December 30

Good drivers understand the importance of accelerating into a curve.

When I was teaching my son to drive a few years back, he was sometimes overly cautious when going into a curve in the road. He would slow down to the point that it became dangerous to us and to anyone behind us who wasn’t expecting it. While an overly cautious approach is warranted in some circumstances, to a new driver it seems counter-intuitive to accelerate into a turn rather than slowing through it. It took some serious convincing to help him see that accelerating through the curve is how you maintain better control of the car.

In a similar way, many people slow way down when they encounter uncertainty. Almost to a crawl. This is not only counter-productive in many instances, it’s actually dangerous. When you slip into “creative panic mode” you don’t think clearly. You take a defensive approach rather than an offensive one, which means that you aren’t seeking answers, but are instead you are trying to avoid mistakes. You aren’t aggressively pursuing your goals, you are trying to avoid messing things up.

As you consider the coming year and any changes you know are coming, how can you “accelerate into the curve” instead of becoming paralyzed with inaction?

Question: Is there any place where you are currently behaving in a manner that is too cautious?