Blog #56 – BEING FLEXIBLE
In your career and personal life you need to be flexible. Although planning for the future is important, there will be circumstances where it is inevitable that plans will have to be changed. It is important that a change of plans does not frustrate you in any way. When planning, you may prepare alternate plans in case your primary plans cannot be executed.
As a mathematics teacher and coach, I knew that I had time constraints, thus I tried following a routine in which I could maximize the time working with my students. My students knew the routine, but they witnessed times when I had to make modifications to the routine. It is important for those around you to see that you can be flexible. Modeling flexibility is something that will have a positive impact on your students and anyone else that spends time with you. When I took students to a mathematics tournament, we always left about 30 – 40 minutes early in case of unforeseen circumstances, which could impact our arrival at the tournament. Thus, preparing for the unexpected was a characteristic that I had and which allowed me to easily make adjustments to my schedule.
In my personal life, everyone knows that I am very organized and punctual. Many see me as being obsessed with time. They know that I am punctual and expect others to be also. Yet, everyone has seen that I can adjust to unexpected situations quickly. I remain calm and use common sense and logic to make the necessary changes to my original plan. I do not stress out during those situations. Being organized does not mean that you can’t be flexible. With time, opportunities for demonstrating flexibility will prepare you to be more flexible in the future