What does T.R.E.A.D. Lightly mean? More importantly what should it mean to you?
Well it’s pretty specific, but also pretty vague. TREADing water is where I coined the term. When you TREAD water, you are really just trying to stay afloat, and ultimately NOT drown.
- You aren’t actually “trying to move”, from one place to another, that’s swimming.
- You are moving, even if it’s just a bit to the left, right, back and forth.
- You aren’t “trying to dive deep”, but you are wet.
- You aren’t trying to get out of the water, but you are weighing your options.
Usually, if we ever NEED to TREAD water, we are trying to save our own lives. Or, maybe we are biding our time until help arrives. Maybe we TREAD until we decide on the direction we are going, and begin to take your fate into your own hands and, swim in a particular direction.
Either way, you TREAD water until you have exhausted all of your options, and must make a choice.
I believe when we take our time moving through life, making our decisions a bit more slowly, considering all sides of a story, we typically do VERY WELL with the RESULTS WE PRODUCE.
We can usually come up with the best decisions for ourselves, the path for our lives, or for our families. I love that we can do that. I’ve seen it happen. That’s why I love the process of T.R.E.A.D.ing that EARNS us to our most productive life changes. Here is what T.R.E.A.D.ing means to me:
- T – TELL your position. (Here is what I think!)
- R – REAFFIRM your position. (I knew I was right! I was just checking!)
- E – EXPLORE your position. (Am I missing anything?)
- A – ALTER your position. (Whoa. Never in a million years!)
- D – DISCOVER your position. (Oh, that’s what I think! I had no idea!)
I want everyone, to think of T.R.E.A.D.ing Lightly when they approach every situation in life. If we do more of that, before we act I think we can see immensely better, more productive, and healthier results in our society.
Let’s Get on our life vests Team Reason, it’s time to T.R.E.A.D. Lightly!
