The living contradiction is a concept I first encountered in my days as a teacher. Through my professor and friend Tom Russell I learned of Jack Whitehead, who was very interested in action research, reflective practice and living educational theory.

Jack talks about experiencing oneself as a living contradiction — when we experience our actions being at odds with our beliefs and values — as the impetus to improve. When we experience that feeling, we are motivated to act. To change. To iterate.

This is different than hypocrisy. Hypocrisy is the when we pretend to have certain beliefs and values, when we don’t really have them. With hypocrisy, we are lying.

A living contradiction, however, is about the truth. Finding a way to live true to what we believe — both personally and professionally.

Feeling the Pain

In the final two months of 2009, I did precisely the opposite of what I should have been doing. In October, I wrote two posts “What Gives?” and “Needs More Whitespace” — both of which explored the need to give things up, to slow down, to create space in our personal and professional lives in order to achieve a better balance between the personal and professional parts of our lives as part of long term “success” and happiness.

I wrote the words, but I couldn’t live the ideals. I slept less per night than I had for the last 2.5 years. I didn’t log my hours of sleep, but I know that more often than not, my alarm woke me only 3 or 4 hours after my head hit the pillow. Not healthy.

I believe, like Jack, that I can make a positive change after feeling and experiencing this dissonance. Feeling it so acutely is certainly more than enough to provoke me. I need to reflect, plan, act and evaluate. I am a living contradiction, and I’m okay with that, as long as I do something about it.

What are you doing — right now — that shows you are a living contradiction? What are you going to do to make a change to bring your actions in line with your ideals and beliefs?

We both need to change this now, while we’re still in the tone-setting, habit-building infancy of 2010.

That is part of the reason that I signed up for Project 52. It isn’t just a kick start to get me writing more. I’m using Project 52 as a means for me to understand myself and others more deeply and thoroughly.

In processing the past year of triathlon training and racing, I came to the realization that last year’s activities were focused entirely on the long haul. My wife and I competed in two races: IronMan Lake Placid, and IronMan Muskoka 70.3. Both are long distance races, and are spaced such that they ended up being the only races we trained for. And ultimately, that hurt us. We resented training. We weren’t having fun. We just didn’t want to do it any more.

Mentally reliving the experiences of the past 12 months while kicking off 2010, connected our world of triathlon racing to my world of work. Last year’s long-haul-only tri pain was that of 2008 in business — where we worked almost exclusively on one project for one client for the entire year. That singular focus for an entire year nearly burnt us out completely (ask Jeff Smith — he’ll tell you!), and I’m determined to never let that happen again.

Just as we need variety in our training and competitions in triathlon, so too, do we need variety in the projects we take on in business. It can’t just be the long haul.

It seems to me that in many ways, my ideal year in triathlon would be very similar to an ideal year of business. For the company to be healthy, and for us to maintain our passion, to feel good about what we’re doing, we need a well-balanced mixture of activity. Mix some short term projects — the sprint distance triathlons where we push our limits to go fast and furious — with some longer term projects — the long haul, IronMan and IronMan 70.3 races that take long, slow preparation and lots of endurance building — and a good dose of fun — projects where we experiment and scratch our own itches, doing things just for us.

Now, more than ever, I’m looking forward to the year 2010 — with a clear path forward for the right variety — in business, and in health.

What’s the right mix for you for 2010? How are you going to maintain variety so that you don’t burn out and keep the passion for what you do alive and well?