“Be quick but don’t hurry.” – John Wooden
Speed. Pace. Tempo.
The world around us accelerating before our very eyes. Society moving faster and faster. Technology evolving at lightning speed. Communication is instant. All is important. Everything is urgent. YES!
Yes? Wait… What the…?
What happened to the “good ol’ days”? How about the “way things used to be”? What happened to “tradition” or “that’s the way we have always done things”?
Gone. Done. History.
Over the past week I have been reminded 1,000 times over my need to adjust my speed, increase my pace, and accelerate my tempo. Funny thing is I should know better. After all I obsess over the littlest of things. I constantly think about what’s next. Thinking. More THINKing. MORE THINKING! Like I said, I should know better, there it is right in front of me. My urgency affected by the “good ol’ days” or “the way we have always done things”. Not good.
Everyone has a speed in which they operate. A pace at work or at home. A tempo on the field of play or off it. Cities have a certain speed. Products have a pace. TEAMs have tempo. Fortunately for us all, it’s learned. Its behaviors reinforced by practice repeated. Controllable outcomes among coachable discipline. Simply put, if you practice fast, you play fast. Want to play faster, practice faster. My need to increase my speed, advance my pace, or pick up my tempo clearly were things within my control. How I practiced was how I played.
If knowledge is king, anticipation is the crown and initiative is the throne. We all seek out the knowledge but don’t always put ourselves in the best possible position to receive it. We prepare but don’t step up when it counts the most. If you anticipate why and initiate how, almost everything becomes controllable. If it’s controllable, you can practice it. Practice this repeated = success. Multiply that by the need to have everything now… and WHOA! Again, I should have known better.
Relentless. Impatient. Eager.
To my historians these three words all have negative connotations to them. They don’t allow you to savior the taste, follow the rules, or be logical. To my new historians this is normal, everyday life. It allows you to make the most of every moment, seeking out the future, now. Can we do things the way we always have? Yup, and we can always get what we always got. Good enough can become acceptable and status quo the norm. No thanks! Gimme momentum. Gimme progress. Gimme next.
WIN THE DAY.
Fast. Hard. Finish.
It's amazing how time is fluid - think about how one moment flows into the next moment, or how conversation is described as flowing. Even though we live our lives in this fluid state, I noticed today that when I'm with someone, I need to be 100% present. So whether I'm setting up train tracks with my son or talking to a client on the phone, my mind needs to be steady, and not accelerating on to the next task at hand.
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