Nature intended our thoughts to be a guide to action not a substitute for it. While I was finishing my studies for a doctoral degree, I was talking with a fellow educator at the university where I worked. I had heard him say, many times, that he, too, often thought about obtaining his advanced degree and he knew how important it was, based on his chosen profession as a university educator. He just hadn’t gotten around to it. His thoughts and dreams of having his advanced degree had become a substitute for action and not a guide to completing his goal. He was older now and had so many family, and other obligations that he wondered if it would ever happen. ‘A fellow that has lost sight of his goals and ambitions, doesn’t notice it so much until he also runs out of alibis.’ Our alibis, sometimes, become just as important as the goal or dream we may be making the alibi for.
As a young man I had many temporary jobs, jobs which, not only, kept a few dollars in my pocket, but they also provided many informative and valuable experiences. Those experiences have been beneficial to me all of my life. I, too, have worked with many men and groups of men. They all have contributed in some way to my way of thinking and of doing things. No two experiences have been exactly alike but all have made a contribution. Education is not a preparation for life, but it is rather life itself, as life is an educational process from birth to death. Living involves not so much a matter of the adjustment to problems as the adjustment to having problems and dealing with them. I have also worked with many different types of equipment, machinery and, more importantly, procedures. They, too, contribute to our way of thinking and doing things. One interesting example is the flywheel. My first car was a 1934 ford coupe which had a tie rod bearing that was worn out and I tried to repair it myself.
While doing so I became acquainted with all of the engine parts including the flywheel. The flywheel is a disc with its weight concentrated toward the outer circumference. When the disc is spun it stores energy by virtue of its angular momentum. This means that it resists changes to its rotational speed. When the load applied to the crankshaft is uneven, as with a piston driven engine, the flywheel keeps the crankshaft turning smoothly in between power strokes. In an internal combustion engine the pistons only provide power during one in every four strokes. The flywheel keeps the crankshaft turning smoothly during the other three rotations. Additionally, the pistons and connecting rods are offset from the crankshaft and want to push the crankshaft from side to side with each piston stroke. The energy stored by the flywheel dampens this process and reduces engine vibration, thus balancing the engine. By maintaining engine speed and balance, flywheels help to extend the useful life of other components connected to the engine. By adjusting the weight of the flywheel, the engine can be tuned to work at optimal efficiency under a variety of work loads.
That sounds like a mouthful of mash, but it makes perfect sense and it can easily be applied to human behavior, as well. In working with groups of men or people there has always been at least one who functions as a flywheel. That person’s energy acts as a flywheel by balancing the strengths and weaknesses in the group. The ‘flywheel’ of the group will also have a balancing effect on the others by reducing negative vibrations so that they work more smoothly together. In so doing he helps to maintain the level of work being done and maintaining group efficiency and balance. Those who serve as flywheels help to extend the useful life of a business or operation. By adjusting the authority of the flywheel, the engine can be tuned to work at optimal efficiency under a variety of work loads. Flywheels just have a way of making things run more smoothly and they have the energy within them to keep things going when an organization starts to sputter and slow down. The human flywheel seems to understand the weightier matters and they know how to keep everything in balance. ‘We should each try to be the flywheel in our organizations, the one who reduces negative vibrations and keeps everything in balance and running smoothly.’