Doing the Basics Well

Along with commitment, I was reminded that I need to focus on doing the basics well.  This is hard for me - much hard than one might think.

Why?  It is not for the reason that you might think, that somehow the basics are too difficult (they are not) or too hard (again, they are not).  It is because I get easily bored and I look to more knowledge as the way to be admired and be great, rather than doing the basics well.

1) Bored:  I get bored easily.  Or maybe said differently, I have a short attention span.  Either way, I have problems focusing on the same sort of thing week after week or year after year.  I lose interest because I have done the same thing over and over and over (and often times, it seems like I am not getting any better at all).  My solution is to continue to want to learn new things rather than truly mastering the basics well.

2)  More knowledge:  I want to be acknowledged and recognized.  Badly.  So badly that I think that quickly moving forward to more visible appearances and presentations (through greater knowledge) is the key.  I often tend to skim over the stuff that is difficult (or boring, see item 1) rather than work to really dig down and get that right.  Why?  Because somewhere I have come to believe (and maybe in the business world it is presented this way)  that this is the way to move forward in life.  Which works - up to the point that you are actually called upon to us the basic knowledge only to discover that it is really not there.

It was a needed reminder (iaijutsu is good for all kinds of life lessons) that my focus needs to be on the basics:  knowing them, doing them well, being able to show them to others.  It may mean that in fact the "greater knowledge" is never achieved - but I need to realize that such a thing is not the ultimate value of the learning.  It is in doing something well, knowing it fully, and being able to execute it completely - even if it is basic - that the true basis for success is found.