An adage from cycling that applies to so many areas of life is “drink before you are thirsty”. In fact, I’ve written about it many times on this blog from different angles, including here and here and here.
A few examples of being proactive with resilience, of drinking before you are thirsty.
- First, yesterday I did my first long ride in and around London since before my major operation at the end of March. It was a wet day, so we had to concentrate more than usual around the city. At the advice of my riding buddy at our “coffee and breakfast roll” stop, I took the train most of the way home. I could have made the ride all the way back but would have been really exhausted at this stage in my fitness recovery journey, so though I felt great at that coffee stop, it was smart to decide right then to make the trip home easier.
- Next, someone close to me recently sold their house to downsize to something more manageable. They loved that house and were perfectly able to maintain it, but they are a “modern elder” somewhat older than my 57 years, so they recognised that if they waited too many more years the act of moving would have been even more difficult.
- Finally, if you reach a point of “knowing” that it will soon be time to make the decision to leave something (a job, a relationship, a situation), then far better to leave before things deteriorate to the point of resentment or other negativity, but to leave when you can still have a mindset that this had been the right place to be for some time but that now it is time to make a change.
Drink before you are thirsty. One rarely regrets making the choice at what can seem “early” at the time, but one often can regret making a decision too late, once you have left yourself depleted, or, as the picture above says, with an “empty cup”.