The Slippery Slope

Do you ever wonder what happened to the bright eyed student that you used to be? Do people change into the couch lounging tv watching slobs overnight?
For most people the process of becoming something that they do not desire is the result of many small choices that compound each other over time. I know that from my personal experience the process of "accepting" to be ordinary did not happen overnight, but was gradual that began from much smaller roots. Once I bought the alarm clock that allowed me to snooze, there was a major shift in the tide of what is acceptable and what is not. It was now acceptable to allow my subconscious to believe that putting something off (getting up) was totally acceptable. It happened everyday! Well if that is acceptable, then putting off other things that are not immediately satisfying must be acceptable too right? Right, and thus begins the slippery slope that many of us have been sliding down since we ended up on our own (at college or universtiy- or after we got out of our parents home)
There are many small decisions that may not seem to be incredibly important when you make them, but if we look at the compounded effects of those decisions, we see another more obvious path that we chose solely by making bad small decisions.
Let's look at weight gain for example. I know that I ALWAYS feel better when I eat right, sleep well and excercise. (This is what I tell my kids when they want to know what I think is the ingredients to health--I will explore that in another posting) But I have gone through periods in my life where I did not eat well, and did not exercise regularly and as a result I did not sleep well. What do you suppose the eventual outcome of that scenario is? Weight gain! ANd then when I did gain weight, what did I tell myself? "It's ok to just watch one more show before getting up to do something active..." for many of us that 'One more show' turned into 3 or 4 or 10! Well that is a slippery slope that can take us into the pits of despair isn't it? I have been fortunate enough to realize when I am going down the slippery slope, and I have course corrected to get myself on the right path again. Have you done the same?
Another analogy for the slippery slope is what you will do for your company with respect to what is right, what is wrong, and what is easy and what is not. There is a great example of what not to do for and to a company as shown by the employees of far too many banks in the US and Canada during the period of 2005-2008. Many were just doing what was easy and immediately gratifying to their bottom dollar, without consideration for the future, and whether or not a multi mortgaged economy could survive. The result was a terrible (and totally preventable) recession.
For many businesses, the future may seem bright, and for others the future looks like it is full of work. Just remember: like the exercise that your body needs, your business needs hard work and constant correct decisions being made to keep it on the proper path. One of the things that I do is to keep a card with my priorities numbered from 1-5 on it:
1. My Health (and fitness)
2. My Family/Friends health and safety
3. Learning and growing
4. Helping others through my work
5. Giving back to community/charity work
I find that if the decisions that I make are not in alignment with my priorities, then I need to re-evaluate my decisions.
So before you let a slippery slope decision take you down the wrong path, make sure that you are evaluating each decision based on your own set of priorities. Don't always do what's easy, choose what is right!