"Get to" or "have to"?

When I was a college president, my children were pretty young. We made a conscious decision to allow them to have their own lives separate from that of the College, but there were still plenty of times when their presence was called for.

I remember having a conversation with my daughter in advance of some sort of lecture (or concert, or ceremony, or ballgame, etc.) that the family needed to attend for some reason. I remember her asking, “Do we have to?” And I replied, “Well, you are going…and you get to choose whether you have to or you get to.”

I find myself going through the same exercise sometimes with myself. When faced with something that I may not particularly be looking forward to but is an opportunity to have a new experience, or to learn, or that’s outside my comfort zone, etc…I’ll catch myself saying, “I have to…” And as often as not, if I replace that with “I get to” it helps me reframe from a sense of obligation to a sense of opportunity. Like my daughter to that event, I’m going anyway…so I get to choose whether I bring a mindset of “have to” or “get to”.

You have to do hard things. You have to overcome an obstacle. You have to do something outside your comfort zone. You have to have a difficult conversation.

(You are a victim. If only those hard things weren’t there your life would be better. You don’t want to expand your comfort zone. You aren’t sure about whether or not you can do these things successfully.)

You get to do hard things. You get to overcome obstacles. You get to expand your comfort zone. You get to have a difficult conversation.

(You are powerful. You know that happiness and/or success don’t come from things being easy but instead by doing difficult things. You are confident that you will find a way to the other side—even if you don’t yet know how--and come out that other side even stronger.)

Have to or get to. It’s your decision.