The Goose & the Golden Egg

by | Jun 7, 2019 | Fitness | 0 comments

Do you remember Aesop’s fable of the goose and the golden egg?

One morning a farmer finds a glittering, golden-coloured egg sitting beneath his goose. At first he thinks it is a prank, but he decides to have the egg appraised just in case.

To the farmer’s amazement, the egg is pure gold! 

And each morning his prize goose continues laying the valuable eggs. Thefarmer becomes extremely wealthy. But he also becomes greedy and impatient.

One day in his frustration the farmer kills the goose, hoping to get all of the golden eggs at once from inside the goose.

As we all know, the farmer finds nothing. And now, he has neither a goose nor any more golden eggs.

The Moral of the Story

The moral of this story is normally about the danger of greed. The farmer grasped for too much wealth in too short of a time.

But, there is another lesson here and its about finding the balance between results and the ability to continue to produce those results.  

Stephen R. Covey in his book The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People (one of my all-time favourites) describes the essence of effectiveness:

Effectiveness lies in the P/PC Balance. P stands for production of desired results, the golden eggs. PC stands for production capability, the ability or asset that produces the golden eggs.

The P/PC Balance

The P/PC Balance is about balancing between two extremes:

Extreme #1: Focusing only on golden eggs or producing short-term results. In the long-run, you lose your ability to produce results at all because you never nurture your production capacity.

Extreme #2: Focusing only on the goose or production capacity. In this situation, you never produce anything.Either extreme is a problem.  So, you have to strive for a balance between the two. And that delicate balance is the essence of effectiveness.

The easiest way to understand this is to draw the parallel to your body and your car.  You can’t continue to drive your car without maintaining it.  Eventually it breaks down or runs out of gas.  It requires input in order to produce output.  So do you.  

If only we were all designed with our own internal gas gauge…  

You have to work at this balance if you want to be consistently effective in any area of your life.  This includes your job, ability to earn money, real estate investing, relationships, and of course, your health.

Apply P/PC Balance to Your Health

The main point is to think about the situations in your life.

Are you spending too much time in either of the two extremes?

1. Excessive focus on production (golden eggs).If you have been all about rapid weight loss through extreme diets and crazy intense workouts, but have never been able to maintain, how can you nurture the golden goose so that you can start to get longer term results?

 2. Excessive focus on production capacity (the goose). If you are lacking results, how can you shift focus towards the golden eggs right now?  Are you too comfortable with your current routine? There is a big focus on self care now a days but sometimes self care means raising the standards you have for yourself and pushing yourself outside of your comfort zone.  

If you need help either being pushed to finally start getting some results or to be moderated so you can actually sustain them then give us a call!  We know how you can have your goose…and your eggs too. 

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