Win the war between ‘right’ and ‘right now’

Unless you live in a cave, hurry is likely killing creativity in your life.  Few people have the opportunity to make something great in this fast-paced, instant-success-seeking world in which we live today.

I believe it’s time to challenge this obsession with quantity over quality.

I feel the same pull toward creating a bunch of content and posting plenty of information on social media you might be experiencing today. If you get a little boost of hormones every time you check another item off your to-do list, this can become an irresistible tractor beam pulling you toward accomplishment at the expense of greatness.

Even people who can withstand society’s tug toward keeping up with their neighbors are often compared by their output rather than their mastery.

With this article today, I want to slow down and take a step back to examine what this insane pace is doing to true creativity in our over-saturated, but under-satisfied, world today.  

Byron Morrison made a statement in his conversation with me on the last episode of Unbeatable that caused me to slow down and rethink our obsession with producing content ‘right now.’  

Go to the world’s great museums and see masterpieces that have endured centuries or millennia.  No matter the form of art, every item in the museum looks as if it consumed all of the artist’s energy, attention, and time.

While I respect every art form, from the written word to music, movies, paintings, and sculpture, I don’t feel moved by the random, rushed exhibits in the gallery.

When I slow down and reflect on this frantic, reactionary society, it’s clear that urgency is killing creativity in our age.  Even the books on the shelves today feel like they were all written under an intense deadline to finish a project rather than get it right.

If you also see the beauty in timeless tapestries and splendid gardens, then maybe you’ve also noticed this trend toward a soulless, unskilled, mass-produced society in which we live.  Feeling overwhelmed and overweight, Byron turned away from this pressure-to-produce society. 

By slowing down and reflecting on Byron’s decision to reorient his life, I began to look more closely at the quality of the content our society produces today compared to what was made 100 years ago.  Here are my suggestions to anyone wanting to pursue a quality life over quantity. 

Often the desire to produce content comes from insecurity rather than sincerity.  To choose a quality life, fight against the need to keep up with the assembly-line lifestyle of other influencers.  Putting your heart into what you produce will necessitate making less but improving it simultaneously.

Let me help you overcome the fear that often accompanies making something great.  When you’ve put your heart and soul into a project, there’s always a fear that it will be misunderstood or rejected.  Rather than avoiding this critique, you should expect it.  I can promise that the people who choose quantity over quality will not understand your most significant endeavors.  And those that do understand it will try to minimize your greatness by criticizing it. 

A life that produces quantity over quality is always motivated by short-term thinking.  It’s the immediate gratification of having something to post or putting something out there for the world to see that inspired many people in our instant-feedback society.  Unfortunately, most people trade this temporary instant gratification for the satisfaction of knowing you made something great. If you want to make a difference in the world, create something that will last longer than the latest fad.

This final step might be the most difficult in our day. The fast-paced world that technology and A.I. offer mandate giving a little bit of your time to many worthless projects rather than providing much time and energy to one worthy endeavor.  You must be ruthless with your use of time if you’re going to live a life of quality over quantity.

Thanks for taking the time to read to the end of this article.  I hope these brief thoughts have caused you to ask what you’re missing by scanning a lot of data rather than soaking in a little bit of data.  I hope you, like Byron Morrison, will choose to “become a better you” by following these simple steps.