Life’s Journey, Enjoy the Ride

When was the last time that you looked at your life and thought, wow, how did I get here? How many lives have each of us lived as individuals? Obviously, we only get one life, however we do have transitions in our lives where we change phases of where we were and where we are going.

When I look at my own personal past, I see a person that has for the most part always had an idea of what he wanted to accomplish. I see that I have been extremely lucky for the most part, and have taken on new challenges in life, not only to keep things interesting, but also to push my boundaries.

We all have the beginning of the journey in common for the most part. We have a childhood. Each childhood is different, and some are more challenging than others, however, as it is a time of learning and evolving, each of us struggled in our own way before setting out on our respective careers.

We all face challenges along the way. The question is, how do we identify challenges we want to undertake, so the effort gives back in ways we can appreciate?

The best way we can do that is to remain open. When I say open, I mean open to possibilities. What if you have a chance to take a class that will give you a new skillset? Do you need that skillset now or maybe in the future? Or maybe, just maybe, it might be something you might enjoy learning. You would be surprised on how taking on a new topic can instigate a new way of thinking as well as give you direction on future topics you might want to learn.

No one learns when they think they know everything. Once you believe you have learned everything there is to know, then you are cutting off possibilities to discover new things.

Take for instance, about a month or so ago, I read one person talking about leadership and how they chose to run their business. This was a very successful CEO of a company. Her words were inspirational and should give hope to her employees.

One of the comments in her post was from a gentleman that strongly disagreed with her sentiment due to his experience with workers. Now, he preached his experience as, in his mind, he was the expert on all employees. He believed people were extremely lazy and needed to be micromanaged aggressively. What informed him of his opinion also gave away his ignorance as he talked only of managing dead-end jobs. He lived in his very small world and to him, everyone was the same. If I was speaking to him about his opinions, it would include, did he understand what incentives that he provided to his employees? How did he treat them? Did he consider taking leadership classes to learn how to inspire people?

What it does say about him is that he lives in a bubble. That bubble gives him his feedback and in the way he spoke, it reinforces his own ideas.

We all live in some type of bubble, as we only have outreach in minimal ways outside our own perspective careers. Successful people will look for ways to break out of their respective bubbles. To do this, we must educate ourselves. Step 1 in this process is to question every preconceived notion we might have. Question why something worked as much as why something didn’t work. It is not about creating repeatable patterns so that we can better succeed, it is about understanding when interventions need to occur when things are not going well. When we can do that, we will be better prepared for situations in the future. From there we can look for ways to educate ourselves that might include classes, joining a club, finding a mentor, or even mentoring others. By engaging with people, we become stronger in everything we do. It is this engagement that helps make the journey in life much more interesting.

But how do we enjoy the ride? We need to look for something we have an interest in doing. It may sound easy, and it really is. If you enjoy doing something, you will naturally put more effort into getting better at it. You will spend the hours necessary to going from a new learner to a subject matter expert! Time will not matter to you, because you are gaining knowledge of something that makes you happy. In my humble opinion, the most successful people are the ones that enjoy what they are doing and make the space around them a place that others will want to share. It could be someone that loves to work with metal. They will learn everything there is to know about it from a scientific basis all the way to how to best work with it. They can then see areas where they might be able to apply their knowledge. Maybe that is working in a metal shop, or maybe it is someone that wants to design the next spacecraft that will take humans off the planet. The decision on how to use this knowledge is for each of us to determine.

How we spend our time says a lot about us as individuals. Take a moment to really look at yourself and ask, am I where I am supposed to be? If you are, congratulations. For the rest, open yourselves to friends and family about your dreams and aspirations. They might have great ideas to help you achieve your dreams. As a person that saw new employees and clients, and was a part of their education, there is no better feeling that sharing knowledge with those that are ready and willing to learn.

It’s the journey that matters. I hope yours is a good one!

Thanks for Reading!

Craig Findley