by Yours TrulyStuff I’ve learnt growing older
I drafted this post about 5 months ago (on my birthday to be precise), but never really remembered to post it till recently.
Growing older, I’ve learnt a whole lot (naturally). And once I turned a year older, that seemed like the perfect opportunity to share a few lessons that have really stuck. My first intention was to make a list that correlated with my age, but on second thought, I settled with listing out just 14 points. It’s obviously not an exhaustive list, but 14 seemed like a pretty justifiable figure. So, here are a few things I’ve been privileged to learn in my little life here on Earth:
When there’s life, there’s hope: Whoever came up with that quote was clearly on a roll that day.
Babies are cute (most of the time): And they have no worries (well, for most of the time too). If that’s reason enough, then let’s strive to make the world a better and healthier place for the new babies coming into the world, if not for anything else.
There’s a compulsion to walk: At some point in the life of a baby, it just gets tired of crawling… then it starts walking… then it falls… then stands up again. Then it starts screaming at people who pick it up for too long… because it just want to get down and… well, walk some more. Respect the growth process, but never stop moving.
A Social Media Tip: Don’t use Social Media to vent your anger. In my opinion, neither should you use it to vent happiness. In short, stay emotionless for most of the time. if you’ve got an ulterior motive for tweeting, blogging, posting a status update or uploading a picture, just sit there and do nothing. The feeling would pass. Share your deep feelings with close friends, family and loved ones instead.
Sometimes, Drastic Steps: In the movie ‘Family Weekend’, Emily was so frustrated with the ‘dysfunctional’ in her house that she had to ‘kidnap’ her parents and, well, deal with them. It wasn’t easy for her, but they were all better for it. Besides, the song by Katie Herzig at the end brought a tear or two to my eyes. But that’s another story entirely.
You’re not Indispensable: Don’t let anyone tell you that you are… or that they can’t do without you. Or their life would be incomplete without you. If they do tell you, just smile. Don’t believe it. It might be difficult at first, but people would always move on. They’re built to move on. We’re all built to move on. And that’s the basic truth.
Carry the World: Dedicate yourself to a cause much bigger than yourself. It’s what makes life really interesting. Every other thing is, quite honestly, just survival.
It’s hard to let go of the past: Past glories… past failures… it’s hard to let go. But we really do not have a choice but to let go and move on. I’d argue that Nature agrees, as it’s actually quite difficult to walk backwards for a really long time. So, keep moving forward.
Stay Focused: Have your main goal… and let everything else be secondary.
Work Hard: There’s still no substitute for sweat equity.
Work Nimbly: Learn to be adaptive to change. With the shocking tales of the once-been behemoths turning irrelevant within a surprising period of time, it seems like the world is moving faster than anyone can fathom.
Put action to your words: The world is filled with too many people talking… just talking; too many free-readers arguing at the newspaper stand… too many unfulfilled promises and overpromises. It’s a long and humbling process, but we need to learn to walk our talk.
Let your words be Life: Expletives and poorly-thought-out speech, as much as they seem ‘hip’, won’t do much for those listening, as well as for those speaking.
Lead Right: A mentor of mine recently told me, that “True leaders live in the future. They only come back to the present to carry everyone along with them.” Naturally, that got me thinking… ‘how possible is that, to constantly live in the future?’ And I figured something out. It’s not the easiest of things to do. But if I’m not ready to lead right, there’s no use in starting in the first place.