The Tortoise and the Hare
July 8th, 2016 by Katherine Moller
I am sure that you are familiar with this parable… The tortoise works away slowly but surely while the hare gets distracted, and ends up losing the race. Perhaps I should have put a spoiler alert before that!
There are three different events that have occurred in my life (and in the lives of those around me) over the past few weeks that have reminded me of how true that parable is in so many
aspects of our lives:
- Music – I just had three students complete their exams recently with varying degrees of preparation and varying degrees of success. We do not yet know the results, so I am judging success on how the students felt as they exited the exam. We all have the best of intentions about practicing, and especially practicing scales… They are not particularly fun, and are easy to skip when practicing. Here is the issue though: you really can’t cram with music. You really can’t learn all of your scales right at the last minute right before the exam. Even if you were to spend a lot of time working on scales right before the exam – it would not produce the same results as if that same amount of work was spread out over time. The good old tortoise wins again with regular practice plodding toward the goal.
- Exercise – A friend of mine just recently had surgery on his knee and is now doing physio to get his muscle tone back up to par around his knee. Due to life getting in the way (as it seems to do so often); the first week he did not accomplish the exercising he had planned on, so tried to make up for lost time in the second week. Yet again, this is a place that one cannot cram.
- Weight Loss – This is kind of related to the exercise story above… I have decided again that I want to lose some weight. I have noticed at Pilates that I am just not able to roll into as small a ball as I was last year. I still feel quite good, but have noticed a few differences. I have returned to watching what I eat and walking several days a week on top of continuing with my regular Pilates routine. I have noticed a change in some of the exercises since I started behaving a bit better again, and have managed to lose 5 pounds over the last month and a half. I should be happy about that (and actually am), but I want immediate results! I want to feel slim and trim right away after changing my eating habits instead of waiting.
So, I hope to keep our dear friend the tortoise in mind as I continue on my journey of learning music, exercising, and trying to maintain a healthy diet. There is no quick fix, and by getting distracted like the hare, we get off course and may lose the race. In all of these areas of life, slow and steady wins the race. This is true even though it is not necessarily fun, and even though there are not immediate rewards!
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