Against the grain #thursdaythoughts

If you know where you’re going, and you’re sure, then by all
means take the moving sidewalk. Swim with the current, go with
the flow - pick your metaphor. If you have a clear destination
you may as well take the fastest and most efficient route.


But you don’t have a clear destination nearly as often as you
think. At best you have a vague idea of your intended outcome.
It’s a feeling or gut instinct, but nothing like a map or
blueprint.


In those cases, when the destination is loose and the journey
unclear, the easy path offers no benefit over the hard path. It’s
not more effective or efficient. If you don’t really know where
you’re going, getting there quicker is of no use at all. 


Walking against the sidewalk, swimming upstream, following the
path of most (or at least more) resistance instead builds
resilience. It slows us down just enough to notice new
opportunities.


As Norton Juster wrote in The Phantom Tollbooth, one of
the greatest books ever written for any age, “There are no wrong
roads to anywhere.”


Next time you’re struggling to find the right path, try an
obviously wrong one instead. It may not be so wrong, after all.
Leadership Mastermind

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