When "good enough" just isn't enough...

When I was a kid, your parents expected the world from you. You were expected to give everything you had on the T-Ball League and to run your little legs off during Track and Field Day in elementary school. Those blue ribbons meant everything when you were seven years old.
Times have changed. Now, as long as you "try" everything is going to be okay. But nothing defines "trying". You can try a new food and if you don't like it, spit it out. But did you really try it? Or did you just go through the motions so you can say you tried it? Slogans like "it's not if you win or lose that matters, it's how you play the game" have allowed people to live with good enough. As long as you make an attempt at doing something, the world is happy. What are we saying when we take the losing team out for pizza just because they tried? They lost - do they really deserve a celebration? Sure, they tried and did a good job, but we are teaching those people that it's okay not to succeed or reach your goal. Is that really the message we want to teach? If you are always getting a reward - win or lose - then what's the point in putting forth the extra "umph" to be successful? 
In a society where mediocrity is par, we look up to those who have achieved greatness. People who have reached their goals are put on pedestals and idolized by the rest of America. But why? It's not only because they put their heart into their goal and did everything they needed to achieved it, but because so few people are putting themselves out there and actually doing. If succeeding at your goals became the norm, then more people would climb the tallest peaks across the world, write the novel they've always wanted to write, become a great baseball player and the "elite status" would then be raised to the next level. 
The point is to keep raising the bar and to reach that bar in everything you do.  Instead, we continually lower the status quo so more people can feel successful. Trying is not getting by. You can try with all your heart, but when you actually get out and do it with all your heart until you succeed, you will feel true accomplishment and become an elite.
Pave the way for yourself. Continually exceed your own expectations, raise that bar, and learn to live with everything you have.