On Saturday, I sat. For about 30 minutes, as I was covering the last kilometre or so to the first robot as you enter Fish Hoek at the bottom of Ou Kaapse Weg.
As you can see, there was a long queue forming behind me. The queue in front of me was stationary most of the time, crawling ahead about 5 meters at a time every now and then. Which was more ‘then’ than ‘now’.
Some motorists could not take this any longer, turned around and rushed back to where they came from just a few minutes ago. My guess was that they were going back maybe a kilometre or two to take the alternative route to Noordhoek, or a different route to the same robot they were heading to anyway. Maybe they believed it would take them less time to get there even if it was farther.
I wonder what the final thing was that made them turn around. Boredom? Extreme frustration? Inability to wait things out? A crisis at home? Or urgency addiction, urging them to be on the move, be busy, rush around even though the rushing could cost more than being patient?
In all this, I was visited by the CIA once again. “Gerrit, is this situation in your direct Control (C)? Do I hear a no? Can you Influence (I) it? Do I hear another no? Mmmmm. Well, if that is the case your best approach to the situation would be to Accept it and Adapt (the A) to it.”
Buried in “accept and adapt” is another choice – what do we choose to use as ‘adapting mechanism’?
Some people chose the ‘be busy’ option by turning around and finding a different way, even though there was no guarantee that the alternative route could not also be waiting with a surprise delay. Others chose to sit it out. Neither option is right nor wrong.
One should, however, think it through. What are the possible outcomes of your choices? And then base your choice on those possibilities.
In some instances, in the past, I chose the ‘at least it feels as if I am making progress’ option. On Saturday I used the 30 minutes of slow progress to turn the inside of my car into a concert hall and enjoyed a piece of Beethoven I don’t often listen to.
“Slow down to speed up” is the one productivity principle that people find most difficult , yet most beneficial, to implement.
Shall we declare the week of 2 December 2019 to be ‘the week of the pause button’? To look before we leap. To think before we speak. To not be busy just for the sake of feeling productive, but actually being productive.
To consider options carefully before we choose. And then throw ourselves whole-heartedly into our choice.
Shall we dance? Slow dance?
Human freedom involves our capacity to pause, to choose the one response toward which we wish to throw our weight.
~Rollo May