Productivity and Self-improvement
It’s Okay to Slow Down
You’ll reach your destination regardless
Ever heard of the story of the tortoise and the hare? Of course, you have. It’s one of Aesop’s many fables and it goes like this…
The tortoise and the hare raced each other. Ridiculous, right? The hare is faster, everyone knows that.
There’s no point in making it sound like a Sherlock Holmes mystery novel. Everyone already knows how this ends. So let’s cut to the chase, shall we?
The tortoise won the race.
But that’s not what’s important. What’s important is how the tortoise won and why you should learn from the tortoise.
Immediately the race begins, the hare sprints in full force with the power of the wind. In a few seconds, the hare passes the tortoise so thoroughly that one wonders why such a slow-ass creature thought of racing the hare in the first place.
But slowly, one step at a time, the tortoise creeps without stopping. He’s, slow, he knows it. But he’s no quitter. So he keeps going.
The hare is faster, he knows it. Winning will be a breeze.
So what does the hare do? He gets complacent and slows down. Then he even quits at one point in time just to take a nap. The audacity of this one. But hey, it’s an easy win. So why try too hard, right?
Well, the tortoise, of course, knows this isn’t going to be easy. So at his own pace, not looking at what the hare’s doing, he keeps crawling until he eventually passes the hare and then wins the race.
Like most of Aesop’s Fables, this story has a moral lesson: the slow but sure wins the race.
Well, I beg to differ, the fast and sure wins the race. But, there’s a catch. Speed without surety (focus) is useless. Slowness coupled with unwavering focus beats directionless speed.
This story, while simple, sums up our entire lives. Think of the finish line as your goals and the race as the culminated efforts involved in reaching your goals.
At the beginning of the race, you’re either the tortoise or the hare. As to whether you reach the finish line or not is dependent on which one you are.
It’s easy to start as the hare.
It makes sense, to be honest. You have goals, and you’re so motivated that you want to achieve them. So you begin with aggressive vigor. You want to do the big things. Everything seems important, so you do all of them at the same time. You get lost in the smallest details.
But, it doesn’t last long. It never does. Because eventually, your momentum ebbs, and you crash and burn. What’s worse is that it takes a long time to get back on track. And more often than not, you have to start from scratch.
Time after time, you’re forever the beginner.
That’s what it is to be the hare. You start fast and aggressively, but you have no focus. So you lose momentum and get stuck.
I’ve experienced this too many times. I remember when I always tried to write a book and never got it done. I set ambitious targets and unrealistic expectations by forcing myself to write thousands of words every day.
It worked for a whopping three days until I relapsed back into weeks, or even months, of procrastination. And then I’ll start all over again, and the vicious cycle continued.
What was the problem? Why did I never accomplish my goals no matter how many times I tried?
It was pretty simple — I was going way too fast.
When you’re just starting out, going fast is more likely to exhaust and frustrate you.
Go slow, instead. There’s nothing wrong with that. Focus on one step at a time. You’ll get to your destination regardless.
I get it. It’s tempting to want to do everything at once. It makes us feel productive, you know, like we’re actually doing something worthwhile with our lives.
The first time I got into the whole online writing thing, I dived headfirst into things I thought were necessary but turned out to be completely useless. All they did was waste my time and money.
I thought I needed everything before starting. That’s the first rookie mistake. Don’t wait until you have everything to start doing something. Start now.
Instead of focusing on what was important, which was writing, I rather focused on things like logos, cover photos, website themes, the perfect domain name, the ideal web hosting service, the coolest computer, and just about all the thousand-and-one irrelevant things beginners obsessed over.
It’s okay to want these things. But, if you’re just getting started and don’t have them yet, just start with what you have.
Your rickety computer, internet connection, and free website are all you need if that’s all you have. Hell, you don’t even need a website at all to write. Free platforms like Medium, Twitter, LinkedIn, or Facebook, are much better options since they come with an inbuilt audience you can tap into.
As a virtually unknown beginner, this is powerful stuff. I wish I knew that from day one.
When you’re so worried about getting everything done at once, you get nothing done at all.
Instead of sticking with one or two platforms in the beginning until you get a hang of what works, you want to publish everywhere. You stubbornly keep at it even when it’s taking a toll on your mental health.
It’s easy to confuse that with productivity. After all, you’re doing something, and that’s better than nothing. Well, there’s nothing wrong with that if it’s yielding the result you want. But if all it does is overwhelm you and make you want to bang your head against the wall, then that’s a sign that you need to slow down.
Choose one platform that works for you, for example, Medium. Dedicate your time and effort to that one. Focus, that’s key. And when you have just one thing to focus on in the beginning, it gets easier
As you grow and start getting traction, you can scale out. At that time you’ll have gotten more experience which you can then apply to your newest endeavor.
Whatever you start — whether a side hustle, writing a book, or learning a new skill — start small and go slowly. Develop your muscles to get used to it. And as it gets easier, you increase your pace.
If you go to the gym for the first time, you don’t start with reality-altering yoga poses on your very first day, do you? Unless you want to cross out “breaking your pelvis in three locations” on your bucket list, you start with the easiest workout. And you keep at it until you can do a hundred push-ups with only two fingers
Apply this to all aspects of your life.
Want to start a blog? Don’t obsess over all the little details. Just start by writing your first post. Don’t even sweat it. Stop worrying about what people will think.
Listen to me when I tell you this, no one cares. No seriously, no one knows you, and no one cares. That’s the beauty of being a beginner. No one knows who you are. So this is the time to take things one step at a time, try things, fuck up, learn from your fuck ups, do better, then repeat.
This isn’t a race, I promise you. Everyone who’s already ahead started where you once were. You’re not being fair to yourself if you compare your progress to theirs. The only one you should be competing with is yourself.
The only question you should ask yourself is this, “Am I better today than I was yesterday?” That’s it.
No matter how slow you are, as long as you keep your pace and momentum, you’ll eventually get there. Be the tortoise. The good news is that you won’t be slow forever. You’ll get better at what you do and speed automatically follows. And then, you won’t even be the hare, but a freaking rocket.
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