Traditions look like they will be tossed out as no longer relevant. But we must hold on to our values as lasting qualities for sailing along the often troubled waters of our lives. We need to try and figure things out as we lose many of our parents’ and grandparents’ generations. They held things together, now it is our turn.
Conversations over coffee…
“The world and the way it works are rapidly changing,” I said this somewhat off-handedly as if looking for some kind of hope, perhaps to understand it all.
“Duhhh… you think?” My friend and I were chatting over a cup of coffee. We were musing about how our lives and how things have changed completely.
Fortunately, although the pandemic is lingering in some ways, we can live our lives normally for the most part. No more lockdowns, we hope; been there, done that! After staying home so long and working from home, we are ready for more balance and what we used to call normalcy. Hence an afternoon was spent recently with my friend getting caught up with each other in a cafe over coffee and muffins.
We mused about many things, including how the youth, our children, will manage to find new ways to make a living in the future. Our lives are now amazingly different from our mothers, not just work, but everything! And the lives of our children are already entirely different from ours. How do we guide them?
Depending on their age group, some of our children are struggling to find meaning in their lives. They wonder how they will make a living, buy a home, and more. “Will their work have a meaning?” Even university degrees don’t guarantee a job. We all know those who started down one path only to end up on another. Sometimes the paths we end up on are more meaningful to us. This is hard to explain to someone just entering the workforce.
Discovering what is relevant in your life leads to finding meaning.
Life has always had a way of tweaking us as we butt up against circumstances. Finding what is “relevant-in-the-moment” can lead to finding new meaning.
Perhaps we don’t have the right answers for our children’s lives. Perhaps encouraging them to dig deep into their psyche, to be free, have courage, and step out into life is the best advice. To take the first step and just start doing. Then the next step and another after that will appear. We learn by doing.
Let them know they can find answers different from ours. We all come out okay in the end.
It is about leaving room for the serendipitous.
Neither Computers nor AI can do that!
Fortunately, we humans live in several dimensions at the same time. We live mostly in a mundane world, where sometimes everything looks as if it is full of problems. But we have to remember Flow. It is that something else that makes us tick. Flow offers up new possibilities.
You’ve probably heard what happens when an athlete enters the Flow State. Or the references to “Swing” in rowing? We work, we strive, and we keep going. We gather strength in cooperation with others. Then all at once, we get an idea, or something appears that we never noticed before. Something serendipitously wonderful takes place. Suddenly we’re transported to a new and better state. Flow is a brief moment that changes everything. But without the courage to just go for it, that Flow never happens.
Sleep, Re-Start or Shut Down
We are all familiar with these computer commands. In computer terms, Sleep means you can wake up at a moment’s notice and pick up where you left off. Re-Start means you are being stripped of all previous code, shutting down, and re-initializing with new information. When you start up again, you are starting from a new place. Shut Down is turning off with back-end memory still untouched. The parameters are the same as when you shut down. You have not changed.
Each Process has its Purpose.
Because of current circumstances like inflation and such, many people are finding themselves, post-pandemic, in the same boat as some of our children. We found ourselves “temporarily” working from home. The new reality is that some of us can never go back. But work we must.
In a way, we now have choices. There is so much about what used to be that is good, relevant, and worthy. We need new information, growth, and learning, but stripping out or deprecating all that was relevant and beautiful about our past is not the answer. We need to take all that was good and carry it forward while at the same time learning and developing new skills.
Most of us are trying to re-invent ourselves. As we share our lives with each other, we’re trying to sound like we have things in hand, but we’re actually treading water and somehow trying to juggle our new lives. Finding new ways to fit into these changing times is not easy. It seems we are working double time to learn and keep up with new technologies and ways of doing things.
There are a lot of proponents who favor just dropping the past entirely and re-starting or re-setting everything. But that would leave us with no foundation to stand on.
Everything is fortunately not bleak. I look at what many youths are focusing on. When you see a group of young people talking excitedly about what they are doing, that means there is hope for all of us. I have noticed there are two areas that don’t dwell on gloom and doom but are capturing the imagination. One is the Crypto and Bitcoin markets, and the other is Content Creation. For instance, and Adobe Study called “The Future of Creativity is insightful, inspiring, and hopeful. (from news.adobe.com)
There is an old “Round” or Song we used to sing as children. It needs singing again now.
“Make new friends,
But, keep the old…
One is silver, and the other gold!”
It could be re-worked these days, to say this,
Learn new things
But, keep the old…
One is truly told,
And the other gives you wings!
Keeping and building from the good and relevant in the past is comforting and adds stability to our lives. New ideas have a place to take off from. Flying on to new vistas is more assured from a solid foundation.
The Future Needs Every Old Wisdom… As It Soars To New Heights
- Hold fast to the Values we must keep.
- Keep things that have worked. “Don’t throw the baby out with the bath water.”
- Find new innovative solutions to problems.
- Use new technologies together with traditional wisdom.
- Learn from those who actually have experience doing things.
- Learn to cultivate rather than tear down.
- Appreciate our connection with nature.
- Be more people-oriented.
- Be kind.
- Realize the potential of individuals.
- Encourage each other.
- Listen more.
- Strive for more balance and Win-Win scenarios.
- Be encouraging to team members.
- Change continually for the better, but work for the long term.
An Old Story About Building for Long-term Success.
A woman who had been in the business of marketing and selling products had built up a large following. She treated her staff well, and together they weathered some difficult times but also enjoyed the fruits of their labors together in the good times. They adapted to the times, always coming up with new solutions to problems.
The woman was asked by a younger woman if she would mentor her. The young woman very much wanted to “make it.” She wanted to impress her mentor by any means possible. She wanted to be a financial success. She began making deals that were not as beneficial to the others in the company. She portrayed some ideas as her own when they were not. Just as detrimental, she was sometimes flippant and deceitful with customers. Things seemed to go fine until, one day, her mentor watched as her protege handled things.
The mentor saw that the young woman needed some sage advice and gave her a one hundred dollar bill. “This is your profit,” she said, “See if it will feed you tomorrow?”
The young woman replied, “Oh yes, I will make another hundred tomorrow.”
“Okay now,” continued the Mentor, “The customer you deceived will never come back, and the team member whose idea you stole is leaving the company. That is the last one hundred dollars you will be making.”
“Who will be there for you tomorrow? Who will watch your back? Who will stand up for you during hard times? Who will buy your goods? Money comes and goes, it is people you need!”
Remember Faith Popcorn who coined the word “Cocooning.” I think Cocooning might get a bit lonely, especially since we’ve lived through the pandemic. As social beings, we just have to reach out and “touch someone.”
We can evolve to an entirely new mindset when we think of others.
There have been too many dystopian futures written about. We don’t have to have a dystopian future with individuals working to further our communities. Caring about each other, the future will be awesome!
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