I read an article by Dr. Denis Waitley about freedom from urgency. He talks about defining priorities and how we get caught up in the “urgent” things. These fires that we encounter each day take us away from doing what we love and care about. He writes, “What we seldom realize is that the really important things in our life don’t make such strict demands on us, and therefore we usually assign them a lower priority.” He means things like health, relationships, solitude, chasing our dreams, etc. He’s right and it got me thinking about how the little things, the minutia, that we encounter every day also distract us from achieving our dreams.
I’m reminded of a colleague who loves to discuss the minutia of every little technical challenge. This conference call was a high-level strategic overview and didn’t require any in-depth technical discussions. Yet, my colleague continued to get ever deeper into insignificant minutia. He literally extended the meeting by almost 15 minutes. In effect, the meeting was useless. It is an easy trap for people to fall into, especially those in the technology industry but it can happen to anyone who is passionate about what they do. They get a big thrill discussing the intricacies of something. Look, there is always a time and place for minutia. You just have to know when and where to apply it. If you don’t, not only will you bog yourself down with unimportant information, your colleagues will won’t appreciate it very much.
The other problem with blabbing on about minutia is people will think you like to hear yourself talk. No one else can get a word in because you’re still blabbing! Learn to say only what is necessary to move the conversation along. The positive outcome is shorter meetings! Speak and write with scarcity and authority.
