Are You Proactive or Reactive

  Are You Proactive or Reactive?


   I debate this all the time at my work with my boss, are we reacting to a situation or have we planned well enough for it that we are prepared? Most of the time it is reacting not pro-acting to a situation because predicting consumers wants and needs is almost impossible because of an infinite amount of outside factors ( weather, trends, supply chain, etc ). By reacting to a situation and not being prepared fully for the "needs" of the situation, profit is lost, manpower is wasted, customers get frustrated. Definitively not the best way to do business, but it happens everyday and is unavoidable in most cases. Now to step back and look at this personally.
  
   Am I a reactive or proactive person? Do I plan ahead or do I knee jerk and run out in fear because I am afraid of shortages or running out of something? I like to think I am proactive. I like to believe I have thought about my family and their/my needs and planned accordingly. With what is going on in the world right now, that is being put to the test.
   Today I got a little bit of a shock. I use spud.ca for some online ordering of food for home delivery. It's a great service, delivered to your door weekly, fresh local ( when possible ) produce and bakery goods. Works great, good quality products, very friendly people, helps local producers ( when in season ). Well I went online this morning to place my weekly order and BOOM, this weeks delivery trucks are all full! My weekly order is now 2 weeks away. At first I was annoyed, then I wasn't. It occurred to me that more people are using this service than ever before because of this current crisis and that is a good thing, people are trying to stay at home as much as possible to slow the spread of this virus. Again I say, that's a good thing. It has adjusted my thinking a little because that tells me more people are finally taking this more seriously. Good!
   Now I sit back and think to myself, if need be, how long are we good for in our house before we start to run out of some of the essentials? Hmmm, time to do an inventory, I guess I am not as proactive as I had hoped.

   "How does this relate to my Kung Fu" I ask myself. Well, Kody ( my son ) started Kung Fu at Silent River in September of 2008, Deb ( my wife ) and I started in March of 2014. So for the last 12 ( Kody ) and 6 ( Deb and I ) years of our collective lives, Silent River Kung Fu has been an intricate part of our lives. The people, the training hall ( Kwoon ), the joys and challenges faced in class, the triumphs and defeats, all of it, woven into who we are and who we have become because of Master Brinker and his absolute super human drive to bring this treasure to us. And now the new reality sinks in.............
   Online classes. This is a reality I never thought would be necessary. Luckily, Master Brinker was proactive enough to not only be prepared for this, but up and running IMMEDIATELY! That is proactivity ( made up word ) at it's best. Since the school's last class on Tuesday, I have already seen 3 info meetings and 1 I Ho Chuan class. That level of preparedness by Master Brinker and his top notch instructors is amazing. Thank you for that!
   Now, am I prepared to use this new powerful tool?  Doing as checklist, audio/video, check, space to do Kung Fu, small check ( there a 3 of us doing this in a 12'x8'ish area ), time to do this, HUGE CHECK, and most importantly, willingness to attempt to put at least as much effort into this new reality as Master Brinker and all of our awesome instructors have put into this, INFINITY CHECK!! While I will miss the interaction and comradery that the in-person classes bring, I am intrigued and excited to switch to an online format. Time for this old dog to learn some new tricks, arf.

   So back to my initial question, are you proactive or reactive? Are you the hand extended offering help, or the hand reaching for help? Asking for help is not a bad thing if you learn from it. Offering help is only good if it needed and wanted, not forced. Be your best right now to others, and most importantly, be safe.

See you soon