It is vital that you keep moving forward or around or moving in general. You can’t stop moving in your daily efforts. When you stop moving, people take notice, and they start thinking that you have mentally quit, or that you are going to quit soon, or something of that nature. There is a power with continuous movement that is almost unmatched by any intermittent attempts at extensive effort.
Think about someone playing basketball. If they are going towards the basket, and then stop for 8 seconds, you might think they are crazy. Also, you might think they are missing the concept. Lastly, you might think that they gave up on their goal of scoring a basket and are now thinking about getting a sandwich containing tomatoes and avocado.
Relay that example over to a person who is reading a book. Let’s say you read 50 pages and then stop. Do you know how hard it is to get back into reading the rest of the book after a few days? It is tough because you aren’t as connected to the book anymore. Your brain has left that’s book’s train and isn’t returning to the train station. That book might as well be a foreign book because you sure aren’t able to read it anymore.
The same is true with ideas. When you have an idea, the world seems like it is yours. You think you can tackle the idea and bring it to life as soon as possible. If you leave that idea untouched for a few days, suddenly it is old like a piece of bread you left out in the living room and didn’t finish eating. This bread is going to be terrible. You probably will throw it away. The idea will also be thrown away because it got stale like a fortune cookie usually is, even when you just got it with a meal.
Now, if you do continue moving, suddenly the world is at your fingertips. People know you aren’t quitting. People feel like they can rely on you. Your efforts have value that remains. This is what comes with the territory.
If you are already making moves, keep it going. If you aren’t, you have to start making them, and then you can work on keeping them going. As a last note, when you stop or slow down on an effort, everyone notices.
{ 2 comments… read them below or add one }
It’s Newton’s First Law of Motion: a body in motion tends to stay in motion unless acted upon by an outside force. In space, for all practical purposes, gravity is the only force, and while it is very powerful, it generally only shifts the direction of motion — almost never causes something to come to a complete stop.
On Earth, however, we are constantly acted on by other forces: friction, wind resistance, electromagnetic, etc. In “the real world”, nothing keeps moving forever (despite many attempts to patent a perpetual motion machine). You can, however, come very close by reducing friction and other forces as much as possible and/or by supplying external energy into the system.
I think this is a great metaphor for our lives, as well. Most people try to keep in motion toward their goals by simply applying more and more force. It’s exhausting, and often times they run out of fuel. If instead, you spend some of your energy on removing the forces that will slow you down, that’s often a much better use of your time and energy than fighting against it throughout the whole journey.
Let’s use the book as an example. Whenever you’re done with a reading session, instead of putting the book on a shelf or a knick-knack table, put it by your bed, or in your car, or somewhere you’ll be more likely to read it.
Another example: I used to go for weeks or even months without playing my guitar. I even had it in the right room, but… in a case. And just that was enough. Solution? I hung it on the wall! Now I play it several times a week.
So if you find yourself frequently getting stalled, stuck, or hitting a plateau, instead of trying to find more energy to push through it, take a look around and so what you could do to remove a speed bump or grease the skids.
Scott @ PSI Seminars´s last [type] ..Power of Choice – PSI Teleseminar August 2011
Twitter: Armen
August 25, 2011 at 10:09 am
Yo Scott.
I like that you respond sir. Newton’s first law sounds about right in relation to this content. Easier to keep moving when you already doin’ it.
Smart move about hanging guitar on the wall man. Real good analogy. That stuff makes things easier and all it takes it a little rearranging or setup.
Smart stuff in this comment. I like it.