-The All-American Rejects “Gives You Hell”-
*This post was originally posted on December 18th, 2019 on my blog on Medium*
Do you remember the story of the Tortoise and the Hare?
Tortoise and Hare wager on a race. Hare was sure that it will win the race. Tortoise agreed anyway pledging hard work. Hare figured he was a shoe-in winner and decided to take a long break after getting way ahead. Tortoise kept plugging away and eventually passed the Hare. Seeing this, the Hare got going but was beaten by the Tortoise. Hare’s fate was sealed by his Hubris. The Tortoise gave him Hell! Thus the moral is “Slow and steady wins the race.”
Or is it?
Believe it or not, we fall into the Hare’s mindset more so than we think. Why? The answer is COMPLACENCY. The Hare entered the race, no doubt, with a conceived notion of winning because of his overconfidence in prior successes. With this overconfidence came an overestimation of his ability to finish the task on-time with the same kind of success.
Merriam-Webster’s definition of COMPLACENCY is “self-satisfaction especially when accompanied by unawareness of actual dangers or deficiencies.” Sounds a lot like the Hare, doesn’t it.
The same applies to life. Once we find that which we are good at, we tend to stick to it. Nothing wrong with that. Where that thinking goes wrong is when we settle for what we can keep doing minimally, and stop growth because it is too risky.
On the other hand, the Tortoise plugged on slow and steady, winning the race. Great idea, right. We too fall into the mentality of the Tortoise as well. Plugging on the trail, trudging toward success. Measuring satisfaction in winning the race against the “Hare” so to speak.
We look at things in life, looking to win the race instead of looking at what we can do to learn from our EXPERIENCE. We look at the race as something we have to win, if nothing for pride itself. Inherently, there is something a miss there too.
So when we look at our societal affinity toward burnout, we can see that both these ideals, “Fast and Furious” and “Slow and Steady,” are readily present. Each one staring each other down like winning will bring happiness through pride.
The truth of the matter is that, in the long term, life satisfaction is reached through balance. Balance is achieved through mindfulness and self-improvement. It is being neither tortoise and hare: it’s striving to become a Unicorn. And if you can imagine a Tortoise and Hare racing, you can probably imagine the existence of a unicorn.
In this case, the Unicorn is not concerned about SPEED or EFFICIENCY. It’s concern is BALANCE and EXPERIENCE. After all, life is a JOURNEY and not a RACE.
And if you disagree, ask yourself, what is the finish line of life?
Next Week: We explore why it’s a great idea to have a guide.
Continue to join me every Tuesday on this lyrical quest for balance.
Until then, Strive for Functional. Live for Idealism.
-The Functional Idealist
The Functional Idealist 