Go Fly A Kite

This morning I made a kite with my oldest kid.

She was in charge of decoration; I was in charge of construction. I can tell you that the kite was very well decorated.

I didn’t get up this morning with a plan to build a kite. In fact, I had a lot of other things I needed to do; it’s a busy day. I had a plan all laid out for what I wanted to accomplish today. My plans are often quite resilient, but there’s no such thing as a plan that never changes. What happens when you have to change and adapt?

That’s why principles are greater than plans.

A firm set of values that guides your decision-making is better than a concrete plan. Principles allow you to adapt without confusion. They let you restructure a plan without losing sight of what’s important. Sometimes they even give you the mental tools you need to change or abandon a goal that no longer fits with your life.

And sometimes they tell you that all the important things you had to do this morning aren’t as important as making a beautiful, poorly-constructed kite and then running around the yard like maniacs, laughing hysterically while trying to fly it.