I was talking with my friend this morning, and he was telling me about his golf game. He said that he needs a new full set of woods, and perhaps even a new set of irons. I asked him how long he’s had his current set of golf clubs, and he said only about six months. I asked him if his game had improved enough to warrant buying a new set, and he said it didn’t really matter, that his game was ready. I didn’t know what that meant, so I asked him. He said it had something to do with being on the cusp, or the apex or something else that sounded like an excuse to buy a new set of clubs. Sometimes I think he likes to argue just for the sake of arguing.
Like this other friend of mine that I go fishing with sometimes. He has a gigantic tackle box with about eighteen million different lures. Once when the fish weren’t biting, he gave me the entire history and theory behind each type of lure. All I I know is I usually lose two lures for every fish that I catch. He was telling me that he has this system. He can tell what kind of fish are in the area, and he uses a specific type of lure and other set up (I’m not sure of the proper fishing lingo,) based on the type of fish and their current temperament. I, on the other hand, usually grab the first lure I see, which naturally is the closest. He kept telling that I didn’t know what I was doing. And although I agreed, I suggested a wager to see who would catch more fish.
I am of the philosophy that you can take whatever you have, throw it out there, and then let whatever fish that happen to like that kind of lure come and get it. Maybe I’m lazy, but I don’t see any reason to change whatever you are doing to try and match the environment you’re in. I think it’s easier just to throw out what you got, and see how much you can attract.Â
It’s like an old friend of mine that used to be in door to door sales. He swore by using the exact same sales pitch to every single person that opened the door. Others in his company would try to vary their pitch based on the gender, age, ethnicity, color shirt (I kid you not,) and all kinds of other stuff. He said it was a lot easier to memorize only one pitch, and then just throw the same pitch time after time. He was able to be more successful than anybody else for quite a while.
So we each fished for two hours with our respective lure methods. And we each caught the same amount of fish. While that sounds like a tie, when my friend was fished with his method, he was studying the lures and prepping his next strategy. When I fished using my method, I read Moby Dick.
And I convinced my friend to only allow himself a new set of clubs after he’d managed to consistently improve his score to lower than a hundred.