Have you ever been in a lively discussion and afterwords you thought to yourself, "Oh if only I would have thought of this or said that." It has happened to all of us at what time or another. Right after we hang up or walk away, we think of a better answer. It is challenging to think under fire and come up with your best shot on the spot, but it happens all the time. As rapper Eminem famously sang, "if you only had one shot, or one opportunity to seize everything you ever wanted... one moment.... would you capture it or just let it slip?" It is far easier to think of brilliant actions when there is the benefit of time and distance to look back and reflect on the situation.
But what if you made a habit of looking back on the days events and thinking about how you could have done something better? I have been "on" a lot lately, doing interviews for Celebrating Failure, creative presentations, keynote speeches, and I started making a concerted effort to look back on my responses and think about how I might have done them better. It is a gold mine of better answers.
I can't believe how much more thoughtful I can be when I'm given additional time and no pressure. So what you might be thinking. You don't get two shots. You've got to be "on" all the time and you've got to get it right the first time when the "man" asks you to step up and be brilliant! Yes and no. Yes you've got to be there when the money is on the line with your best shot. But history repeats itself. We are asked the same questions often. We are put in similar situations repeatedly and we can use that brilliant repartee we think of after the first confrontation to knock it out of the park during our second time at bat. If we take the time to think about a better answer.
In order to do that you've got to take a few minutes periodically throughout the day to go back and think about a better way of doing it, so that when you receive a second chance, you are brilliant. And believe me you almost always receive a second chance. What goes around comes around. Or as Eminem said, "When he goes back to his mobile home, that's when it's back to the lab again.... I been chewed up and spit out and booed off stage, but I kept rhyming and stepwriting the next chypher... best believe somebody's paying the pied piper... Success is my only MF option, failure's not. Mom, I love you, but this trailer's got to go." I couldn't agree more.
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