The digital age is a fast paced world. Life has become busier – there’s so much information to process, there are so many things to do, and so many things on our mind. In fact, it appears that our sense of self esteem these days appears to be linked to how busy we are. Further, our perceptions of people appear to be based on how busy they are.
The net result? A conscious / sub-conscious desire to be busy always. In the book ‘First things First’ by Stephen Covey and others, I came across the interesting phrase “Addicted to urgency” and it sums up today’s scenario rather well.
While not discounting genuine scenarios where all of us go through periods of fairly intense work, what we need to watch out for is becoming addicted to being busy. “I’m just so busy, I’ve got so much to do, and no time for anything” might be okay occasionally. However what’s risky is when this becomes the “de-facto” mode of operation. Before we know it, our default mode of operation becomes 60 hour weeks. We check emails for a couple of hours before sleeping, during the night when we wake up, or first thing in the morning. We respond to every email immediately on receiving it. Friction, unrest, angst at colleagues starts increasing. Arguments, even screaming / yelling at colleagues, begin to rear their head.
As more and more people get “infected” with this mindset, a culture of “Everything is a fire” starts to develop. Everything appears to be urgent, very urgent, or super urgent and needs to be delivered yesterday. The values of vision, strategy, planning and anticipation are forgotten. Quadrant 1 Important-Urgent) takes precedence over Quadrant 2 (Important-Not Urgent). “Fight or Flight” is the default approach and work life is about surviving the daily grind one day at a time.
Does it really need to be this way? Not really. Perhaps it’s time to realize that:
- We can all calm down and tell ourselves that there’s no need to panic.
- We can chill out a bit and not take work (and life) so seriously.
- There may be great value in sometimes slowing things down and changing the pace.
- Everything need not be a fire.
- Every e-mail does not need to be responded to immediately. In fact, several e-mails need not be responded to at all.
- Every meeting invite does not need to be accepted.
- It’s better to anticipate and prevent fires, not just fight them.
- It’s time to breathe deeply. Learn how to concentrate on one thing at a time. Focus. Think. Think again, and think through.
Perhaps it’s time to ask ourselves: Do I feel peaceful? Calm? Happy? Mindful of my surroundings and the world around me? Do I feel that there’s enough time to do what’s most important in life?
If not, might be worth some soul searching, introspection and perhaps some course correction?
Thanks for reading. The views expressed are my own. I’d love your opinions, feedback and comments.
shantanupaknikar 