BREAKFAST AT REDS
Tuesday Oct. 30, 2018
Open people are more fun, aren’t they?
Too often we all are so busy we don’t have time for surprises. I don’t mean spooky ‘boo’ from someone lurking around a corner on Oct. 31st or surprise party. I mean ‘being open to a surprising conversation or turn of events’, the kind of 90 minute meeting that takes all morning for instance …
I’ve told this story – about an annoying pompous jerk I met; he smiled lots but said little, wouldn’t commit to ‘how or now or clarify anything’ – just, “we’ll see in the fullness of time”. I hated his stonewalling, but loved that phrase, ‘the fullness of time’.
After a recent breakfast meeting I’m expanding my meaning of and appreciation for time and its fullness.
Not all morning – but 7:30-11:00 is extraordinary. Driving home that meeting the other day I wondered how things might have gone if both of us had somewhere else to be, or rigid thinking. It was clear within the first few minutes that our allotted 90 minutes of breakfast and discussion time was insufficient. We could either limit the scope or arrange more time another day. As it turned out we both had time. And time flew. Suddenly, without constraints of a time-limit, conversation and ideas flowed, stories were told complete with tangential side-bars and plenty of digression too.
Or it unlocked by some other key?
Maybe we can all be open, be more fun if we have the time, took the time and scheduled the time.
I’ve been pondering this and I’m looking at a strategy change. I’m going to try it. I’m going to ask for 30 or 60 minutes more than usual when I make appointments. Not so all go longer, but so that more meetings could take longer, so there is more time available for discussion, chemistry and exploring new ideas or opportunities because the parties are available, willing and have sufficient time.
Our time, short or long, can never be full unless we have a mindset which allows it to be full – full of ideas, full or listening, full of openness. It might not ever lead to a ‘big deal’, but I’m becoming convinced that it might be a great key to unlocking people, ideas and possibilities.
Conclusion?
Planning to make the time available, take the time – allowing that extra time to be the fuel and engine that lets open minds relax, play and imagine what could be …
Reader feedback:
PICKING OUR FRIENDS
I read your musing about friends. Hope you are surround by really good ones!, CM, Victoria, BC
