My writing today is driven by a classic image I saw that shows the divide between old school and new school.
I grew up in an age when riding your push bikes to friend houses and spending the whole day outside exploring the world then coming home at dinner time was the norm.
Half the time our parents never knew of the adventurous things that we used to get up to, well not unless someone broke a limb or came home with some sort of injury that required explanation.
But we always made it home and we always experienced new things every day. We took chances, we met new people and we developed lifelong friendships through shared experience.
We did not have mobile phones,we just turned up on doorsteps asking if so and so can come out to play.
This modern world divorces a lot of people from these shared experiences, we make connections online, we communicate not with our voices anymore but with our thumbs, and we no longer engage with each other because eye contact is not even a concept, lest we miss out on something on our screens.
FOMO (Fear of Missing Out) is a very real condition and prevents many doors from opening and stops many real interactions from taking place.
I see people walking and looking at their phones, I see people with their kids and looking at phones, I see people in groups and looking at their phones, I see people at restaurants and looking at phones.
This may present an excellent opportunity for marketing through technology and is definitely a tool to be used for promotion and accumulation.
However, I love interacting with the people that I am out with, I share things in the real world, I engage with children, I eat my meal and enjoy great conversation when at restaurants and I look where I am walking when I am out.
These seem to be skills that people are losing at a rapid rate and I for one find this a great shame.
Remember to communicate, remember to engage, remember to look where you are going and don’t lose sight of the bigger picture, if you don’t you just will not see that truck barreling down towards you and by the time you do it could be too late.
These are all analogies of course and, in case you missed it, should be applied to how you guide your business venture and how you interact with your customer base and how your customer base interacts with you.
Allow the experiences that you have take you to the next step. Do not be afraid to take a direction you have not considered; it may lead to an even greater adventure.
As they say (whoever they are) If you knew what was around the corner, chances are you wouldn’t go.
So be brave, be adventurous, be bold and be forever moving forwards, don’t get entwined in the narrow view of what’s immediately in front of you, look at the bigger picture. It has greater longevity
And first and Foremost, Enjoy yourself while on the Journey, if it is no loner enjoyable, look at taking a different path.
