How do we show up on our bad days?
“Each person must live their life as a model for others.” - Rosa Parks
On December 1, 1955, Rosa Parks was riding a crowded Montgomery city bus when the driver, upon noticing that there were white passengers standing in the aisle, asked Ms. Parks and other Black passengers to surrender their seats and stand.
Three of the passengers left their seats, but Ms. Parks refused. The rest is history, and for her role in igniting the successful campaign, Parks became known as the “mother of the civil rights movement.”
There are versions of Ms. Park’s story that would have you believe that she had refused to give up her bus seat because she was tired rather than because she was protesting unfair treatment.
According to Parks’s autobiography, “I was not tired physically, or no more tired than I usually was at the end of a working day. I was not old, although some people have an image of me as being old then. I was 42. No, the only tired I was, was tired of giving in.”
It’s clear based on her autobiography that Ms. Parks was not any more tired than usual on that December day. I have a feeling that she was showing up and not giving in, regardless of whether she was tired or having a bad day.
What can we do to make sure we show up, even when we don’t feel like it?
We have to accept that we don’t feel like showing up, because that’s what we would do if we felt like showing up, we would accept that it was a good day.
There will be good days and there will be bad days. We can’t get too high on the good days and too low on the bad days.
Consistently showing up, regardless of whether it is a good day, or a bad day is part of the process. Focus on making progress in the process.
Forward, always!