Seth Godin writes a fantastic blog. Every day he comes up with brilliant tips on life and work. Here’s his from today –
“When is it due?
Here’s the schedule. Follow it.
There’s your in box. Empty it.
When something is imminent, speed up. When you’re off the deadline machine, take a breath and poke around a bit, explore, relax.
Nonsense.
The goal isn’t to do work and hand it in just before it’s due. The goal is to do the work as beautifully as you can, faster than anyone else, so you can do more work.
If it takes a deadline to get you off your butt and to push past the resistance, then move the deadlines forward.
You don’t work on an assembly line any more. You work in project world, and more projects mean more chances to screw up, to learn, to make a reputation and to have more impact.
When it’s you against the boss, the goal is to do less work.
When it’s you against the project, the goal is to do more work.”
What he said today brought up memories of my incredible music composition teacher at University of Illinois, Herbert Brun, in the mid-70’s. Herbert was a radical his whole life. He was a pioneer in electronic and computer music and a sometimes maddening but uncompromising exponent of his brand of critical thinking.
He worked closely with Heinz Von Forester at the Biological Computer Lab at U of I and Humberto Maturana, the visionary Chilean neuophysiologist. Thank you Herbert (1918-2000) for being one of my teachers.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sAIUnbG45kE
Herbert in this video shows how peace is a need (not just an idle dream or desire).
“Needs are conditions that have to met so that they can happen again.”
“Peace has to met by our conflicts, our differences, so it can happen again.”
Similarly, as Seth Godin implies in his post today, work, meaningful work, is a need.
“The goal is to do the work as beautifully as you can, faster than anyone else, so you can do more work.”
Herbert Brun
Of course implied here is we need to rest and celebrate after each project is done beautifully, so that work and the desire to do beautiful work can happen again.
Work has to be done beautifully and met with rest so that it can happen again.
Of course, for us massage therapists, the content of our work often is to help the client experience and resolve the conflicts of life in a peaceful, relaxed way. We generate peace and create the conditions for rest so that work and peace can happen again.