THAT WHICH MATTERS
Saturday Sept. 27, 2014
My cause, my issue, my way – does not have to fit you.
Does not have to fit your life.
Or yours mine.
So, what matters?
Name, brand, reputation – rarely outlive anyone.
How about your brand, your reputation – your schtick.
Are you branded?
Labeled?
We cannot out-live great reputations, or out-run bad ones.
Everything we do revolves around relevance.
We are here until we expire.
What else matters?
Matter or not.
Help or not.
Care or not.
Many institutions have names attached. We revere product, idea or ideology – religions aside, not so much that person (Bell .. phone, Jobs .. the apple .. or was that McIntosh?, or Adam?) as their product.
Graham crackers, nachos, Caesar salad, saxophone – no added years of life for inventors Sylvester Graham, Nacho Anaya, Caesar Cardini or Adolphe Sax.
If products had another name – creators would be just as obscure as the rest of us.
We cannot control how we will be remembered, if we will be remembered at all!
Few things last long, work out as imagined. Sure, things matter.
Without us, they matter far less.
Many buildings. Organizations. Foundations. Research chairs. Initiatives – with names on them. Mostly, dead names.
Having your name on a building, not the same as a statue, but close. Pigeons, I believe, prefer statues.
To me, it makes sense to focus on things that matter, people that matter and issues that matter – little point spending effort on anything or anyone if at least one of those aims is not at the core of our thinking, actions and motivation.
Which brings me back to relevance.
Tell me, please, if not relevance, what matters?
Mark Kolke
column written/ published from Calgary
morning walk: 6C/43F, drizzly, Gusta anxious – she knows we are about to hit the road (she saw me packing a bag) … traffic typically light, nearly everyone was still sleeping when we walked earlier before dawn, as if you can tell the difference between night and heavily overcast dawn..
Reader feedback / comments always welcome:
NOT ABOUT MORE ANYMORE
Hi Mark: Thanks for the informative visit this a.m. Truly not enough time to cover some things I’d planned … like asking to see pictures of your grandbabies, and Gusta, as well as a few questions arising from the house discussion … oh well perhaps another time, or not. Anyway, thanks again .. it was fun and great to see you again. You truly ARE making great progress with your new ”plan” and I myself will refer to your card often!, BR, Calgary, AB
