Skip to main content

The Lily Pad


There were once four frogs sitting on a lily pad. It was beginning to get crowded, and they were running out of food. As conditions worsened, one frog decided to jump. How many frogs are left on the lily pad?

If you said “three,” your math is correct but your behavior psychology is off. There are actually four frogs still left on the lily pad. Although one frog decided to jump, he never actually built up the courage to execute. He was waiting for a fish to give him an accurate depth of the water under him, a goose to let him know what the weather was like on the horizon and a duck to give him an update on the current status of other lily pads in the area. In short, he was waiting for the right conditions and the best plan.

How often are we like that frog? We make a decision to do something or go after an objective, but when the time comes to jump, our knees buckle and our legs get weak. We wait. And then wait some more, coming up with excuses for why “this just isn’t the right time.” Opportunities and life itself pass us by as we sit on the lily pad, just waiting.

This is precisely the value of a measurable, time sensitive plan. As I mentioned yesterday, a good plan isn’t designed to chart your entire course to a perfect pond, but it will help you to get off the lily pad. It gets you to jump.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Toxic Humility

We have all seen false humility: the guy who tries to hide his arrogance with feigned modesty. It’s usually pretty obvious and always obnoxious. But there is also another variation of false humility out there: toxic humility. This is often displayed in self-deprecating talk and a lack of self-confidence, belittling or undermining one’s own talents and abilities. The danger in this kind of behavior is twofold: it is too often accepted as true humility and like a virus, it spreads doubt and disbelief. To clarify, it is not that the bearer of this toxic humility isn’t honest about his view of himself. That is the very issue: he absolutely believes he has little value or utility. He thinks downplaying his own worth is humility but I disagree. CS Lewis said it best when he wrote, “Humility is not thinking less of yourself, it's thinking about yourself less.” His point being, true humility is not an ever-present raincloud of self-doubt that follows you around. It’s a focus on
Post a Comment
Read more

Primed for Progress

Just as some pumps need to be primed to work effectively, our lives need to be “primed” to flow efficiently. Good mornings and productive days don’t happen by accident, and by “priming” your day, you can set yourself up for better results. Does it mean you won’t have bad days? Of course not, but it’s making your day happen instead of just waiting for what happens. Once again, it’s a choice of being proactive rather than reactive. You will still have challenges and difficulties, but how you face those hurdles and respond to the struggles will be different with a primed mindset. I am sure there are many ways to prime your day and set the tone for the hours ahead, and what works for one won’t necessarily work for all. However, the process of creating a plan or a model of how things should unfold is a great place for anyone to start. Also, as I have mentioned before, how you actually start the morning is critical - the battle with the alarm clock is your first chance at victory for
Post a Comment
Read more

Flower Among Thorns

About six or seven years ago, my wife was around three months pregnant as we eagerly anticipated the birth of another child. One night, as I lay sleeping, I had a dream that our baby was born. It was a beautiful little girl with thin, wispy hair and large, bright eyes punctuating her beautiful face. I held her proudly in my arms and stared down at this precious little creation. I carefully handed her off to her older brother, who was just a toddler himself, as he sat on the coach, arms outstretched, anxiously awaiting the chance to hold his baby sister. I helped him prop up a pillow underneath his little arms to help support my daughter and then stepped back to take in the amazing sight as he gazed down at her with both pride and amazement in his eyes. As I stood there watching them, the dream quickly faded. When I woke up, my eyes met the tearful glance of my wife. “I’m bleeding,” she said as she fought back the emotions, “I think I am miscarrying.” Those words sunk deeply i
1 comment
Read more