Go Easy

“Why are you driving so fast? It doesn’t matter how fast you go. We will save only four or five minutes. What will saving five minutes do. Just go easy.”  

This is something my wife often tells me whenever I am driving fast to get to some destination. Go easy. She is right. Whether I move at 110 Kmph or 90 Kmph, the arrival time doesn’t shift by more than 5 minutes at best.

While it is my driving that agitates my wife, the truth of what she says applies to other aspects of life too.

A stitch in time is worth nine.

• As students, we didn’t study consistently, only to cram the subjects just before the exam.
• As adults, we don’t do stuff that needs to be done when it needs to be done, and then we hustle trying to make up.
• We choose to start five minutes earlier to reach our destination on time at ease, but we start late and then scamper, trying to make up time.

I suspect there is a science to the experience of life. Newton’s third law teaches us that every action has an equal and opposite reaction. The more hustle we put in, the more pushback and resistance we encounter.

In the case of driving, speeding never really gets us to our destination sooner. It gives us the illusion that we are moving fast. 

It is the same in everything else. We don’t need to go through life huffing and puffing when we can achieve almost the same results being calm and composed.

There is a brilliant Navy Seals message that I have come across that says Slow is smooth. Smooth is fast. When we take it slow and smooth, we will inevitably get to where we need to go as fast as nature allows us.