Jants and their views about Time and Energy
A story about long term success, managing pressure, utilising time and energy appropriately.
I wanted to tell you a little story.
You see, in a little animal village hundreds of years ago, they have a weeklong festival that was held annually.
The animals will gather, to merry, to marry, to rejoice, to have fun, and to thank their maker. This weeklong festival of eating and singing culminates with a conference and event. Every animal will present themselves at the house of the most senior animal of their kind to listen to sound advice.
The jants were the wisest of all animals and they lived longer than the rest of the animals in the land.
Jeuant is the official title of the most senior jant. The jants are now extinct (the story of their extinction is for another day) but they are a four legged omnivore — a lion-like figure but in the size of an elephant.
On a particular historic festival at the turn of the century, the Jeuant gave a speech to the entire jant clan. The wise and old Jeuant decided to speak on: ”Why jants are so wise and why they live so long”
Life is not a sprint but a marathon
Most animals take a sprint view to life but the jants think about life as a marathon. The jants run every impulse, every action and decision almost automatically through a long term thinking filter. The fact that we are strong and big does not mean we run after every potential prey. We fundamentally understand that every jant had a certain number of steps allocated to it by God. God allocates the steps but it is the job of the jants to spread it over as many years as possible. How I wish I can monitor my daily steps.
This is why some of the animals think we are lazy because we rarely run but we are just being wise and prolonging our days by taking steps in a conscientious way.
Life is about the interplay of time and energy
Time seems constrained and energy seems boundless. Most of you young jants think you have the energy and power to do so much but you don’t seem to have enough time. 24 hours seems inadequate to fit in everything. But this is often the wrong view of life.
The true life secret lies in understanding that time isn’t as constrained as you imagine it. Only the day is constrained, time itself (though limited) can stretch into weeks, months, years and decades. And that energy is actually not as bounteous as your brain suggests.
Energy means so many things but number of steps will be a good measure for jants like us. To our cousins — humans — it will speak to so many things. Energy for humans will mean physical strength, mental acuity and capacity, breadth of relationships, financial resources, among others. There are no humans here and they have invited me to speak at their own festival next month. But today is for jants.
Yes, energy is not as bountiful as your brain suggests. You are running low on energy but you all don’t know it.
As a young jant, your default place has been to expend maximum energy and get the best out of the day. No, start conserving energy. Start taking paces in a thoughtful way. Stop trying to get the best out of a single day. Get the best out of your lifetime. Today is just one day out of many. Tomorrow is another day. If you were allocated today, all the food you will ever get in your lifetime, will you increase your consumption rate? No. I don’t think so. I am sure you will rather focus on planning, preservation and conservation.
Energy is much more than activities
I am afraid humans will understand this better. Imagine we both set out to catch a prey and we probably come home with a similarly sized antelope. But, just maybe you took a 2000 steps to catch yours but with careful planning, I got mine by expending only 200 steps.
We have carried out thesame activity but I have conserved more. I have gotten more done with less. Careful planning is only one of many ways to move beyond mere activities. Beyond careful planning, you must figure out how to recreate energy and improve your energy balance.
The best way is to learn and adapt from some of our human cousins — the ones that are successful at the business of life and living. We taught them but they seem to be getting better at it because you young folks are loosing the core ideals of being a jant.
How do humans conserve energy?
- Careful and diligent planning
- Delegation and Outsourcing
- Being principled but adaptable
- Continuous learning to be better
- Giving Energy away
- Relaxation and Recreation
- Absolute dependence on God
So much to say on each of these points but that’s also for another day.
Enjoy the rest of the festival.
