Having taken off a few days from work, I know that I have to face a couple of clients next week, where my message will be to ‘dig deep’.

The words are meant to motivate and to drive encouragement. There again, it is used so often that the phrase loses some of its impact. After all, we have become used to Hollywood films, where a sports coach comes along, demanding more from a team that should know better. And then the revatilised players miraculously win the cup, the league and every girlfriend in sight. Tres cliché.

A more genuine approach, possibly my favourite, is the true story of Roy Hayim, a family friend. Roy suffered from food poisoning, after eating a meal on a flight. He was minutes away from death, as his muscles ceased to function. He was to spend months communicating by moving his eyelids. In the book “The Will To Live”, Roy and Caroline describe how they had to fight physical and emotional pain of the highest order, effectively while separated from each other. On reflection, one wonders how they found the inspiration to come through, hour in and hour out.

Slightly less dramatic, but equally interesting, are the thoughts of comedienne, Rachel Dracht.  She found fame on Saturday Night Live and looked set for a great career, which then somehow slipped between her fingers. And the relationships she found seemed to involve addicts, no-hopers and no-goes for her parents. Life sucked, yet similarly she found a way to use her values, which she did not realize had been installed in her by family and schooling. Finally, in her early 40s, she was to meet a partner, to mother a beautiful child and to revive her career.

While thinking about my clients, my son posted a cute video on his facebook. It is easy to be won over by this little kid and his use of the phrase ‘rock and roll’. However, even this little creature at such a tender age has got the message. If you want something really badly, you are going to have to act in a manner way above the standard and the average. The comfortable boundaries, which you had previously accepted, will have to be stripped away.

And then, at that amazing point in time, you will suddenly realize what it means to ‘dig deep’.