Jim Cote writes in Man of Influence:

When I was seven or eight, we lived next to a boarded-up school. We took turns rotating the merry-go-round in the playground for our friends. They'd climb on and grab the rails, and we'd run alongside as fast as we could, pushing.

The bigger kids relished the thrill of hanging out beyond the platform to experience maximum Gs. The smaller ones were taught to quit crying by slowly working toward the center pole. The closer you got, the more stability you enjoyed.

This is an important principle. The faster your life goes, the more focused you must be on your center if you're to survive and thrive. And what or who is the center of your life? It's not your family or career; it shouldn't be your golf game or favorite football team. It's God. We often forget or neglect that.

Due to the exhilaration of our ride or sheer panic from its velocity, we hang on for dear life but never catch our breath. It's time we realign our activities around the security of that perfect center, drawing closer to him.