Sometimes, when the flaws show or occur sturdily and repeatedly in your orbit, it is an indication that the field you are in is not your niche. Or the goal that you are pursuing is supported by and leveraged on the low level of intellectual capacity and shallow intuition. Don’t be gossipy about it. In that regard, choose to be a follower and not a leader, if you understand what I mean. Your influence will be more meaningful than if you were to be in the lead. No one wins all the time. Nothing we ever work on will be perfect. We are all imperfect in thought, word, and deed by nativity. We are all work-in-progress. 

I see it almost every day - many people try to fix weak areas of their lives with fervor. They want to be perfect in everything their hands touch and their mind thinks about. And they wonder why their life does not improve. You cannot be a jack of all trades. If you try to do that, then, one thing is certain - you will be a master of none. It is virtually impossible to be perfect in everything all the time. Let me ask you a question, if I may. How old will you be if you try to fix all the weak areas of your life? All shortcomings of your life? The average global life expectancy is seventy years. You will be close to 2,700 years old by the time you finish fixing all the weak spots in your life. And you know what that entails. Mark Twain was right when he asserted, “. . . many geniuses live and die undiscovered either by themselves or by others.”

The virtuosos understand the canon. Very well. They know they can’t reach 2,700 years to fix their weak spots. And they also understand that no one bats 100 percent all the time. So, they do the opposite of what most of us do – they work on the weak areas of their strength. They establish strong areas of their life, and focus on them fervently, polishing up the flawed spots. Former England football captain, David Beckham, was a genius at set pieces - dead balls and corner kicks. His skillfulness did not come naturally. No. He nurtured it. Beckham’s precision in long-range shots was attributed to the extra tryouts that he put in after the other team members had left the training ground. He would remain behind, alone, until late in the night, to practice shooting long shots onto a target placed in the 18-yard box. He was working on the weak spot of his strength. With time and concentration, he improved and became a specialist in set pieces. The same is said about legendary basketball player, Michael Jordan. When he was not playing a game or training with other teammates, he would practice alone, honing flaws, for many hours. Same thing, day in and day out. With time, he became world-class. 

Ask any farmer and they will probably tell you that when a plant withers, it’s an indication that it has either been attacked pathogenically or is under water stress. Whereas the former necessitates spraying, the latter calls for an improved balanced feeding program. Unremitting attention definitely brings the plant back to its vigor. The plant starts to grow, blossom, flower, and bear abundant fruits.

You and I are like this. There are times in our life when our performance dips. Plunges. We don’t win all the time. Sometimes, we fall short of the mark not necessarily because we can’t measure up to the challenge or ordeal but due to our personal development. Yet at other times, we miserably fail to elevate our life to the Mount Everest of achievements and a happier life due to the environment or associations that we find ourselves in. The key is to embrace our imperfections. Ascertain where they originate from - are they the weak spots of your strength or general weaknesses of human life? Once you can understand, differentiate the two, and particularize an antidote, you rise to greatness. You become more polished. You think better. You get better results.

However, as you materialize your aspiration to another level and reveal your innate giftedness, your frontier will start to expand. You start to experience new weak spots that in turn expose you to new challenges. The very nature of personal growth and the fiery hope of making it happen means that scores of shortcomings will ensue. No worries. It is normal. It’s an indication of growth, and it is the right thing. This is the right time for you to recalibrate. To devise strategies to fill the gaps. To refine the flaws. To defeat the inadequacies. Appreciate that you cannot eliminate personal weak spots completely. The strategy is to differentiate between weaknesses of human life and weaknesses that infuriate your strength. Live up with the former and attack the latter intensely. This is the best advice that I can give you. No two ways about it. Don’t sit on your laurels. Act. 

In his book, Long Walk to Freedom, the great humanitarian, Nelson Mandela, alluded to this point beautifully, “. . . after climbing a great hill, one only finds that he has many more hills to climb. I have taken a moment here to rest, to steal a view of the glorious vista that surrounds me, to look back on the distance I have come. But I can rest only for a moment, for with freedom comes responsibilities and I dare not linger, for my long walk is not ended.” To me, Nelson Mandela is talking about personal growth and the need to take absolute personal responsibility to navigate the labyrinth of life. If you make the right choice and work hard, life will support and catapult you to the pinnacle of your dream and its trappings. My small advice [to you] is to not fall into the trap of plateauing (is this an English word?) your mastery. Rather, get busy enjoying the trappings of life. They are fleeting. Cosmetic. 

Every time I write about this topic, I remember the wise counsel of a multiple award-winner and manager of Real Madrid FC, Carlo Ancelotti. When asked how he was able to win multiple trophies, yearly, Ancelotti said that at the end of each football season, he bade farewell to his players with one piece of advice “. . . today’s championship is the starting point of next year’s performance.” Don’t flatten your performance in the wake of opacity. Aim high. Keep your head up. Always. You are chosen to soar. Yet, as you ascend to the lofty blue skies of your dreams and materialize your aspiration, be on familiar terms with the fact that you will, sometimes, slip. This should not give you high blood pressure. Nothing to worry about - remember no one bats 100 percent all the time. Sometimes you win, at other times you lose. No one wins all the time. This is what life is all about. Those who understand this principle become great.

Lester Chinyang’anya ǀ General Manager - Operations ǀ Minet Malawi