Just Do It!

Lisa is attending a two day Franklin Covey workshop down in Greenwich. When I was in corporate, I attended one of these workshops. It's all about time management, goal setting, staff building, ... Is it productive? I guess. I know, this is an indecisive answer, but to be honest, two days is a lot of overkill in my opinion. I'd prefer the cliff notes version which could be summed up in three seconds by the brilliant folks at Nike; "Just do it!". I mean, how simple and smart is this slogan?! Words to live by. Big Rock's (my father) is way into time management, which is a good thing. However I often bust his big rocks in that the time he spends writing goals and things he "needs to do" down in his day-timer, he could be getting a hell of a lot accomplished. I know there is a secondary purpose to Lisa's company attending which is uniting everyone in trust exercises, but power clapping and trust falls are long forgotten once your back at the office. At the end of the two days, when they ask what have you learned, I'd stand up and say "I learned that I just lost two days of being productive and getting things done had I been back at the office!". OK, maybe this is a bit hypocritical seeing as how I'm a firm believer in writing down goals, having a plan, and, well, just doing it. Maybe I just feel that two full days of this training is excessive. But then again, what do I know? I pay an exorbitant sum of money to swim from a starting line and bust my ass for hours on end only to finish up right back at the same spot from where I started.

On another note, I was recently contacted by an athlete inquiring about me coaching him. After talking with him for a bit, I had come to learn that he was currently working with a coach and two other coaches prior to this one. He mentioned that his present coach wasn't doing anything wrong really, but he wanted to be faster than where he presently was racing at. Yet his development seemed quite good considering his prior results and ability. Often times, people look at others instead of looking at themselves. A friend and colleague of mine who coaches was telling me last week about an athlete of his that left. This coach is a very knowledgeable guy and hard worker. I know some athletes that bounce around from coach to coach, mainly because they haven't accomplished what they might dream of. So instead of being patient and developing a working relationship with their coach, they leave and find another hoping that this new one will be the answer. But in their hearts, I'm sure they realize what the answer is. It's happened to me before in the past and I used to take it personally since I'm a big believer in loyalty, yet I get it now after time. Often it's a better situation for everyone involved.

Met with a good friend a few weeks ago and his motivation has been a bit low. He mentioned how he's left his front door to run, and has gone left 1000+ times, and gone right 1000+ times and it's leaving him a bit unexcited. What he needs to do is switch it up a bunch - go right but do 30 sec fast, 30 sec easy, ..., or go left and find a hill and do bounding hill repeats. As I believe, now is the time to switch it up, focus on some strength and yes, speed. Be creative. Think as though you are brand new to this recreation and make each training session way different then it's been in years. It can only help!

Cheers,

EH