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Volume 11, Issue 07: How You Do Anything

What comes to mind when you hear the words "do little things like they are big things?". For me it's applying the same level of integrity and excellence to everything I work on. Giving my best in the kitchen cleaning as I do on my laptop working. Expecting the same level of excellence from myself at all stages of my day.

In the same breadth, it is also said that "how you do anything is how you'll do everything." Yet most of the time we seem to apply double standards in the different things we do. Is it? Maybe the excellence we show people in certain areas of life isn't who we really are, but only an expression of the role we are performing or the impression we want to make.

Who we really are is who we are when no one is watching. If I am sloppy in my personal space, when it comes down to it, that's who I really am in the public eye as well, only dressed up to impress an audience. I may deliver what is expected in the short-term but not sustainably unless I reinvent myself.

“Jesus went on to make these comments: If you’re honest in small things, you’ll be honest in big things; If you’re a crook in small things, you’ll be a crook in big things. If you’re not honest in small jobs, who will put you in charge of the store?" Luke‬ ‭16:10-11 MSG‬‬.

An excellent person does their best at everything they do whether anyone gets to see it or not. They do it for personal satisfaction, not for applause or recognition. I heard a true story about Michael Angelo's excellence. One day he was painting the Sistine chapel, the most awesome painting in Rome. People travel from all over the world to see this man's work. On this chapel, he lay on his back on a scalpel and painted the entire ceiling of the chapel.

The story goes that as Michael Angelo was painting one day, one of his aides came in to check on him. When he came in to the chapel, there were candles everywhere, it was dark and musty, so he couldn't see Michael. He cried out to find him. He heard some noise in the corner in the dark, behind some post, up above the nave, in the secret corner where no one could see him. Michael's voice came from way back behind the post, up above the ledge in the dark corner of the chapel. An answer came, "Yes, am busy."

The aide came and looked up. He found Michael on his back, with a paint brush in his teeth and one in his hand, and his pallet painting the feathers of one of the angels in the dark, behind the post where no one will ever see. He said, "Michael, what are doing up there?" "I am painting the ceiling," replied Michael. His aide retorted, "But Michael, you are putting details on a feather on the wings of an angel in the corner, behind the post, above the nave, beyond the rafters where no one will ever see it. Why waste your time? Without catching a breath, Michael Angelo spoke through the brush in his teeth and said, "But God sees it". He continued painting.

"An excellent person does not work because people are watching or because it will be known. Excellence comes from an attitude on the inside. Michael was not working for the observation of people, he had an integrity with himself. He believed that everything he did should be the best he had ever done, even if no one ever saw it". Myles Munroe.

 

For His Glory,

Lillian Chebosi