Career Mission Chief Executive Officer, A. Harrison Barnes, in a webinar discussed the dangers of complacency and how you should make it a point to continually improve and grow.

Harrison believes that the types of people who surround you are crucial in determining the rate of your growth both personally and professionally. Surround yourself with mediocre people and you will face mediocrity in your life whereas if you surround yourself with exceptional people, your life becomes exceptional as well. People who share similar dreams and aspirations empower one another to achieve these goals and also continually judge each other by what each person in the group is doing. If you go to a poor college, you are likely to be with people who have low expectations and goals than if you go to a first rate college. Another thing that could lead to complacency is resting on the laurels of your past achievements. You need to understand that there is no end to growth. If you have achieved something or become someone of importance, you need to achieve something more and become someone greater.

Never allow yourself to settle down for less or accept your results as finite. Do not chase complacency and isolate yourself from the world. It is not what life is all about. You cannot stay in the same way forever. You need to grow and improve always. You cannot afford to live in a cocoon. Harrison’s main concern is for you to watch your life and see how people around you are affecting you. You need to understand the fact that what makes people happy is the basic process of growing and becoming something. The signs of danger as stated by Harrison are, those times that you fail to judge yourself by your potential, you rest on the laurels of your past, you are not challenged, and you have reached contentment. Be aware of stagnancy and always make way for growth. Harrison believes that, ‘If we are not growing then we are dying.'