The Long Game
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THE LONG GAME
As I am sure you have noticed, a theme central to these newsletters is that I strongly believe that we live in a short-term world with long-term problems. If most of humanity could pause, reflect, take a deep breath, and focus on what we all would want in a few decades, decision-making would improve drastically. I am convinced of that. Of course, easier to say than do. But as usual, it starts with us!
For effect, I will try to be short today and simply say this: Life is, indeed, short. But, it is also long. We talk often about short-term pain for long-term gain. But, in reality, too often what we end up doing is taking a shortcut, grabbing some short-term gain for long-term pain.
The problem is that most of the habits that reap long-term rewards are invisible. Or noticeable in any way. Therefore you end up feeling like what you are doing is having no impact. And furthermore, the long-term effects you are seeking are about maintaining a healthy system overall and it is even more difficult to realize when that system is starting the process of deterioration.
Most of us don't notice the early effects of increased inflammation in our body or the gradual accumulation of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere or when we are starting to lose the connection to people we love. The impact over years is cumulative and compounding. Like with most significant problems, like bankruptcies, they happen gradually and then suddenly.
Some of you might recall chemistry experiments in school where we dripped ink into a beaker of water. You could keep dripping for a long time and the water seems unaffected. But then, at a particular threshold (or what sometimes is referred to as the saturation point) the water turns into the color of the ink (affected by both time and amount).
So this is the problem with the long game. We don't feel or see the negative consequences of our short-term decision (yet) AND we are sufficiently impatient waiting for the delayed gratification of the long-term benefits.
An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure. We measure twice and cut once. There are many good sayings that indicate that we ought to invest today for a richer harvest tomorrow.
Of course, it's important to find balance. We should invest most of our time and take action toward the vision we have for our lives. But we should also maintain a degree of flexibility to both learn and explore new ideas, as well as occasionally let our hair down and just enjoy spontaneity and whatever tickles our fancy at the moment.
But I would passionately argue that too much of humanity, right now, has this balance way out of whack. Reporting, conversations, and decisions are too myopically focused on immediate returns and rewards without sufficient regard to investing in systems and resources that can bring us all more joy in the future.
Jeff Sullivan, a.k.a. “Jeff El Jefe” writes beautiful short summaries that I subscribe to. I highly recommend getting his wisdom in your inbox. He wrote this piece that inspired me to double down, yet again, on our addictive relationship to instant gratification. It's not good. As he reminds us in the end: “Easy choices, hard life. Hard choices, easy life.” So they say.
I’ll end with a few of my favorite quotes on the notion of long-term living. Hope they inspire you as they do me.
"You cannot escape the responsibility of tomorrow by evading it today." - Abraham Lincoln
"Rome wasn't built in a day, but they were laying bricks every hour." - John Heywood
"Success is the sum of small efforts, repeated day in and day out." - Robert Collier
"Vision without action is a daydream. Action without vision is a nightmare." - Japanese Proverb
"The best time to plant a tree was 20 years ago. The second-best time is now." - Chinese Proverb
"Compound interest is the eighth wonder of the world. He who understands it, earns it; he who doesn't, pays it." - Albert Einstein
“Don't judge each day by the harvest you reap but by the seeds that you plant." - Robert Louis Stevenson
”Where there is no vision, there you find short-termism, for then there is no reason to compromise today for an unknown tomorrow.” Charles Handy
Have a great day, week, and, most importantly, a fantastic life!
