I'm not sure if you've seen "School of Rock" starring Jack Black, but there's a scene in the movie where Joan Cusack, who plays a tough-as-nails prep school principal reviled for her disciplinarian ways, tells her fellow colleagues that it's always best to "over prepare." "The best defense is a good offense," she goes on to say.
As someone with OCD-like tendencies, I've always lived by this motto. Just yesterday, as I was pulling into the parking lot of my barber shop, I noticed there was no available parking, which left me no choice but to find a metered space in the adjacent street. I debated how much change to put in the meter and wound up putting enough to last me an hour and 40 minutes. Initially, I thought I had gone overboard. "Why did I put so much?" I asked myself.
It usually takes my barber about 20-30 minutes to cut my hair, but the only difference was this particular appointment was scheduled for the early afternoon. (I normally schedule morning visits.) That's probably why my gut told me I should put more change than I initially assumed would be necessary.
As it turns out, the place was crawling with customers. I had to wait 30 minutes for my turn, and then the barber took another half-hour to cut my hair. That means I still had 40 unused minutes on the meter when I left, but I cut it a lot closer than I'd anticipated.
My point is that it's always served me well to, as Cusack put it, over prepare. I like carrying a little more money than I need, toting a medicine bag should the need strike, stocking up on foods and other items that may come in handy in the event of a power outage or natural disaster, and so on. You just never know what could happen, so why not imagine the worst-case scenario and plan accordingly?
The words I feel encapsulate this tendency best all begin with the letter p: "proactive," "preventive," and "preemptive." I realize not everyone lives his or her life this way. Many of my closest friends are the spur-of-the-moment, go-with-the-flow kind who waits for a problem to arise before dealing with it. I'm the complete opposite, which has given me peace of mind and served me quite well in life.
Are you the type of person who over prepares? Do you prepare for the worst, just in case? Or are you the loosey goosey kind who prefers to tackle problems rather than prevent them?
As someone with OCD-like tendencies, I've always lived by this motto. Just yesterday, as I was pulling into the parking lot of my barber shop, I noticed there was no available parking, which left me no choice but to find a metered space in the adjacent street. I debated how much change to put in the meter and wound up putting enough to last me an hour and 40 minutes. Initially, I thought I had gone overboard. "Why did I put so much?" I asked myself.
It usually takes my barber about 20-30 minutes to cut my hair, but the only difference was this particular appointment was scheduled for the early afternoon. (I normally schedule morning visits.) That's probably why my gut told me I should put more change than I initially assumed would be necessary.
As it turns out, the place was crawling with customers. I had to wait 30 minutes for my turn, and then the barber took another half-hour to cut my hair. That means I still had 40 unused minutes on the meter when I left, but I cut it a lot closer than I'd anticipated.
My point is that it's always served me well to, as Cusack put it, over prepare. I like carrying a little more money than I need, toting a medicine bag should the need strike, stocking up on foods and other items that may come in handy in the event of a power outage or natural disaster, and so on. You just never know what could happen, so why not imagine the worst-case scenario and plan accordingly?
The words I feel encapsulate this tendency best all begin with the letter p: "proactive," "preventive," and "preemptive." I realize not everyone lives his or her life this way. Many of my closest friends are the spur-of-the-moment, go-with-the-flow kind who waits for a problem to arise before dealing with it. I'm the complete opposite, which has given me peace of mind and served me quite well in life.
Are you the type of person who over prepares? Do you prepare for the worst, just in case? Or are you the loosey goosey kind who prefers to tackle problems rather than prevent them?
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