Line upon Line

Editor’s Note: This article is a chapter from the new book for returned missionaries: Live Your Mission 21 Powerful Principles to Discover Your Life Mission, by Andrew Scot Proctor. Click here to read the whole book for free on Kindle Unlimited.

“If I have seen further it is by standing on the shoulders of giants.”

– Isaac Newton

Every April in Philadelphia, thousands of athletes from all over the world gather for what I believe to be one of the most amazing events on earth: The Penn Relay Carnival. Track athletes as young as middle school get to run and compete on the same track as Olympians. I had the opportunity to run in the Penn Relays twice during high school. I remember my junior year seeing Michael Johnson, Marion Jones, Maurice Greene (the fastest humans on the planet at that time), and other amazing athletes running on the same track as me. I remember thinking that I was in the presence of greatness.

After I had seen the USA 4X100m and 4X400m relay team demolish the rest of the teams (from Scotland, Jamaica, Germany, etc.), I was totally on fire. I wanted to put my spikes on and turn up the gas like I never had before. I wanted to be as fast as Michael Johnson and at that moment, I actually believed that I could reach his level at some point! After that, I went on to become the captain of the track team at my high school as well as my collegiate team. I broke a seventeen-year-standing high school record as well as many collegiate records in my small college, and I even became a collegiate all-American. I would never have believed this was possible if I hadn’t tasted the nectar of greatness at the Penn Relays.

I don’t share this to brag about the glory days, but to show that when we surround ourselves with greatness, it rubs off on us. We are strengthened by the greatness around us. A little piece of Michael Johnson rubbed off on me and gave me the vision to do something I would never have imagined. The same is true for you. Don’t surround yourself with people who drag you down and don’t believe in you. Hanging around constant criticism and negativity will never help you find your life mission. This type of person will not believe in you or even that you have a mission in life. They will probably just say that having a calling in life is a bunch of hogwash. Don’t spend your time with people like this. Why would you? Consider this profound statement by Gordon B. Hinckley about the influence of negative people around us:

Sir Walter Scott was a trouble to all his teachers and so was Lord Byron. Thomas Edison, as everyone knows, was considered a dullard in school. Pestalozzi, who later became Italy’s foremost educator, was regarded as wild and foolish by his school authorities. Oliver Goldsmith was considered almost an imbecile. The Duke of Wellington failed in many of his classes. Among famous writers, Burns, Balzac, Boccaccio, and Dumas made poor academic records. Flaubert, who went on to become France’s most impeccable writer, found it extremely difficult to learn to read. Thomas Aquinas, who had the finest scholastic mind of all Catholic thinkers, was actually dubbed “the dumb ox” at school. Linnaeus and Volta did badly in their studies. Newton was last in his class. Sheridan, the English playwright, wasn’t able to stay in one school more than a year. All of this seems to say to me that each of these men, every one of whom later became great, might have done much better in his studies had he received less of criticism and more of encouragement. (Gordon B. Hinckley, Let Not Your Heart Be Troubled, BYU Speeches Oct. 29, 1974.)

What if they had surrounded themselves with great instructors, inspiring peers, and edifying mentors? These heroes in history may have even become greater than they already were! As you seek to find your mission in life, you must surround yourself with the best and the brightest, with those who will lift you up, with people who will inspire you to be your best self, to reach past the low hanging fruit for the great potential joy of the fruits hanging higher. Anyone can reach them if they can only observe it. Sometimes we just need to watch someone else succeed to believe that it is possible for us to do the same.  

Even if you have no idea what you want to be or do, spend time with people who do know their purpose and calling in life and who are living their purpose. It will rub off on you. Find a lot of these great people in a lot of different areas (remember what I mentioned about trying on lots of hats.) If you can’t find anyone, go watch five TED talks, go to the Olympics, or stop into the office hours of a super sharp professor and just chat. Take a millionaire to lunch (there are a lot who are willing to be taken to lunch) and pick their brain about how they got there. Go to some networking events and meet entrepreneurs who are starting businesses or whose businesses are already booming. Go to a live performance where you can witness the best performers in the world. Ask your parents who their heroes are. Look at the NYT best-seller list and email or tweet every single one of the authors. (You will probably hear back from at least one. I just tweeted a best-selling author last week, and she personally retweeted my tweet!).

Just being with someone who is the embodiment of greatness in their own way can bring the spirit of greatness into your heart. And if you are listening, you might just hear your spirit tell you what you are to become and what you are to do. Remember though, when you are with people who are passionate about what they do, you may catch the bug of what they are passionate about and think that this is your calling because they are so passionate about it. If that truly is your passion, then GREAT! If not, keep moving forward. How do you know? Remember what I said about finding flow. If you skimmed that chapter, go back and read it now. And trust your gut, remember?

There is an interesting body of research in the world of positive psychology about what are called mirror neurons. These mirror neurons are the reason a yawn spreads in a meeting. Positive psychologist Shawn Achor teaches about this in his trainings and on his viral TED talk. Mirror neurons are “specialized brain cells that can actually sense and then mimic the feelings, actions, and physical sensations of another person.” (Shawn Achor, The Happiness Advantage, p. 203-204). So when we observe another person get a painful papercut when carelessly licking an envelope, even though we aren’t the one with a bleeding tongue, the same set of neurons that are associated with “papercut on tongue” pain light up in our brain just as well as the careless licker.

I’m not trying to get you to change your major to neuroscience. I’m just trying to show you that our mirror neurons will actually mimic in our brains what we are observing in others. With this in mind, who would want to spend time with a person who complains all day and moans about how much they hate their life, someone who is completely apathetic, someone who is constantly negative about everything around them (including you), or someone who never smiles or laughs or plays or relaxes? Over time, these things will literally rub off on you through your mirror neurons.

So find amazing people. The type of giants that Isaac Newton learned from and the heroes of the heroes. Spend time with life’s Olympians and it will rub off on you. You’ll be a better person because of it. And there will be a ripple effect of positivity and greatness that doesn’t stop at you, but that spreads to thousands of other people who you don’t even know.

Surround yourself with greatness, and you’ll know what to do with your life.