Riffing on my email yesterday about slowing down to the speed of life:

One of the implications of people moving faster than the speed of life is that frantic effort and white-knuckle intensity aren’t always the golden goose we think they are.

What really matters instead is patience.

That might be an odd thing for a corporate banker to say.

But then again, what do you expect from the self-anointed Buddha of Banking?

To me, it looks like we treat life like a hasty farmer trying to rip an unripe pumpkin from the ground. Then we get disheartened when the pumpkin refuses to co-operate and abandon the field altogether.

Nowhere is this more obvious than the art and craft of getting good at something.

For instance:

*** When I ran my first Mindset Workshop for my esteemed banking colleagues almost 2 years ago, it was clunky to say the least. Workshop two was also clunky. Same for workshops three, four and five. But now I’m fifty workshops down, the impact is unmistakable. Word has spread around the watercooler and I’m fielding messages from colleagues I’ve never met asking if I can spend an hour or two at their offsite or leadership meeting 

*** Pre Covid, I hired an underground legend in the London card magic scene for magic lessons. By the end of our two years together, I’d nailed a sleight of hand move which is widely seen as one of the hardest sleights in magic – despite initially fumbling with the cards like an octopus wearing boxing gloves 

*** A reader replied to my “slowing down to the speed of life” email from yesterday to say it was “stunning”. Which was lovely. And while there’s still room for improvement, what I know for a fact is that no-one in their right mind would’ve called any of my daily newsletters “stunning” for at least the first year (and quite possibly a long time after that too)

*** At uni, I bought a book on how to solve a Rubik’s Cube. I studied a few pages each week and practised enough until I could solve the damn thing in less than 2 minutes. I can still solve two-thirds of a Rubik’s Cube to this day (a niche party trick if ever there was one)

*** Five years ago, I’d never coached anyone. Today, I have 4 clients on the books and a bunch of great testimonials to boot

For each of these, I literally started at zero. Then I stayed patient through the inevitable twists & turns, ups & downs and failures & successes. And over time, I got better.

But it’s not like I come from a dynasty of magicians or a long line of literary greats.

It’s why anyone who tells themselves “I’m not made for that” is spinning a dodgy yarn.

It’s just a case of sticking with it.

I remember reading how Stephen King chucked a draft of his book Carrie into the bin because he thought it was a load of old tosh. Only for his wife to fish out the crumpled manuscript, give it a read and tell Stephen “this is good – keep going”.

Carrie went on to become the book that launched Stephen King’s writing career. He’s still going strong 67 novels later.

So sometimes all it takes is a friendly nudge from a fresh pair of eyes.

As it happens, this is the essence of coaching.

(fancy that!)

If you’ve got dreams stuck in neutral and you’d like help getting them moving, you might like this:

https://waitinglist.followingfulfilment.com

To fulfilment,

Tom