“Wisdom is knowing what the moment requires.”
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The Wrong Button
I was ready for bed. That was the plan, anyway.
Rebecca and I had finally bought the massage chair we’d talked about for years. We found a good deal and called it an anniversary present and an early Christmas present to each other, which by my math made it fiscally justifiable. Tired, but excited to try out the new chair, I settled in, reached for the Night Program and hit “start.”
The chair had other ideas for me. Within seconds, it was rocking my hips from side to side and kneading, with real conviction, an area I had not authorized. A second glance at the screen told me I’d hit the Ischium Buttocks Program. The description and early results both seemed accurate and effective. It was not what I needed.
The next morning I went looking for the manual. The chair has thirteen programs, chosen, in the manual’s words, “according to purpose/use.” There’s a Morning Program to wake you up and a Night Program to settle you down. There’s Recovery, Stretch, Shoulder & Neck, and something called Stoop Correction for those of us who spend our days hunched over laptops and phones. Extreme Shiatsu promises a “sublimated” experience, which I decided was best not to look up.
Everyone in our house uses it differently. The kids come in after a practice or a game, sore and spent, looking to recover. Every time Rebecca climbs in, she tries a new program, and every time it becomes her new favorite. The only constant is the rollers under her feet; they stay on no matter what.
I’ve come to think Rebecca has the right idea. She isn’t loyal to any one setting. She sits down, decides what sounds good that day, and goes with it.
Most of us don’t work that way, especially those of us who coach and lead. We settle on whatever worked once, and we stay there. Some coaches operate on Extreme Shiatsu from the first practice to the last: push harder, demand more, turn up the intensity. Others find a comfortable setting and rarely leave it. Either can work for a stretch. Neither will work for everyone, or for every day.
The chair, for all its engineering, has no idea what I need. It waits for me to tell it, and when I press the wrong button, it commits fully to the wrong thing. Those we lead don’t come with a manual. We have to read what they need, and when we guess wrong, we go all in - just like my chair did.
The energy patterns we see in people are snapshots, not permanent labels. A kid who needs accountability one day may need grace another. The people we lead don’t come with one program, and neither do we. Change is part of leadership, ever-present in sports, and ubiquitous in life.
The new chair has an answer for that, too. The Quick Program runs about ten minutes and covers everything from the neck to the soles of the feet. We tell ourselves we can’t help because we don’t have the hour a real conversation would take. Usually the person doesn’t need an hour. A few minutes in the hallway, a message after a rough game, or connecting with each member of the team before they go home, to make sure they are okay - and they know you mean it.
Before the chair does anything, it waits for your input. After witnessing the wisdom of a fellow coach, I started asking my players the same question he used: What’s your juice telling you right now? The last two words are important. People keep changing; the job is never over when it comes to getting to know them.
Before you press “Start” this week, with your team, your family or yourself, ask what this moment actually needs. And double-check to make sure you hit the right button!
“The shoe that fits one person pinches another; there is no recipe for living that suits all cases.”
— Carl Jung
Connecting this quote to the story. What works for one person may be exactly the wrong thing for someone else. That is why great leadership requires recognizing what the moment and the person actually need.
This week’s Chasing Influence tip: Good leaders know their people; great leaders keep getting to know them.