Planning over Doing

There exists out there a wonderful tool for personal and career assessment called the Birkman. One of the things it measure is 11 components of how you function in a work environment. It tells you what your usual behavior is, what you need from others, and what kind of crazy you do when you don’t get it. (well, they just call it stress behavior).

I heart the Birkman because it finally explained me to me. See, with most people, their usual behavior and needs line up – like if they like to work alone, they also need others to leave them alone. They’re easy to read. Not me. I like to keep it interesting. On 7 of the 11 components I have what is called a “cross” where my usual behavior is on one side of the spectrum but my need is the opposite. Then sometimes my crazy stress behavior runs back to the other side. I like to keep people guessing!

Two of my “crosses” are in Activity and Thought. In Activity, I have a fairly high score, meaning I like to be busy. I operate best there. But my need is lower, which means I do actually need to take the time to think before I do things. My Thought score is low – I will make snap decisions most of the time. Unfortunately, my need is high, which means I later take the time to think about my decisions and often regret my rashness.

That’s all a long introduction to yesterday’s victory o’ the day. Because my usual behavior on these two components makes me run top speed without much thought, I know that I need to discipline myself to take time for reflection and planning, or I get worn out and lose focus. Resisting the temptation to do instead is difficult. But I did. I spent all of yesterday (aside from one hour of a massage which was glorious) planning and praying and thinking about my life. It was so good. Now I’m off again!

What are you calling victory today?