As the New Year approached, I thought of a great resolution: Arrive on time. Eliminate all ideas of lateness.<\/p>\n
When I am late, I feel horrible. One of my personal values is following through and keeping to my mind. The idea that I didn’t arrive when I said that I would arrive or when I would deliver something shakes me to my core. The fact that guilt settles into my bloodstream for hours on end that I profusely give apologies (or in some cases, avoidance due to fear) is unsettling.<\/p>\n
What if I never was late? Wouldn’t that be crazy?<\/p>\n
What if I could always arrive on time so that other people would soon start doing the same?<\/p>\n
Because after all, many reasons leading to lateness were usually procrastination, misestimation of the time to travel or to produce, not valuing someone’s time, enjoying my sleeptime. Ridiculous shallow stuff.<\/p>\n
But then I thought about the repercussions. Sure, that meant that I would have reduce the time I spend on other activities in order to make sure I arrive on time. Or that I would have to spend more time thoughtfully planning my days and minutes, which isn’t a horrible bad thing.<\/p>\n
But the worst part, the one reason why I couldn’t do this as a resolution, was the dependence on factors beyond my control. Whether it was public transit or unforeseen traffic. Or a passenger or a driver that didn’t prioritize the same way I do and made me late. Or even worse, team members that were responsible for delivering something that I couldn’t personally provide due to my lack of skill (or time).<\/p>\n
And so as a result that resolution was crushed. The fact that many things that I do rely on others\u00e2\u20ac\u201dcompanies, devices, colleagues\u00e2\u20ac\u201dmeant that punctuality couldn’t be guaranteed 100% of the time. That I couldn’t predict that someone was “tired” or “just couldn’t get to it”. Or that they overslept. Those images rile me up and there’s so little I could do.<\/p>\n
In college, when I was interviewing for a job, I arrived one hour early, partly because I didn’t want to arrive late (and didn’t have anything else planned). The interviewer spotted me in the hallway as I was patiently waiting. “You’re early,” he said.<\/p>\n
“Yes,” I smiled. “I’ll wait here.”<\/p>\n
“Um…okay,” he said uncomfortably and returned to the conference room.<\/p>\n
I always took that as a cue that early was not a good thing. A sign of desperation? A sign that I was not a busy person? I was rejected that year and reapplied the following year, arriving only 10 minutes early. Less than a week later, I got the job.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
As the New Year approached, I thought of a great resolution: Arrive on time. Eliminate all ideas of lateness. When I am late, I feel horrible. One of my personal values is following through and keeping to my mind. The … Continue reading