WHAT’S NEXT? – PART ONE
Friday, January 6, 2023
Live your dream, and dream your life …
Or dream your life away?
Dreaming isn’t so bad. In fact, it’s magical sometimes, but our maturing genes kick in like muscle memory reminding us to be steady and responsible, so we avoid straying outside our lane.
Why is that?
We can stray, can’t we, and explore the limits in ways we only can when we push those boundaries a little more than usual?
But reality invades our space – the back-to-work, break’s over, resume what we do well and ‘shoemaker stick to your last’ – we’ve heard every cliché, uttered them too. We’ve given sage advice to younger colleagues, old friends and complete strangers because we are intelligent, experienced, and wise beyond our many years.
Poppycock. We run the same risks every day of every year, getting stuck in the muck and throwing up our hands over things that shouldn’t rattle us because it doesn’t get simpler, ever; everything is better, faster, and more complex than we ever imagined – and every day, every year, life and business get more tech-driven and more complex to understand. Brash youngsters seem to be doing better than ever, while most of us wouldn’t know blockchain from a block of wood or be able to describe crypto, 5G, or ChatGPT to anyone.
Their ups and downs sometimes garner headlines over grand-scale booms, busts, millions made, and billions lost or foolishly wasted – all so easy when we look in the rear-view mirror or stand on the sidelines watching. It seems billionaires can lose billions from stupid mistakes and they remain slightly diminished billionaires all the same.
The difference we’ve forgotten as we get older is the fear factor is the difference. Remember when we were skiing carefully, in control, enjoying ourselves with pride at how we navigated bumps and steep slopes without falling or injury, only to see kids without poles or fear or brakes flying by without a fear of falling or failing – they just flew down any slope so effortlessly while we planted poles and learned our stem-christie …
They didn’t know more than we did; in fact, they knew only a tiny fraction of what we did. They weren’t without fears, but our worries were different. As a ‘late-middle of middle age’ person, I see now that bravado and fearlessness are critically important in driving change, changing landscapes and shaking up the status quo …
Getting rolling each year is similar to any fresh project start or business start-up; always taking me more time than expected and a lot of energy to overcome the inertia of my stationary train, and I always struggle with restarting myself in the re-establishment of rhythm and routines, on top of all that ‘planning time’ in November and December.
Every child in school learns the concept – because that train in motion is easy to keep rolling, but getting it moving is much like pushing a dead car in winter; it requires a tremendous amount of energy to get the wheels rolling …
Continued tomorrow – check out WHAT’S NEXT? – PART TWO
Reader feedback:
I enjoyed reading this Mark, and it was a great tribute to your departed neighbour Gord. Condo life is definitely a big change from living in a house, but for me it’s a perfect balance between autonomy and community. And, like yours, the location is ideal, HW, Calgary, AB
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