Not preparing to win is preparing to lose, or as we used to say, proper prior planning prevents piss poor performance. Whichever road your pithy alliterative adage style preference takes, there is, as always, something to be said about either path.
There is a high road as well as its lower counterpart. Fundamentally the reference in each is to the dichotomy between values. In the former it must be assumed that winning is better than losing and in the latter that piss poor performance is to be avoided at all cost. Especially if the performance assessment is to be compared to coyote urine.
Why in the word would then would I, on the Sunday morning before a monumental road trip of epic proportions, working from my trusty check list of equipment and tools of the trade to pack, take the opposing viewpoint to the above solid sound bits of advice?
While it may have roots in the work of Richard Restak, whose Mozart’s Brain and the Fighter Pilot, brain building handbook I am plodding my way through, it has long been my feeling that there is beauty to the art of chance, of chaos and or getting lost in order to find something of value. Like ourselves.
Long time readers may recall the heresy I have often suggested as a philosophical probability that the one true winning is losing. And while no-one should prepare to lose, when it does happen, even at even odds, the TAKE AWAY from our losing, the lessons of the loss, are what builds character, wisdom and experience that may, as the other side of the coin, come up heads and provide us with a bigger victory than the initial one could ever have provided. There is some faith required here because one must be patient enough to get through the pain and possible humiliation of the first defeat. One must by experience keep moving, stay alive and see that the war can be won despite the painful loss of the most recent battle. So yes, prepare to win, but should you lose, take the lesson and toss the exhaust. LEARN THAT LESSON.
We practice to improve. We repeat drills to enhance our skills. With practice comes confidence. With confidence comes a rare opportunity. When one has reached a high level of competence, one stands at the crossroads. One can now take the next step and trust her skills to thoroughly, so completely that the thinking bout the doing vanishes leaving the muse of satori, she of pure creation, ready and willing to take a solo. And we blindly lose ourselves in the process, ego and fear asked politely to take a seat. This willingness to search for the sound takes incredible courage and can crush individuals not up to the task. So, yes, proper planning in the form of hours of (perfect) practice improves significantly the odds of success, but sometimes the intentional non-prep practice of leaving your map and compass behind to explore the magic of wanderlust provides rewards far greater that that safe path of the road more traveled.
I will prepare and I will plan as best I can today. To be ready for tomorrow. It is a ritual I am familiar with and appreciate. There is discipline and habit, method and ease of mind in this somewhat anal process. I have done it enough to know that one of the main reason why I use the check list is so that I can relax and not lay awake all night wondering what I might have missed or forgot. I have a backup plan for that as well, fully cognizant that of the 2,500 miles I will log over the next 5 days, there will be 100 Home Depots, 75 Wal-Marts, 50 Denny’s and enough gas stations, cheap motels and coffee shops to get me out of almost any temporary jamb. As another example, I really miss hitchhikers. Oh for 500 miles with Sissy Hankshaw.
It is what I find when GPS fails that I seek.
Hence, I prepare to fail, ready to make lemonade out of any piss poor performance that might arise from the ashes of nomadic chaos while searching for the magic well beyond the regular and routine, so far of the beaten path that there is little trace. The single-track of the soul.
Because whose fault is a flat tire anyway?
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