Day: September 18, 2017

Because I’m in Europe as I wrote yesterday’s post, I screwed up my dates and didn’t post on the topic I had intended. Yesterday was the seventieth anniversary of our nations beloved Air Force. All the authors served in our Air Force so I think it’s only appropriate to post on this topic even if it’s a day late.

I don’t think any of us joined the Air Force with the intention to serve longer than one tour and then get out and do something with our lives. Ironically, we all found out that the simple act of serving our country achieved that objective without having to wait four, ten or twenty years. We all love our country and that love was made stronger by our service. I know I speak for all three of us when I say that no matter how hard we worked or how much we sacrificed, the military gave us far more than we could ever contribute to this nation.

The Core Values of the Air Force are Excellence, Integrity and Service Before Self. The values were imbued in us from the first day of basic training and hammered home in subtle and not so subtle ways each day of our careers. The Air Force matured me faster than I eve could have on my own. It taught me leadership by example, good and bad, and that followership is a key ingredient of being a great leader. The Air Force brought the great majority of the most important people into my life. It gave me new skills, new challenges and new experiences that I could never have attained without serving.

Our Air Force is the greatest Air Force in the planet. Happy birthday USAF!

I’ve always been fascinated at how elite athletes say the game moves slower
to them. I’ve only experienced this twice and only once while playing sports
which, if you know how often I’ve played sports, is concrete proof that I’m
not an elite athlete and never will be. It was interesting though to feel
separated from the rest of the players on the field. Kind of like a Guy
Ritchie movie.

Anyway, I learned today that different species see motion at different
speeds also. The reason it’s so hard to swat a fly is because they see
motion four times faster than we do. Conversely, a turtle sees things much
slower which is one of the reasons they move so cautiously.

But it’s not the vision that makes a difference for the elite athletes. It’s
the way their mind fills in the gaps to allow them to make a decision at
their speed which is nearly always ahead of the defenders decisions making
speed.

This concept only works for activities that take place in real
time…sports, accidents, life threatening situations. The other time I
experienced this concept was during a car accident. I won’t go into the
details other than to say it saved at least one life and if I had taken the
time to think at normal speed it would’ve ended disastrously.

I think we all get in our own way when we try to be smarter than we need to
be. Sometimes we need to stop thinking and just do something.