Just think
Do you know why good decision makers take time to think during the day? This time gives them the opportunity to relax, rehearse, and refocus. The CEO of AOL, Timothy M. Armstrong, enacted a policy of 10% “think time” in the company. He requires all his executives to spend 10% of their workday thinking.
You should start your thinking journey. You have a unique human capacity — to think, to imagine, to create an idea, to go deep. This is the source of your power.
You live in an on-the-go society. You are passionate about producing results and accomplishing tasks. You have a “time is money” mentality, and while this approach may seem to pay off in the short-term, it prevents you from focusing on the big picture. You are in a hurry to get where?
Remember, when you’re going fast you can’t go deep. Don’t be seduced into going so fast and doing so much without a specific plan or destination in mind. Don’t be a robotic person — the kind that goes through the motions until they just can’t move anymore. It doesn’t matter how busy you are; find uninterrupted time in your day for thinking, reflecting, and being present.
I guess you don’t have time for thinking because of your fear. Right? Thinking is the hardest work ever. Thinking requires discipline as well as time. You worry about overthinking. Your mind doesn’t like thinking because thinking is messy; thinking makes you soak in a problem and it generates strong emotions. Suddenly, your brain goes crazy and you feel flooded with thoughts. And you do your best to stop the flood.
What if this unique human capacity is a gift rather than a curse? What is it’s actually an effective tool for sorting information, like a very sensitive spam filter? Researchers suggest that thinking gives us the opportunity to reevaluate the outside world in productive and creative ways. Taking time to think helps you to process information, helps you to form stable memories, and helps you to “calm the storm” and get back on the right track when you plans go awry.
Taking time to think will increase your productivity and your focus. Using this time, you’ll be able to revise where your career and family are and develop a further action plan. You will get a clear picture and create an outline for the direction you want to move in. You have the opportunity to evaluate whether or not you’re spending your time in the best way possible and to make adjustments as needed.
Rarely do we find men who willingly engage in hard, solid thinking. There is an almost universal quest for easy answers and half-baked solutions. Nothing pains some people more than having to think.— Martin Luther King, Jr.
