Friday at Five: Voltaire, The Panama Canal and Rest Days
Happy Friday, friends! I've been dialing in this newsletter and website for a few weeks now, getting ready to go on a public journey of writing and launching a book.
I'm working on not freezing up and instead taking the simple next step that I know, even if I don't know the step after that. It's fun to get unstuck consistently by taking one step at a time.
What do you do when you don't know what to do? Not a rhetorical question. Send me what you do when you don't know what to do!
Now, on to this week's Friday at Five to help us finish the week well:
💬 "Judge a man by his questions rather than his answers." - Voltaire
🤔 The Panama Canal
The Panama Canal was a massive undertaking, spanning 51 miles, raising boats 85 feet up one side and down the other. Every boat that crosses the canal uses 52 million gallons of water! It took 40 years to build, with many failures along the way.
A few insights:
The first man to attempt to build was the obvious choice. He failed miserably and ended up getting arrested for defrauding investors. The obvious choice isn't always the right choice.
They built the canal bigger than any ship that existed at the time because the leaders recognized ships were increasing in size at a rapid pace at this point in history. This was harder work on the front end but meant that the canal stood the test of time, remaining in place from 1914 until 2007 when it was expanded. Build for the future, even if it's harder in the now.
One of the biggest problems was worker health. Malaria and yellow fever, spread by mosquitos, ravaged the area with an 8 month rainy season. They had to fumigate 500 square miles continuosly just to keep the work going. In almost every case, health precedes long lasting success.
📚 Bigger, Faster Leadership
Want to read more on the Panama Canal? Sam Chand wrote an incredible book that got these thoughts flowing for me called Bigger, Faster Leadership.
🏃🏻♂️ "Rest days are as important as race days."
If you're like me, you struggle to sit still. That has been true in every area of my life, including running.
I've had a mantra as I've been training for races. "Rest days are as important as race days."
A lack of rest is usually connected to a lack of trust.
>For running, when I don't rest, I don't trust that I've trained and that I'll be ready for the race.
>For work, when I don't rest, I don't trust my team. (Ludicrous. I have great teams!)
>For my soul, when I don't rest, I'm not trusting God to handle things and am instead trying to control things.
What is interesting is that I've been able to put in more miles in a shorter amount of time than any time in my life, all with no injuries. Why? I've taken, on average, one week off for every two weeks running. The graph below shows this. While you might get caught on the high mileage weeks (and yes, that took a lot of time), I pause more at the discipline it took to break for the low mileage weeks in between.
The challenge for me and you: Where do we need to take a break? As it turns out, resting propels us forward just like working.
💬 "There are no shortcuts. There are no substitutes. Success is a derivative of persistence." - Mark Batterson, The Circle Maker
Finish your week well!
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