Our goal with the weekly Catalyst Compass columns isn’t to provide “answers” (AI or Google can provide an endless string of those). Rather, it’s our hope they trigger a few moments of reflection – the opportunity to ponder the topic at hand and think through how you might want to make a tweak or two along the way. They’re intended to be a catalyst for thinking – really thinking. As in going beneath the knee-jerk, autopilot response we’re all (me included) prone to building our lives around. When it comes to this form of thinking, computer scientist and mathematician Leslie Lamport has an important reminder for all of us:
“If you’re thinking without writing, you just think you’re thinking.”
Ouch.
When it comes to our health & wellbeing, we know change is (extremely) difficult. If it were simply a matter of information = application, I wouldn’t be writing this column in the first place because we’d all have everything dialed in (hint: we don’t – or at least I don’t). Maybe Lamport is onto something important in terms of our wellbeing too. Afterall, we have access to all the answers in the world at our fingertips – yet the application piece consistently falls short. Maybe there is a “write” way to change that trend…
If you’re already someone who enjoys journaling, maybe that’s a solid starting point. Consider adding 1 sentence (or paragraph) each time you sit down to write about what you’re learning and trying related to your personal health, wellness & performance. Note the struggles, the new insights, the successes! Then perhaps look back every few months to get a broader sense of your progress over time, where it will be much more apparent than what we see in today’s mirror.
If journaling isn’t your thing, maybe this episode on a new way to journal will come in handy. One of the many tips included is to reformat what we “count” as journaling. Rather than making it a task, yet another “should” where I fall short time and time again, simply sit down with a pen and open journal in a quiet place for 5 minutes. If you write nothing and just stare out the window, that’s still considered your daily journaling. Or maybe a single word comes to mind and you write that word on the page. Or maybe it starts to flow. The point is – it doesn’t matter. By taking the time to allow yourself to write (and thus think more deeply), the change has an opportunity to be revealed.
Revealing. That’s the word, isn’t it? You have – we all have – such potential to move (ourselves and our communities) toward a better tomorrow. It’s there… waiting. Perhaps through the power of the pen, thinking we’re thinking will shift toward a deeper understanding, a revealing of that better tomorrow… today.