“Am I aware that reacting on impulse—saying the first thing that pops into my head—defeats my own purposes?” (ODAT, 25 August)
Recently, someone wanted to get me on the phone to talk through how to approach a particular endeavour. I declined the offer and suggested instead that the dialogue would be conducted more effectively in writing. I don’t think they appreciated this and wanted to get it over and done with on the phone, right then and there.
Except that this would have required me to respond to quite a body of new information without pause for reflection. A few seconds’ pause in a conversation is not enough. Some things require minutes, hours, a day, or days.
In fact, an awful lot of exchanges are best conducted in writing.
It takes much longer to do things properly.
But if there is a single thread running through all actions suggested by the programme, it is the notion of doing things properly, not sketchily, not quickly.
I’m amazed at how people respond badly to this slowing down: to me, it’s such a relief to take things slowly, to think about things properly, to take time to do things properly, and not to have to worry about ‘getting things done and dusted’.
When they are, finally, done, they’ll have been done properly, and the stitch in time saves nine.