[HN Gopher] Slow Is Smooth, Smooth Is Fast: Navy SEALs' Efficien...
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Slow Is Smooth, Smooth Is Fast: Navy SEALs' Efficiency Secret
Author : squircle
Score : 47 points
Date : 2024-08-15 21:34 UTC (1 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (www.navyseal.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.navyseal.com)
| desktopninja wrote:
| Have long stood by this belief and still do but modern IT calls
| it legacy and antiquated. Oh how we've lost The Plot.
| hi-v-rocknroll wrote:
| The modern attitude is discard everything "old", not
| immediately understood, and abandon standardization and
| simplicity.
| leptons wrote:
| I think I can relate to this. I have a lot of projects that are
| time-sensitive. An event is coming up and I have a big project to
| do for it. The event is on a specific date, and there is no
| pushing that date back, it's a hard-stop. Moving a bit slower at
| first and focusing on the essentials and doing them well helps me
| move faster towards the end when I start to focus on smaller
| details.
| singleshot_ wrote:
| I have a hard time believing that this phraseology originated in
| the military given its historical use in the motorsports
| community. See Alain Proust, who professed to embody this
| philosophy.
|
| Granted the SEAL community predated Prousts F1 participation, but
| SeAL tactics were not top of mind in 80s popular culture like
| they are today.
| tracerbulletx wrote:
| Festina lente.
| apeescape wrote:
| Alain Prost*
|
| Marcel Proust is the famous writer.
|
| But yes, it would be interesting to learn about the origin of
| this phrase.
| observationist wrote:
| It's a marksmanship maxim, extant during Vietnam, gaining
| ground in any profession or activity where the principle made
| sense. SEALs definitely embraced it, but I believe it
| originated in WWII in its modern form. There are all sorts of
| regional proverbs and teachings and sayings all over the world
| going back through history capturing the same basic notion,
| though.
|
| Haste makes waste - British
|
| Festina lente - Latin (Make haste slowly)
|
| Chi va piano, va sano e va lontano - Italian (Slow and steady
| wins the race)
|
| Slowly but surely - many cultures, probably dates back to
| hunter gatherers.
|
| "Slow is smooth, smooth is quick, quick is fast" is the
| variation I was taught by a military relative. He was a Richard
| Marcinko fanboi, too, but I don't know if that's related. They
| all circle a notion we internalize with particular meaning that
| the words don't ever quite capture, perfectly, but we get the
| point across.
| lubujackson wrote:
| "Pants on fire" startups would do well to learn from this... a
| whole lot less stress and better results vs. slamming out
| midnight patches.
| annoyingnoob wrote:
| I learned this in racing school.
| dbg31415 wrote:
| I remember my dad saying this since the early 80s at least. He
| was in the service in the 60s.
|
| He would also say, "If you're in a hurry, then you don't have
| time to rush!"
| tunesmith wrote:
| My mom would always say, "the hurrieder I go, the behinder I
| get!" It might have been on a cat poster or something.
| iwontberude wrote:
| The brakes on the car help it to get around the track faster.
| readthenotes1 wrote:
| - I'd be curious if the origin is really the Navy seals. I
| couldn't find in my brief searching any where else...
|
| - I like John Wooden's saying "be quick but don't hurry". I
| mentioned that to a doctor who trained in the mid 20th century
| and he said that surgeons had a line "hurry, but don't rush"
| roughly wrote:
| Especially as I've gotten older, I've noticed I do less work more
| slowly than my younger peers, but I only have to do it once, and
| I usually get closer to the root than my younger colleagues.
| Measure twice and all that.
| zarmin wrote:
| Good lord, 99% of the words in that article were unnecessary.
| m3kw9 wrote:
| Only the title was necessary
| josh-sematic wrote:
| They were taking it slow.
| hprotagonist wrote:
| and the oft-forgotten third clause:
|
| "...and speed is the efficiency of motion."
|
| Move only what needs to be moved, and you save a lot of gas.
|
| Or as a mentor of mine is fond of saying, "slow down! we're in a
| hurry here!"
| borski wrote:
| This is one of the first really important lessons you learn in
| Brazilian Jiu Jitsu (BJJ).
|
| Everyone walks in, day one, and is dumping adrenaline everywhere
| they look. I mean, the person in front of you is literally
| engaging you in practicing murder, so I get it. Everyone starts
| that way. Super tense, super shallow breathing, and everyone
| wears themselves out in about 30-40 seconds. Of a 6 minute round.
|
| Doesn't matter if you're the most insanely buff dude ever, or
| seriously overweight. The first guy has better conditioning, no
| doubt... but not _this_ kind of conditioning. One of my favorite
| things was watching a new guy walk in, looking like he had maybe
| 7% body fat, 6'2" at least, plays D1 basketball, and is just
| nothing but stacked muscle... and then him rolling with a 5'6"
| 130lb woman who just wipes the floor with him, because training
| matters more than strength, but even more importantly, breathing
| and staying calm, slow, and _smooth_ matters even more. The
| basketball player spends the first minute or so using all his
| strength to try and get this "puny" girl off of him, unable to,
| and is now completely gassed. Meanwhile she's tapped him twice
| and could go for a run.
|
| Eventually, the most important thing you learn is to relax and
| breathe. Technique eventually comes, through iteration and lots
| and lots of practice; eventually, things become second nature.
|
| But breathing? Reminding yourself to relax and roll smart, not
| fast? That I need to remind myself of _most_ days, because again:
| you're facing someone practicing killing you. :)
| anothername12 wrote:
| This works for motorcycle racing
| onlypassingthru wrote:
| This is also the secret to swimming anything other than a sprint.
| Gliding through the water is gratifying.
| 2OEH8eoCRo0 wrote:
| I've always loved this phrase. A USMC recon guy I was training
| with uttered it once and it stuck with me.
| swayvil wrote:
| I have a client who wants everything done yesterday and the idea
| of pausing to think and draw pictures is abhorrent to her. No
| doubt you are familiar.
| ian-g wrote:
| I've been taking glassblowing classes for a few years, and this
| is easily the biggest lesson there.
|
| If I rush something, I will fuck it up. If I let things happen
| bit by bit while they can go smoothly, everything comes out much
| easier.
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