FLEXIBILITY

" To improve is to change; to be perfect is to change often" - Winston Churchill

Flexibility is defined as being adaptable to change. In the course of your lifetime, you will be tempted to try to hold on to what is, when in fact, what is is only a temporary phase that evolves almost immediately into what was. It is essential that you learn to bend and flex around every new circumstance, as rigidity robs you of the opportunity to see the freedom of new possibilities.

In order to truly embrace your role as a student of life, you need to cultivate the ability to move easily from "knowingness" to "not-knowingness," which in turn moves you from master to student again and again. In other words, you learn the lesson of flexibility once you are able to flow with what is coming next rather than clinging to the way things are presently.

Paradigms change over time, and so must you. Your company may restructure, and you will have to survive. Your spouse may choose to leave the marriage, and you will have to cope. Technology will continue to advance and change, and you must constantly learn and adapt or risk becoming a dinosaur.Flexibility allows you to be ready for whatever curve lies ahead in life instead of getting blindsided by it.

From 1900 to 1967, the Swiss were the leading watchmakers in the world. In 1967, when the digital technology was patented by the Swiss, they rejected it in favor of the traditional ball bearings, gears, and mainsprings they had been using to make watches for decades.

Unfortunately, however, the  world was ready for this advance, and Seiko, a Japanese company, picked up the digital patent and became the leading watch manufacturer in the world almost overnight. Fifty thousand of the 67,000 Swiss watchmakers went out of business because they refused to embrace this new technology. It was not until years later that the Swiss caught up and regained their position in the marketplace with the creation of Swatch watches.

Learn to be flexible; it makes the curves in your life path much easier to maneuver.