W.I.N.: What’s Important Now?

I recently heard an acronym attributed to famed football coach Lou Holtz:

W.I.N. (What’s Important Now?)

As someone who’s logged quite a few hours in athletic locker rooms, I immediately liked it.

I also immediately recognized that it’s not just locker room talk. It very much applies to this season of life.

Then: Bottom of the 9th. 1 out. Game tying run on third.

Now: Full caseload. Short staffed. Everyone needs something right now.

What's important now?

Probably not checking your email. Certainly not doomscrolling.

Most of us spend a surprising amount of time mentally living somewhere other than where we actually are.

Instead of living in the present we’re replaying yesterday or planning tomorrow.

Thinking about the email we need to send while sitting with a client.

Talking about work while eating dinner.

Thinking about tomorrow’s calendar while lying in bed desperately hoping to fall asleep.

Our attention gets spread across a dozen different things, and then we wonder why we feel overwhelmed and burning out.

W.I.N. gives us a way to narrow the field.

What's important now?

Not this afternoon.

Not by the end of the year.

Not everything currently sitting on any of our to-do lists.

Right now.

Sometimes the answer will be work.

Finish the metrics.

Create the course.

Have the difficult conversation.

Focus on the person sitting in front of you.

But here's where the idea gets really interesting in the Helping Professional context.

Sometimes what's important now is:

Eat lunch.

Take the walk.

Drink some water.

Put the phone down.

Go to bed.

Say "no".

Ask for help.

Leave work at work.

Rest.

We've normalized treating productivity as the automatic answer to the question.

But the most important thing in the moment isn't always doing more.

Sometimes it's doing the thing that allows you to keep doing meaningful work tomorrow.

That matters in the Helping Professions. There will always be another person to help, another problem to solve, another item that could reasonably be considered important.

If everything is important, then nothing is important. And our attention gets pulled everywhere, nowhere.

W.I.N. asks us to choose.

And then, when the moment changes, ask again.

You don't have to solve the whole week on Monday morning.

You don't have to fix your entire health, career, finances, relationships, and morning routine on Tuesday morning.

Just ask:

What's important now?

Do that.

Complete the task at hand.

Then ask again.

That's a good way to win 100 games in The Show.

It’s also a good way to live.

Take this question with you:

What's important now? Am I giving it my attention?