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No such thing as static
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Hi Reader, Welcome to this week's Rev Up for the Week, where every Sunday at 4.05pm, I put something positive or productive in your inbox, ready for the week ahead. This week I want to talk about momentum. I've spent time with two clients this week whose work has felt like it has some real momentum behind it. After sticky patches and struggles, it's all systems go for them. And on our 6 Weeks to Ninja programme, I've been helping people get clearer on what they're working on, which in turn helps get things moving. Momentum is exciting, effortless and emboldening: after the first mile felt like a marathon, the next marathon feels like a mile. But what is the opposite of momentum? We often think the opposite is something being static or still - and sometimes our lizard brains tell us that it's worse than that, that it's 'stuck'. I've come to realise that this isn't quite true - there's no such thing as 'static', or 'stuck', or 'stationary'. Everything has momentum, all of the time. The only question is whether the momentum is spiralling positively upwards, or spiralling negatively downwards - are we surfing a surging wave of glory, or spinning down the plug hole in a spiral of decline? Because here's the thing. 'Static' doesn't really exist if everything else - and everyone else - is still moving. When you think about a project that you've got momentum on, the enthusiasm propels it forward at high speed. Everything seems to go in your direction. Others want to join to be part of the thing that has momentum. But when you think you're standing still, actually everybody else is catching you up. Everything feels like a harder 'sell'. You start to invent more reasons not to push the thing forwards. The next steps or fixes get less and less clear in your mind, and without even realising it you're in the middle of spiralling decline. So the paradigm isn't "momentum vs static", it's "which momentum do we want - the one that takes us forwards, or backwards?". So why does this matter? Because momentum, whilst it feels magical, is actually the practical sum total of effort and belief. It's the hard sells, the quietly determined work you did behind the scenes, and the stubborn loyalty you had to the project when no one else was onside. So it's not so much a freak occurrence and more the reflection of where you chose to put your time, attention and energies to get to this moment. The bad news about "nothing is static" is that if things matter, we always have to keep pushing them forward: Interest in your product is great now, but if you take your foot off the gas, the sales pipeline runs streaky and then empty. It's not enough to simply believe in equality or kindness, you've got to advocate for it and let it guide your decisions - there are plenty who don't consider those things a bare minimum, like you do. "Good corporate governance" isn't something that you achieved three months ago to tick the box for the accreditation - it's something that's going backwards again now if you're're getting complacent. The things you've neglected on your to-do list need to be things that either don't matter that much, or that you're happy to wait longer for. It's not enough to be against fascism, you have to be positively and proactively anti-fascist. I write this on International Women's Day. I'm proudly for equality and meritocracy, and firmly against discrimination of all kinds. All of that feels like a no-brainer to me: if we dismantled the structural reasons that some people get more chances and higher rewards than others, then eventually we'd create a world that plays to everyone's skills and strengths. As Warren Buffett suggests, we've done pretty well building an economy based on "half the population's talents", so imagine how much richer we'd all be if we applied the "other half". It would also be a world that feels kinder, happier and more respectful. It feels ridiculous (and tiring) to have to say this in 2025, but the choice isn't momentum or static, it's forwards or backwards - so I guess that means I'll keep saying it. So this week I invite you to think about where the momentum is, and where it needs to be:
Have a great week, Graham |
Rev Up for the Week with Graham Allcott
Join thousands of people starting their week on a positive note. Every Sunday afternoon, I send out an upbeat idea to set you up for the week ahead.
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