The simplest way to improve your decisions . . . but one that most people ignore

Patience, so the saying goes, is a virtue. Maybe. More importantly though, it�€™s a certain antidote to false and hurried assumptions. Cultivating patience is the best way to find wisdom in a messy and complex world.

Given the patience to wait before reaching a definite decision, much may become clear that was murky or hidden before. It ought to be a no-brainer to be patient while reaching any important decision. It isn�€™t, mostly because today people value action for its own sake.

The current fashion prizes action so much it ignores the benefits of holding back when action must be premature. And so people hurry ahead blindly, like lemmings approaching a cliff above the ocean, intent only on doing something, anything, to content those for whom sitting and thinking is an obvious waste of time.

It�€™s unrealistic to imagine either that you can take in everything important at first glance, or that all you need to know is immediately available. Events unfold at their own pace. And while you don�€™t always need to wait until the very final piece of information becomes available, it�€™s usually unwise to jump into action while a good deal—maybe most—of the data and knowledge you need is still hidden.

�€œBe patient toward all that is unsolved in your heart and try to love the questions themselves. Do not now seek the answers, which cannot be given you because you would not be able to live them. And the point is to live everything. Live the questions�€�
                                Rainer Maria Rilke

When you �€œlive the questions,�€� you start on a path to true learning. Questions are so much more useful than mere answer —especially if those answers are based on convention, dogma, or supposed authority. No one ever learned much from answers. Only time spent wrestling with the most demanding questions can produce real insight and wisdom.

Slow Leadership tries to be free of such tomfoolery. To wait, to think, to consider alternatives, and allow the true facts to show themselves—these are marks of maturity and wisdom. Only a fool rushes towards the cliff edge when a little patience might have shown him how to avoid it.

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