Moving Walkways: Smooth Transitions in a Frantic World

There is HOPE!

It is often assumed that the cause of death in an automobile accident is speed. It is far more accurate to understand that it’s not the speed that hurts—it’s the sudden LACK of speed that causes the damage.

A sniper’s bullet travels at over twice the speed of sound. Pulling the trigger on the rifle would give the shooter an immediate feeling for how much rear-ward force the expanding gases from the ignition of the gunpowder exert on their shoulder. For the unprepared, the shock can be painful and distracting at best.

Have you ever wondered why lottery winners are likely to squander their vast winnings—often ending up more destitute than before their windfall?

Why does the psychiatric community care so much about major life stressors? What is it about death, divorce, marriage, retirement, pregnancy, schools, or other life changes that causes so much risk for people?

Popular management books have focused on different ways of managing change through adopting better habits, getting things done more efficiently, better coping with unintentional mis-location of dairy products, or better managing constraints.

A son of mine once convinced my wife to let him jump out of a moving car, thinking, “it’s not even going 5 miles an hour—I can run WAY faster than that!” While he could easily work up to a 10-mph run over a few seconds of acceleration, our budding track star found out that the ground disagreed with his optimistic leap of faith and proved him wrong. 5 mph is too fast for most (except maybe the Road Runner with fully-spun-up legs).

Moving Walkways is a filter, a perspective, or a metaphor that allows challenging situations to be approached in a pro-active, easy-to-digest way. It also provides a common paradigm so teams can collaborate on fast-moving projects.

Is accelerating to twice the speed of sound in sub-second time comfortable for a 30 gram bullet? (Ask your shoulder after shooting one!)

Could your body move at the same speed comfortably? No, right? Actually (according to Scientific American), the answer is “Yes”, because right now, if you’re on earth, you are:

• Moving 460 meters per second (more than the 343.2 meters per second speed of sound) at the equator because of the earth’s rotation—slower closer to the poles.
• Revolving around the sun at a speed of 30,000 meters per second (over 87 times the speed of sound).
• Revolving (as an entire solar system in a completely different direction) around the center of the Milky Way at a speed of 220,000 meters per second (over 643 times the speed of sound).
• Rushing (as an entire galaxy in a completely different direction) at 1,000,000 meters per second (over 2,923 times the speed of sound).

It’s the ACCELERATION that is uncomfortable — a common speed compared to your surroundings is comfortable.

The point is this—whatever level of stress you feel resulting from a challenge, roadblock, or opportunity is directly related to HOW MUCH your momentum differs from your proposed path.

In other words, if you’re feeling stress, it’s because of the gap you perceive between the pace you are at and the pace you are moving to and the discomfort from the acceleration or deceleration.

The Moving Walkways blog will discuss a toolset for changing perspectives and executing plans that remove the uncomfortable lurches in momentum. It will assist in building real-life strategies for easing transition difficulties and maximizing change management.