Add Fuel
To continue my driving analogy on life, it is clearly essential to add fuel to our vehicles, since fuel is essential to the powering of modern vehicles, without which we cannot drive the vehicle and may even run the risk of crashing. This is especially hazardous on the motorway- imagine running out of the fuel there! On a deserted street with few to no other road user around, one may (should) be able to stop and seek help without inconveniencing others, but on a high-speed stretch of road one is calling for (lethal) trouble if one runs out of fuel. The same applies to when we are working, especially when we are working frantically hard to get things done. Running out of energy then would be disastrous, since we jeopardise not only ourselves but also our work. We must, therefore, be constantly aware of our energy levels and avoid getting to the stage where our fuel tank is almost empty, which applies to our bodies as we must take care of ourselves and not run ourselves down to the point of exhaustion where our bodies simply cannot give any more, especially when we are working at feverish pitch which is when we can least afford running out of energy. While it is easy to check the amount of fuel in one’s tank as it is displayed on the driver’s panel, detecting and self-regulating one’s energy level is a little trickier, though most of the time we should be able to tell whether we are physically and mentally tired or not. One cannot underestimate the importance of rest, which, paradoxically, is essential to achieving high efficiency as it is analogous to refueling our vehicles. There is an expression in Chinese which has made it into the Oxford English dictionary: ‘ Add Oil’ (加油), which literally means ‘add’ (加) + ‘oil’ (油) and is commonly used in sporting events as part of cheering athletes on, and while the metaphor of ‘adding oil’ is supposed to enhance the power of the addressee and spur him/her on, the process of adding oil actually forms part of rest since it is while we are resting and taking a break from our labours that we can replenish our energy levels. A famous song by Jackie Cheung (張學友) which left a big impression on me when I was a child: 偷閑加油站 deals with exactly this. In the wake of the war in Eastern Europe, fuel prices are hiking which makes gas stations somewhat desolate these days. How often should we visit the gas station? Probably more than we do.
發表者：keithtselinguist
分類： 標籤：
cantonese、chinese、driving、hong kong、life、lifehacks、motivation、multitasking、paradox、practice、procrastination、productivity、Reflexion、sleep、slow、success、time
Originally published at http://keithtselinguist.wordpress.com on July 12, 2022.
