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Let’s talk about rushing into things too fast. We’ve all done it. Heck, we tend to do it in most, if not all, areas of our lives. We rush to get ready in the morning and end up messing up our makeup or knocking the coffee all over the kitchen counter. We rush to get a report off to the boss and end up sending him the wrong file. We hurry up to get one more project finished around the house and end up making a wrong cut or skipping an important step early on in the assembly instructions. 

What’s the common denominator in all those hypothetical examples? We messed up and we ended up spending a lot of time cleaning up the mess we made. In hindsight, it would have been much faster to slow down, take our time, and do it right the first time. 

When We Rush, We Don’t Plan or Look Ahead 

It happens all the time. I rush headlong into a new project thinking that I know what I’m doing, only to find out down the road that I took a wrong turn early on. Or worse, I waste precious time on tasks I shouldn’t have been doing in the first place. For example, mopping the kitchen floor before you start to clean the top of the fridge is a waste of time. You end up mopping again after you raked all the dust and dirt off, with half of it ending up on the floor. 

Can you think of a time when you messed up because you didn’t plan or look ahead? What can you do to learn from this? 

When We Rush, We Miss Things 

Why did you spill the coffee, or lock yourself out of your own home? Because you missed something important (the cup on the counter, or the keys stuck in the pocket of the pants you wore yesterday). It’s easy to miss things when you’re in a rush because you’re not paying as much attention as you should. 

Can you think of a time when you missed something important because you were rushing? What can you do to learn from this? 

When We Rush, We Overlook the Simplest Solution

Here’s something I’ve found myself struggling with quite a bit. When I rush, I take the first or most obvious path. I do things the way I’ve always done them instead of stopping to see if there’s a better or easier solution. It often isn’t until someone points out that I could do something a different way with much less effort, that I notice my error. 

Can you think of a time when you overlooked an easier solution because you rushed? What can you do to learn from this?