“Make it so!”

This popular catch phrase from the second generation Star Trek series encapsulates a key philosophy of living: do what needs doing.

There is an attitude to life which says “Do your best!” Not good enough! You don’t stop at doing your best: you do whatever needs to be done.

RULE: THE ONLY TRUE MEASURE OF COMPETENCE AND SUCCESS IS SIMPLY: DID THE TASK COMPLETE, YES OR NO?

Forget the excuses, obfuscations, problems. The supreme test of personal competence is simply the answer to the question: did you do the action you had to do?

We had a look in an earlier section at the concept of excuses, justifications and Whys. Excuses and justifications are get-outs. They answer nothing; they promote and reinforce failure. Shun these imposters.

A why is a real reason — but only if it leads to a resolution of what was non-optimum. Otherwise it remains merely an excuse. We especially shun that “why” of Fate; if it is not under your control, it isn’t a legitimate reason for anything.

We come back to the supreme test: just DID IT or DIDN’T IT happen?

Task-Oriented vs. People Oriented

You will hear debate sometimes over individuals who are supposed to be “task-oriented” and those who are “people-oriented”. Task-oriented people are those who judge by the result, whether or not it happened. The task rules the state of play. People-oriented individuals believe they put people first and the task comes second.

It isn’t nearly as clear cut as this.

What if Alexander Fleming was people-oriented and so concerned about what his wife or fellow workers felt that he never went through with the penicillin project? People all over the world would have suffered and lost. When being people-oriented means that things don’t get done, people start to lose out. Great advances – anaesthetics, telephone, computers, transport — were all tasks that occurred, regardless of whether the people connected had a nice time of it or not.

So there is another hoax unearthed here. The people and task-orientation is being taught at motivational seminars all over the world. Yet it means nothing!

The only criterion of history is did it happen or not. The supposition that to get things to occur you have to ride all over people and mess them up is a phoney nonsense. We take care of this with the section we call the R-Zones (zones of responsibility, from New Thought Horizons). An action is only going to prove harmful or destructive if it is not fully aligned against these 12 R-Zones. This defines sanity and ethical behaviour. That which harms broadly is bad; that which does good broadly is ethical. But you have to have a proper matrix in which to make such judgements.

No act could be considered sane which produced damage in one or more of our R-Zones. So figure out that right action and then drive it through to completion. To fail to do so may be a sign of un-reason or ethical compromise. Always make action a win-win, then you don’t have to compromise; just be effective!