Timing is everything.

Timing and fate seem to stroll hand in hand down the pathways of life. The two forces push and pull, a rip current of influence, moving us to some unseen script, a story that hasn’t been finished yet.

But timing and fate can only go so far. They provide a nudge in one direction or another, but not to the degree of a predetermined destiny. If life was truly all mapped out for us by fate, then what’s the point? No matter what direction we take, or choices we make, the outcome would be the same. The whole concept of “Whatever will be – will be,” doesn’t work for me.

Be Prepared
image by cynthia chang via flickr creative commons

We all face times in life where we have to make a decision and we struggle over it for days and sleepless nights. We put it off, try to avoid making a choice, or hope someone else will make it for us. Do you really want to be the some pre-programmed game piece moving around on someone else’s game board?

This is where timing comes in. I’m not talking about timing in the sense of issuing a press release for your book on the same day a Malaysian Airline jet vanishes (been there). I mean the “what-if’s.” Who hasn’t had that lingering question in the back of their mind about, “What if I made a different choice?” Or, “What if I took another path?”

Life is all about the choices you face and it is the quality of the choice that matters. You’ve heard the phrase “Garbage in – Garbage out,” right?  That really means when you make a decision, you only have control over the facts and minutiae you shovel into the machine. If the gears aren’t spinning when you pull the lever, you won’t get much out of the machine. If you feed the decision machine with too much emotional crap, you’ll clog up the works and choke the pipes, with nothing coming out the other end. This is the point we’ve all faced, “I don’t know what to do.”

image by austin leon via flickr creative commons

Finally, you sort through the minutia and make your decision…good or bad, it’s yours, own it. The intended effect of that decision is were the Fickle Fairy of Timing comes in. Timing is more than putting up Christmas lights in July. Timing is the difference between missing the boarding time for  that long awaited Trans-Altantic luxury cruise, only to find out the ship you watched sail away without you was the Titanic.

image by jolene glead via flickr creative commons

Timing is the missed turn on a long country drive that misses the drunk driver on the road you were supposed to take.

Timing is the chance meeting on a street corner.

Timing is the crusty old guy yelling at you to get off his lawn, after you step in the pile of dog poo.

Timing leaves a bit more to chance. Life is a game of chance. So, don’t let timing get in the way.

image by judy van der veld via flicker creative commons