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I’m in the process of working on a more involved post (actually a set of posts) about skill acquisition. But I thought I’d post something short in the meantime.
I’m an extremely future-oriented individual and my thoughts generally revolve around implications for the future. In general, I’m extremely happy about this bias and the ability to make decisions that it affords me. I think of it as a gift. But, in the past, I think this future orientation was at times to such a high degree that it became a fault.
If you focus too much on the future, you dim the experience that is happening now. I’m up for having a good time, particularly if it’s a unique experience. But an important lesson I had to learn was how to continuously incite and devour a vibrant present.
And that’s where fraternity brothers come in handy. They helped a lot because I was able to see just how much fun anything can be if you choose to make it so.
One of the guys goes out of town: this is obviously an opportunity to fill his room wall to wall with thousands of balloons! (what a fantastic idea,truly amazing)
Have to wake up early to do community service at a food bank: challenge somebody to race to see who can pack boxes the fastest, and if you’re watching, place bets and cheer.
There are many examples of things like this. I’m pretty sure you can make anything fun so long as you’re with at least a few good people. However, this has a particularly important implication for leadership. Here’s another anecdote:
Every summer, we would have to prepare the fraternity house for the summer boarders, which entailed getting the house cleaned up and rooms setup with desks and a bed. This could often require moving around a lot of very heavy desks.
I was in charge of this one summer, and I appointed one of the older brothers to lead the desk moving crew. After all the assignments had been made, this particular brother raised a fist and shouted, “To the Beacon!” and his crew came running. They took frequent breaks, which this task required, and the crew leader would do this very same thing to pull the team back together. This small practice, imbibed with a bit of energy and light-heartedness, changed the nature of the desk-moving task into a more positive experience. More than just the desk-moving crew, it made me, the guy in charge, feel better about whether or not we were going to get the damn house put back together in time.
~
I suppose it’s worth asking, are there limits to how much fun you should have? Well, thankfully my fraternity brothers have again come to the rescue to test that:
(video embed appears to not be working try here: MIT ATO Window Jumping
Note: By posting this I do not condone it, and of course, encourage everyone to never do this, so don’t try this at home, kids.)
-Kevin
8.29.2011
