# Daily Inspiration: “You can’t move a clock faster than it goes!”
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"You can't move a clock faster than it goes!" - Futurist Jim Carroll One of the funniest and more unusual aspects of working with your wife in a home office for more than 30 years is that you still schedule work meetings. For real! Today, we have a meeting to take a look at her latest edits on my book Being Unique. She's put a tremendous amount of effort into working with it, finding its flaws, discovering pathways, and knowing what to do to kick it into shape. This is book #44 and she sure as heck knows what she is doing at this point - she's worked on all of them! (Curious as to what some of the others are? Check out my Wikipedia entry which lists many of them.) Today is the day she'll walk me through the latest result of those efforts, and this particular book will be one stop closer to the finish line. Her skills in this type of thing are pretty deep - I've often referred to her as the 5th Beatle when it comes to the 34 books I wrote and co-wrote in the 90s about the Internet, digital technology and e-commerce. In her previous work life as a CA/CPA, she was manager of taxation for Unilever and Comptroller for Thomas J. Lipton, with a staff of 30+ at one point, and so her ability to manage me is but a subset of what she can really do. And with this process, I've been waiting patiently for her to finish her work. In fact, I know better than to try to rush her along! (It usually doesn't go well - for me.) And I've been patient.... I began the book sometime in 2023 - I don't remember the specific date. I went at the topic quickly, coming up with the barebones of the structure and idea. That came from the subtitle - "Turning Curiosity, Creativity and Courage into Your Competitive Advantage." Later on, I wrote a series of blog posts as a way to kick start my writing into gear. Eventually, I handed her a manuscript - and waited. You see, she might be my business partner, but she's also a wife, a mother, and now, a Nana! She's been very busy on the Board of a charity we have been active with for a decade (and on the side, has effectively been their bookkeep/accountant, head of IT and many other things); she has my business to run; she volunteers at a local food bank operation and does so much more. And so while book might be a priority, it is but one thing to fit into a very busy life. And with that, I've had to learn patience. This is a difficult for a very impatient guy whose entire motto is built around the word 'fast.' Her reaction to the first draft of the book was .... not great. And looking back, it was in pretty poor shape. But the idea was there. So I went back and took another kick at it, giving it a thorough rewrite, some more research, additional stories to fit into the theme.... And then it went back to her.... ....and came back to me.... ... and so on. ...for quite some time. Which is why today's meeting is important. The book is not coming back to me, but in fact, is fully formatted and almost ready for print! I suspect later today, we'll get an ISBN, which is the all important critical next step. I did a little cartoon image about my excitement for this step with my last book. And through this process - which has pretty much been the reality of our lies for 30+ years - I have been slowly and carefully learning the art of patience. Because you can't move a clock faster than it goes.

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Source: https://jimcarroll.com/2026/06/daily-inspiration-you-cant-move-a-clock-faster-than-it-goes/