What can we learn from balls?

Before I go any further let me explain what balls I am referring to. You have all seen them. They are shiny, average 5/8” in diameter, come in groups of five and hang from strings. They are commonly known as Newton’s Cradle and while they demonstrate action and reaction, you can also learn a lesson in life from these balls.

Let me explain. If you pull back one of the balls and let go, it will swing back down and strike the remaining four balls that are stationary. The action causes a like and equal reaction at the other end. One ball will emerge from the other side, come back and keep the process going until the inertia settles in and the momentum to go forward ceases.

If you drop two balls again the like and equal reaction occurs. Two balls exit from the other side. Even if you drop five balls into the cradle, five balls come out. If you have never tried this before you will have to take my word for it or purchase one to experiment with. An internet search will provide many sources.

So how can we turn this into a life lesson?  Let’s place a label at each end of the cradle. We will call one side “EFFORT” and the other side “RESULTS.” Drop two balls into effort and two balls emerge from results. If you drop three balls you get three balls and if you drop one you just get one. Some folks spend all of their time focusing on the results and pondering how can I get better results. They can become so myopic that they never look at the other end.

-Newton (Isaac, not Fig) says that an object at rest will stay at rest, forever, as long as nothing pushes or pulls on it. An object in motion will stay in motion, traveling in a straight line, forever, until something pushes or pulls on it.

It is the same with life and it is ordained that the only way you can change the results is to change the effort. So if we are at rest we will stay that way and if we get in motion we will stay that way until something stops us. The less we put in, the less we receive. So if you are not happy with your results, the only way to change them is to focus on your efforts.