Before it's all said and done, you discover that you have to focus on outputs more than outcomes.
Outcomes have an insidious way of becoming something that controls you. Focusing on them alone can deceive you into believing that you can control them when, truth be told, you really can’t (at the very least, as much as you would prefer).
Outputs, however, are closer to things within your control. And, because of that, they free you to choose what you want and to pursue them. It is the pursuit that matters, not whether or not you succeed based on what are rather arbitrary external standards.
In spite of how it often seems, outcomes don’t actually define you. Ironically, it is what you put out that tends to define you. Output often leads to outcomes, but not always. And, just because they don’t doesn’t mean that you aren’t something when they don’t. You are who you become because of what you do, not because of the results.
Your goodness, for example, is not contingent on the recognizability of that goodness. You are good whether it turns out well or not. Attribution is simply an accessory; it is not necessarily proof of anything. We all know that just because something looks good doesn’t mean that it is.
Work on the work, not on the results. Results, in the end, are impacted way more by things other than you anyway. You can’t control much of anything, other than what you decide to do. So, work much harder on what can control than on what you can’t.
I am facing a searing example of this in my life right now. And, it is revealing to me these distinctions. They are calling me to deeper questions about the nature of things, including the nature of my own self. Though painful, the situation is purifying, especially in terms of what I need to focus on.
The perception of others is not unimportant. But, in the end, it is not the deepest reality of what is needed. I need to focus on what I’m doing, rather than being distracted by how things turn out
