Stop Cutting off the Ends of the Ham

Dear Friends,

This month’s letter begins with a story about baking a ham from Zig Ziglar that I heard many years ago and has recently come to mind again for me. Zig describes how the wife of a newly married couple cut off the ends of the ham before baking it. Her husband asked why. The wife responded that her mother always cut off the ends of the ham and that was the way it was supposed to be.

Not accepting “the way it was supposed to be,” the husband called his mother-in-law and asked why she cut off the ends of the ham before baking. The response was that her mother cut off the ends of the ham.

More curious than ever now, the husband called Grandma and asked her why she cut off the ends of the ham. The answer was that she had a small oven and that was the only way to get the ham to fit.

Grandma had a reason for cutting off the ends of the ham. The next two generations did not. They were blindly following a custom or tradition without rhyme or reason. It was “the way it was supposed to be.”

This story resonates with me as I have been questioning why certain things are the way they are in my life. I think out of fear or simple comfortability, we just accept things “the way they are.” Now, don’t get me wrong, if those “things” are serving a purpose, we should definitely continue to use them. However, I challenge you to question the things in your life that you may have become accustomed to doing or thinking simply because that’s “the way it’s supposed to be.” Maybe we feel if we upset the status quo we may be turning away from a tradition or legacy our family began or it’s just too uncomfortable to make a change or we resign to the belief that “everyone is doing it, so should I.”

Here’s my question: Is the thing you’ve become accustomed to, serving you well now? Is there, perhaps, a better way to do the thing you’ve been taught, coached or has been ingrained in you as “the right way to do or right way to view things?” Now consider this – after enough time passed and enough people died, no one would have known or remembered the reason for cutting off the ends of the ham.

So much of what we do in our life is done without much thought or sometimes, even knowledge, of how the habit began. I challenge you to change this pattern. I challenge you to begin to really focus on what you choose in your life and in your business. Are you repeating behaviors that you really don't even understand? Are there behaviors or habits you could eliminate or those you can switch to something more valuable or productive?

When we do things “because that’s what we’ve always done” we fail to seek opportunities for improvement. We fail to see the assumptions we make every day out of habit and routine. When we just keep cutting off the ends of the ham, we fail to innovate.

Stop cutting off the ends of the ham today. Ask why.

“No problem can be solved from the same level of consciousness that created it.” – Albert Einstein

Contending for growth,

Rica

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