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Welcome to Bite Size – our bi-monthly blog where we explore a topic in bite size form – short, sharp and easy to digest
The process versus the result
During the summer holidays I spent time with my nephew building a sandcastle on a beach. Now this is a rite of passage for most children and we spent a happy hour digging, filling our buckets and building a really impressive fortress. It was an hour full of joy. When we had finished and we sat back to admire our efforts, he took one step back, leapt and squashed it. Just like that.
I know I am probably past the age where this should have upset me, but it really did. I was proud of that castle and was amazed it could have been destroyed so quickly.
Yet, once I’d recovered, I realised that our joy hadn’t come from the result but from the process of co-creating it. It is the process of doing something well that stands out in your mind more than what you actually achieve – the process is the thing in which you put all your effort.
Next time you are in the process of creating something, take a moment to appreciate the effort you are putting in, rather than rushing on and only focusing on the result you are aiming to achieve.