Fear and the "Sense of Urgency"

The race today is between our having a “sense of urgency” and being “purpose driven”. Who will come out ahead?

The answer for me is a no-brainer; “purpose driven” will win out each time because “sense of urgency” is fear based. Fear prevents advancement, purpose propels us forward.

It’s not an all or nothing situation. Humans are not set up that way. There is a productive type of fear which is found in being driven, but it is different from the fear from a sense of urgency that can stop us in our tracks. And then there is the purpose; if the purpose is based on fear, it cancels out the drive forward. Neurosurgeon Ian Weinberg says it this way:

"Being driven does indeed incorporate a greater purposeful element (curiosity, create, achieve - all the dopamine-based activities) together with a touch of amygdala (fear of loss, fear of not fulfilling expectations etc). Being driven is also not generally context-based. A sense of urgency incorporates a lot more fear of failure, anxiety with a touch of panic lurking in the wings (all amygdala-based). Urgency also includes identified objectives so in this state there is a degree of purpose, but in the context of the fear complex."
Ian Weinberg

Our corporate culture, our business world, pushes us to move at an increasingly faster pace; be the first, come up with it sooner. We’re in a race for time. Survival is not based on being the fittest, but the fastest.

In the article, The Common Trait of Highly Productive People,Companies, and Countries, the author writes:

I read a lot about highly productive people, companies, and countries, and from what I learn, there seems to be a common trait behind them all. This trait makes the difference between the average and the superior performers.

The common trait is a sense of urgency.

But here’s the kicker:

A sense of urgency drives people, companies, and countries to work much harder than normal. It makes them work as if their lives depend on it (which, in many cases, is true).

Fear, the fear of survival, has replaced passion as the common trait of highly productive people.

In her article, Why Purpose-Driven Companies Are Often MoreSuccessful, Sherry Hakimi writes:

What makes some companies wildly successful while others flop?

Starting and surviving in today’s economy is hard, but the companies that figure it out have something in common: the pursuit of purpose, alongside the pursuit of profit. A purpose mobilizes people in a way that pursuing profits alone never will. For a company to thrive, it needs to infuse its purpose in all that it does.

She concludes:

In today’s technology driven, rapidly evolving economy, successful companies are built not from the ground up, but from the purpose up.

Image credit: Elite Choice

If you could make one change in your professional life, what would it be?

I hope your reaction to this question was to actually pause for a moment. When was the last time that you either paused to reflect or actually think of change in a positive way?

Let’s look at what I am proposing here; pause, instead of stop, and thinking of a change in your professional life as something positive instead of something to avoid.

I am confident that you will know what I am talking about when I say that most of us live on an edge. Sometimes we even refer to it as The Edge. If we took an Arial shot of these edges, it may surprise you to see that most of them are on opposite sides of a spectrum; we are either on the edge of constantly doing something or we are on the edge of having stopped. Another name for the edge of having stopped is being stuck. On either edge of this spectrum, our control is greatly restricted and so are our options. In this way, we are either avoiding change or trying to keep up with change but end up chasing it.

He who can no longer pause to wonder and stand rapt in awe, is as good as dead; his eyes are closed. 
Albert Einstein

Being able to pause places us more on a point of equilibrium, a place with more control. In this place, you can reflect and imagine answers to such questions as, what one change you would make in your professional life? You can identify a passion. You can attach that passion to a purpose. You can move it all forward.

But who has the time to pause in our race for time? Who can afford to spend time reflecting while others are “doing”? Pause, refection, they are seen as passive acts that will place us behind our competitors. Where is our “sense of urgency”? Hopefully being replaced by a purposeful drive.