Slow Down – Achilles & Aristotle

Warp Speed

I have been working at a zillion miles an hour this week. An 11 hour day thrown in on Wednesday and still in the office well past 7pm on Friday.

Loads of people work long hours but it’s about intensity too; emotional and mental effort. And I gave it all this week.

It can be exhilarating – you feel like you’re zooming along. But smart it ain’t. There’s nothing like working at ‘warp speed’ for making small errors, big mistakes and cocking things up.

Note to self: I need to turn off the hyperdrive this weekend, and choose a different tempo next week… Too much exhilaration leads to rapid exhaustion; steady as she goes.

Life, Work

Friction

Friction: the force resisting the relative motion of solids, fluids and materials moving against each other.

A week of friction, heat and bother. It’s a mug’s game to try to move things faster than contradictory natures allow – but I fall for it every time…

People, organisations and situations exert a constant pull. So the occasional ‘moonlike’ bound forward is illusory – gravity always pull you back to earth.

Easy to think you’re doing the Lord’s work; trying to fix what needs fixing. But fix things too fast and people complain: “What’s going on, what are you doing, you didn’t tell me, what does it mean for me, why?”

As so often, slowing down a bit is probably the answer. Fix less, explain more. Then who knows? Perhaps less will need fixing.

At the very least, there’ll be less friction from the atmosphere.

Philosophy, Psychology, Work

Sat on my Ass

Buridan’s Ass is a famous thought experiment which features a perfectly rational ass rationally stuck between two equally attractive alternatives.

Tragically equidistant between hay and water, the ass lies down to quietly die – as it would be irrational to pursue either over the other.

At work I’m more Speedy Gonzales than Buriden’s Ass at times. And at my worst Wile E. Coyote – hatching complex schemes for simple problems.

I’m often at my best when I slow down a bit. As I wrote today:

Better sometimes to lie down between, than run needlessly and heedlessly between both seeking a carrot.

Perhaps I should treat myself to the odd sit down.