It’s a football term, or certainly a sporting one—that of the ‘closing speed.’ It describes a player in pursuit of a ball so bent on possession they’ll actually increase their speed toward the ball as they arrive at it; or so it appears. What great closing speed is really about is being deceptively quick, catching an opponent out.
There’s a key principle involved here. The speed that matters is the speed at which the player hits the ball with—it’s when the rubber hits the road so-to-speak. It’s the event (i.e. of reaching the ball) that matters.
And it’s the same in life. The most important time for us is the time we’re expected to perform. In the meantime we plan but we waste our precious mental and emotional resources if we worry about things, ‘running hard’ in practise.
The speed we actually hit the issues of life with is the speed that counts—all else is rather superfluous.
But it seems to me that the key matter of doubt (manifested as worry) here reveals a lack of trust. We don’t trust ourselves when in fact we might’ve succeeded many times before.
In other words, we worry unnecessarily about how we’ll perform when we’ve already proved time and again that we can do it. Is this sane thinking?
And even it’s our first time, or if we’ve failed before, we have the choice to place faith in ourselves. We’ve actually got nothing to lose and plenty to gain in being courageous in our self-placed faith.
We can honour our closing speed on particular life issues, provided we’ve planned and prepared well. Let’s trust ourselves more and save our important energies for when they’re actually required.
© S. J. Wickham, 2009.
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