CFC Blog #131: When Easy Tries You

About 15 years ago, Kelly came home from a weekend yoga retreat for teachers with a new phrase offered by the instructor: try easy

Almost instantly it registered. I have some back story about the nobleness of trying hard. It could be blamed on Midwest work ethic or who knows. And to be clear, I am a huge fan of grit. But there have been many, many times where 'try hard' generates far far far worse results for me than try easy. From my dear friend Lisa below...

Pip

When Easy Tries You

I had a great anti-pet peeve happen today! It was Monday (never a good start in my opinion) and it promised to be a long day with an aggressively overpacked schedule. It was sure to end in missed meetings or a missed flight or at the very least — total, frazzled exhaustion. As I looked at my calendar before bed last night, I chastised myself a bit — “What happened to saying 'no' Lisa?! It’s not possible to do all that in a day!”

And then somewhere mid day I realized that the day that was supposed to be impossibly hard had — by pure happenstance —become surprisingly easy! I went to the dentist with pain in my tooth. But he found no crack or cavities. So, I made the earlier train into the city AND had time to get my coffee. I was at my desk an hour early! I got through the to dos in my personal file that usually fall victim to the press of my work to dos. 

A stressful pitch for some business I’m not sure I want cancelled-  so I was able to get an earlier car to the airport. Which meant I got an earlier plane and missed the thunderstorms in NYC and made my connection in Atlanta (to Arkansas!) 

When I landed, I found out some family meetings about some topics I hate to deal with and prefer to postpone — were postponed! Giving me 3 days of time back that I was blocking out. It felt like finding out I had 3 unused days of vacation that I have to take! 

At Roadmakers a few months ago, we talked about Trying Easy. But today my anti-pet peeve is —when Easy Tries You!