We All Have Many Different Roles In Life - so what does best possible mean?

A discussion article. Part of The Thinking Upgrade.

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Before breakfast, you may already have been a partner, a parent, a carer and a neighbour. By lunchtime, you may have been a colleague, a customer, a manager and a friend. Later, you might be a volunteer, a member of a team, or the person someone calls because they need to talk.

Each role brings opportunities to contribute. Each carries expectations, some spoken and some we may never have discussed. And behind all of them is one person, with a whole life, finite energy and much to learn.

So when we say we want to be the best possible in our different roles, what do we actually mean? What are we aiming towards? Who helps us decide? And how do we hold that aspiration in a way that enriches our lives and the lives of others?

Having a clearer idea of what good looks like can help us make more informed choices about how we live. The word 'possible' keeps those choices grounded in the reality of being human.

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There is much more inside a role than its name suggests

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Take being a parent. Within that one role, we may be a listener, teacher, comforter, organiser, boundary setter, playmate and advocate. Each involves different tasks and different judgements. Helping with homework is different from responding to a child who feels excluded. Knowing when to step in is different from knowing when to give them space.

A manager may recruit, plan, coach, allocate resources, resolve disagreements and make difficult decisions. A friend may celebrate, offer practical help, challenge a harmful choice or simply sit alongside someone through a painful evening.

Being good at one part of a role does not automatically make us good at every other part. We might organise family life brilliantly but struggle to listen without offering solutions. We might be technically excellent at work but leave colleagues afraid to ask questions.

Looking beneath the title helps us see where our strengths make a difference, where we need support and what we have never actually learnt to do.

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Learning through life can teach us habits worth questioning

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Much of what we know comes from doing. We watch others, try things, respond to what happens and develop familiar ways of operating. That experience is valuable. It can also pass on practices that deserve a second look.

We may copy the manager who equates long hours with commitment. We may interrupt because that is how conversations worked in our family. We may take over tasks because doing them ourselves feels quicker, without noticing that we are preventing someone else from learning.

Some practices are poor from the outset. Others once served a purpose but no longer fit the person, situation or world around us. Familiarity can make both difficult to recognise.

What if we occasionally asked: “Where did I learn to do this? What effect is it having? What might someone with a different experience help me see?” Years of experience become more valuable when we remain willing to examine what those years have taught us.

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Giving terms like 'best' meaning - so they can be useful

“Be a good partner.” “Be a great colleague.” “Be a responsible citizen.” These aspirations matter, but they leave a great deal unexplained. To use them, we need to get closer to the knowledge, skills, capabilities, qualities and behaviours involved.

What do I need to understand about this person, this responsibility and this situation? What must I be able to do reliably? What judgement does the role require? How do patience, courage, kindness, honesty or fairness show up in my actual behaviour? Which tools, resources and people would help me contribute more effectively?

For a colleague, reliability might mean agreeing a realistic deadline, delivering useful work and giving early warning when something changes. For a friend, attentive listening might mean asking whether they want advice before offering it. For a customer, respect might mean remembering that the person handling a complaint is a human being with limited authority.

We can learn from credible knowledge, skilled practitioners, lived experience and feedback. There may be several good approaches rather than one universal answer. We can still develop a clearer, revisable picture of 'excellence' / 'best' and use it to guide our choices.

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Seeing 'best' through more than one lens

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Our own intentions tell only part of the story. We also need to consider the experience of the people affected, the quality of the outcome, the methods we use and the consequences over time.

A parent may see constant involvement as care, while their teenager experiences too little independence. A manager may see rapid decisions as efficiency, while colleagues see avoidable mistakes because nobody asked for their knowledge. A business owner may celebrate strong results while overlooking the pressure placed on staff or suppliers.

The Maximy emphasis on success, wellbeing and positive impact invites us to look across these different dimensions. What are we achieving? How are people experiencing it? What are our choices making possible, or more difficult, for others and for the future?

Looking through several lenses will sometimes reveal tensions. A choice can help one person and inconvenience another. Listening to those differences gives us a better basis for judgement. It also encourages us to include people with less power to make their needs heard.

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Possible belongs to a whole human life

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None of us is perfect. There is beauty in our individuality, humour, vulnerability and capacity to care; in the unexpected conversation and the imperfect afternoon that becomes a treasured memory. Our worth as people is not a score for how well we perform our roles.

We live with different abilities, health, resources and responsibilities. A person caring for an unwell relative may have very little spare energy. Someone living with a disability may need adjustments or support. A difficult week can change what is available to any of us.

Our roles also draw on the same hours. Staying late at work has consequences at home. Saying yes to every request can leave us unable to honour the commitments we have already made. Best possible therefore involves deciding where attention matters most, what can be simpler, what can wait and where we need help.

Sometimes a thoughtful boundary is the strongest contribution available. Sometimes it is rest. Sometimes it is admitting that we cannot safely or competently take on a responsibility and arranging appropriate support.

We still need honesty about the difference between a genuine limit and an unexamined habit. Could we share the work? Learn a better method? Remove an unnecessary task? Use a suitable tool? Organisations and families also have responsibilities to create workable conditions; impossible demands cannot be solved by asking one person to try harder.

What is possible can expand through learning, practice, collaboration and support. It can also contract during illness, grief or change. Our expectations need enough wisdom to respond to both.

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What if we worked out best possible together

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The people affected by our roles are our stakeholders. In everyday life, they are the partner across the table, the child beside us, the colleague waiting for a decision, the customer relying on our work and the neighbour sharing our street.

What if we made space to ask them: “What matters most to you in how I fulfil this role? What do I do that helps? What makes things harder? What might we each need to change?”

A couple might discover that what they most need is a fairer division of the planning and remembering that keep a household running. A manager and colleague might agree clearer priorities and fewer interruptions. Friends might talk honestly about how to stay connected when their lives have very different demands.

These conversations could turn silent expectations into shared understanding. We could agree what matters, what each person can realistically offer, what support is needed and when to revisit the arrangement.

Agreement will not always be easy or complete. Being best possible includes listening carefully while maintaining reasonable boundaries and taking responsibility for decisions. The loudest preference cannot be the only consideration, especially where someone else’s safety, dignity or wellbeing is involved.

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Begin with one role and one worthwhile change

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We can begin simply. Choose one role that matters to you. Look at one part of it that deserves more attention. Explore what doing it well could look like, including the perspective of someone affected. Then choose a worthwhile change that fits your circumstances.

It might be listening without checking your phone, preparing more carefully for a difficult conversation, learning how to give useful feedback or making a promise you can reliably keep. Notice what changes. Ask how it is experienced. Adjust as you learn.

When we fall short, we can acknowledge the effect, apologise where needed, repair what we can and practise a better response. That willingness is itself part of fulfilling a role well.

Imagine how life might feel if more of us could talk openly about this, without pretending to have all the answers. If we understood one another’s hopes and constraints more clearly. If we helped each other learn and made more conscious choices about the contribution we wanted to make.

Which role in your life would benefit most from that conversation – and who could you begin it with?

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Thanks for reading.

Best,

Rob

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