Saturday 21 February 2009

Survive or thrive

In all aspects of life (spiritual, financial, work performance, creative etc.) there is a level at which we can settle. I call this the SURVIVE mode. It's not necessarily a bad place to be, but it does stop short of the optimum at any given point in time.

The optimum place is what I call the THRIVE zone. This is where improvements have been made and we feel energised and inspired. This is where we are most creative and alive.

To move from SURVIVE to THRIVE, we need to STRIVE. This is where we see the potential for improvement and through commitment, discipline and grind we take steps towards our vision of what THRIVE looks like.

of course, THRIVE can become SURVIVE after a while - especially if you're ENDLESSLY RESTLESS.

4 comments:

That Hideous Man said...

"Thrive, not just survive" is the tag-line we used to try and promote The Marriage Course last year.

What could be worse than making mere mediocrity acceptable.

There is of course, godly contentment in all circumstances - but also a righteous disastisfaction (which must primrily be aimed at self!)

lucy said...

i find it interesting and somewhat amusing that THM referred to a marriage course with the tagline "thrive, not just survive". i was thinking of the dance that we do between moving from survive to thrive and how can we accomplish that without too much horrific striving. the name of the couples workshop i wrote and facilitated last year was called "the paradoxical dance."

that's the question i often ponder, how do we thrive vs. survive and what does that look like? i am reminded of the biblical verse that we must lose our life to gain our life. it feels like all of the really worthwhile views for me come from a very paradoxical nature. i'm going to stop now because i think i have started writing a post instead of a comment.

btw--i agree that this has something to do with my recent post where you commented :-)

Les (Endlessly Restless) said...

Thanks for the helpful comments - I've got a few more thoughts, which will feature in future posts.

KJ said...

hmmm, thanks. This is kind of where I am, too. Surviving for me can be pretty powerful, and keept me from "striving" for the ways that would lead me out of being stuck. Sometimes, striving for me just seems like to a big task to ever get started. BUT, like THM said, what could be worse in like than making mediocrity acceptable. This inspires me.