On Clear Skies by Friday (also: optimism over speed)

Ooo. Well I haven’t felt that in a long time.

Productivity. Focus. Excitment. Creativity. Clarity.

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On the outside, I look like I’m running a million miles a minute. I am relatively quick on tasks, process ideas quickly, and always alert and energetic. It’s easy to confuse my optimism and confidence with the speed of my work.

I have been researching, doing mind flips with my one million questions and gathering data/insight through conversations with folks lonnnnng before I have been asked to do something.

For past six months or so, I have felt like that I was running in a pack that was far too fast for me. And it’s not that I have felt out of my league with colleagues, but that I didn’t know how to reconnect with myself. I’m one of those (sometimes annoying) people, who challenges each step and refuses to do something just because it’s protocol. Before I do something, I need to know WHY. When the reasoning is, “This is how we’ve always done it,” it becomes hard for me to continue without a sense of dread, eventually, I just stop running.

It many ways, it’s a flaw. Stupid BS bureaucracy can really throw me off, and when I am not able to complete those tasks, well… shame spiral.

Often, when we are spinning, our instinct is to spin out so far that we just drop. We know that eventually, the momentum will knock us over. It’s much harder to generate the energy inside of you and balance your core and regain your balance.

I have to keep reminding that despite what people see on the outside, I can’t let their need for speed dictate what I know they actually are looking for in me. My secret is a slow process that allows for intentionality, thoughtfulness and the unrelenting optimism.