If You Are In a Hurry, Go Slowly
When I was younger, around 5th grade, my friend Ian, jokingly said, “If you are in a hurry, go slowly”.
For a while, I thought of it as just a clever word play, and doesn’t mean anything. But fast forward today, my friend Ian died of motorcycle accident but the saying was still stuck in my mind.
I could have google search the meaning of it but just lately, I think I discovered what it meant.
I’ve been practicing meditation since 2013 or 2014. So base on my calculations, that will be 4–5 years. There was a hiatus of a year probably after I lost my job, but that was it.
Anyway, meditation practice was my way of silencing the mind. I learned about meditation when I was listening to The Great Courses, particularly, the meditation lectures.
I downloaded an app, crossed my leg and then concentrated on my breathing. I did it primarily to deal with the stress. At that time, I feared of losing my job. The start-up company that I was in, was slowly dying.
There was no money coming, and slowly they were letting go of employees. I knew I was next. Unfortunately, my wife works at that company too. The bad thing is that if the company is going to fold, two of us will be out of work, with a little kid in tow.
To top that, our working visa, since we are not yet US citizen at that time, was attached to our employer. If we lose the job, our working visa and our stay in the US will be in limbo.
So I practiced meditation primarily for stress reduction. It is called a practice because you have to do it everyday in order to reap the benefits. The benefits of mediation ranges from lower stress, blood pressure, increase focus and many others.
But lately, I discovered a benefit of meditation that slows me down when I was in a hurry.
Currently, I worked forensic chemist. So what I do most will be presented in the court of law if it’s needed. Every document should be free of errors.
Lately, I been double checking my work with less frequency of mistakes. Usually, I do the checking in a hurry to finish my work. Last week, I went through the documents breathing slowly and deep, just like when I am in a lotus position and focusing on my breathing.
This time, I was slowing down to really check my work.
That’s here what the phrase meant. I realized that, if you are in a hurry, go slowly means breath and relax. And that’s what I did, following the rhythm of my deep breathing and my mind doesn’t wander. I wasreally focus on the document in front of me.
With this technique, less mistakes in my work.
I applied this one to my business. I would do deep breathing before working on my business, and it gives me more focus.
There was a coach I encountered before. He was a sprinting coach and was coaching a buddy of mine. The coach advised, if you sprint, breath.
It’s usually that we hold our breath when we sprint, but if you are not relax while sprinting, it works against you.
