How many people do you know that have a 5 year plan? I’m not sure I know of one that has it written down. I decided to take 10-15 minutes today to kind of reflect about the past, present, and future and maybe develop a 5 year plan from there. I don’t think it’s as important to follow one’s 5 year plan as it is to envision what one wants for the next 5 years. With that being said, I will use mine as more of a guiding light and a navigational tool in life, as I have with several of my past “5 year plans.” The reason I say this is because I know if you would’ve told me 5 years ago I’d be where I am today I wouldn’t have believed you, I’d have labeled you as crazy. Even as little as two years ago, my life has completely flipped turned upside down. They say if you want to make God laugh, just tell him your plans. I think God would pay to see my life as a stand up comedy show. I read somewhere that the biggest growth and the most challenging time we’ll ever know is in our twenties. Generations ago your life was basically scripted for you. If you weren’t married with kids by 22, 23, or god forsaken 25, there was something wrong with you. You were out of the norm. Life was pretty simple; grow up, go to school, find your sweetheart, soulmate, babygurl, raise a family, and retire with enough money you can enjoy it. There weren’t as many choices, people didn’t travel as much, the American Dream was owning a house, that was it. I hate to say it, but times have changed, people have changed. Those who grew up in Michigan can’t find a job in Michigan, they’re forced to move. They immediately become part of the rare 5% that live 50 miles away from their hometown. No longer is owning a house everybody’s dream, some people love the city, want a view, want to travel, want to live abroad, want to create a foundation, a business, a perpetual entity, want to create art, music, be famous, chase, chase, chase that’s what we do. Is anyone really happy anymore? Or is it all a façade? We’re overleveraged, living on credit, trying to keep up with the Jones’s, material possessions consume us, and our desires our consuming our soul. No longer is going from A to B the goal, it’s going from A to B better than the last person and much more in style. People don’t talk about world events anymore they talk about themselves. We’re our own center of the universe, how sad is that? More women than ever go to college, so instead of getting married at 17 they are waiting until 21 to even think about pursuing that option. Women’s self-worth isn’t predicated on their baby-making and domestic skills, they are actually creating an identity based on their values, personality, and desires. They are on a more level playing field then ever, they are becoming more dependent and less reliant on us. They now can be more picky, and they should be. Many people use to sacrifice themselves to make everyone else happy, they only thought about not hurting anyone else, instead of worrying about what was really important, themselves. They weren’t fair to thyself. One of the everlasting true statements of our time, “Be True to Thyself”, because if you aren’t true to yourself how could you be true to anyone else? It’s not just the trains, plains, and automobiles that are taking us away and transplanting us in foreign environments. It’s the blackberries that prevent us from meeting strangers, it’s the internet we use to communicate instead of actually walking down the block to say hi, it’s more work hours, less vacation that’s isolating us. The very thing, technology, that was suppose to make everything more simple, fast, reliable is actually hampering our ability to communicate. How many of today’s children are book smart, yet lack the very basic communication skills? Video games, cell phones, computers, internet, movies, and music are making our kids walking voids, making them socially awkward. Instead of playdates they are playing a stranger in World of Warcraft, instead of football under the street lights they are bowling with the Wii, instead of hanging out on the porch they are texting, sexting, and instant messaging, instead of living in the real world they are living in Sim City. We wonder why America is losing ground to the developing nations, we lack the very skill it takes to compete in the market, we lack interpersonal communication.After college, you are still coming into your own, you’re growing mentally, spiritually, and consciously. You are realizing your place in the world, where you want to be, and who you want to be with. I believe the reason so many people break up in their mid to late twenties is because they weren’t who they were when they began their relationship. Trying to understand, feel, and adjust to your maturing as a man/woman is not only tough, but trying to grow and also manage a relationship with someone who might be changing in a very different way can sometimes be impossible. You weren’t who you were when you were 21 and neither are they. And that’s okay. A couple years ago I found myself often questioning the meaning of life. Why are we here? What is our purpose? Who am I ? What makes me happy? I started studying other cultures, religions, and traditions, to see if I was missing something. I found these truths to be self-evident, I found these questions were universal. Just like love transcends all feelings, happiness is what you create. Too many people forget, happiness doesn’t depend upon who you are or what you have, it depends solely upon what you think. “Are you bored with life? Then throw yourself into some work you believe in with all your heart, live for it, die for it, and you will find happiness that you had thought could never be yours.”-Dale Carnegie Life is a journey, not a destination. Life isn’t about knowing. It’s about living for the moment. It’s about finding the person you can go through anything with and still find something to laugh about together at the end of the day. Its’ about making your dreams come true. Its about making mistakes. Its about finding what makes you happy. Life has never been about knowing, so stop wasting time wishing you knew. I felt like I need to preface my five year plan with my ideas and thoughts so you as the reader would know where I’m coming from and my state of mind. My five year plan would be better labeled as a guidance, than a plan. With the ultimate goal being happiness, I could care less if I achieved of failed my plan. The plan is just a means to the end, and if in the end I’m happy than that to me is the definition of success. As I’m writing this I’m thinking about Albert Einstein’s Theory of Relativity. I saw a video about it that was trying to explain how as you get older time seems to go by quicker. It was talking about when you were younger and how your first birthday you remembered seemed to be so long and such a wonderful memory. It was indeed a big part of your life. And then when you were in your thirties and forties how you could easily forget a birthday. It talked about since you only lived for five years, a year was a fifth of your life, 20%, therefore relatively major. But as you get older, as the days, weeks, months, and years go by, 5 years turns into a much smaller perecentage, therefore each day seems like it goes by faster because it is a smaller increment of your life. I think that’s important to state because, as some point in your life you are going to hit the middle of it, where you are no longer growing, but starting to shrink, everyday you live is a closer day to your death. I know that seems like a weird twisted way to put it. But if you position it in your mind correctly it can be very rewarding. Tim Mcgraw said it best when he sung, “Live like you were Dying.” It is only when one confronts death head on that one seems to live. The goal isn’t to survive it’s to thrive. With that being said, I feel like 5 years is still a very large percentage of my life, 20%. At the end of that 5 year plan, 5 years would be only 15% of my life. I guess what I am saying, due to relativity, it would make more sense to have a shorter plan than 5 years, since 5 years is still a fifth of my life, who could actually try to plan the next fifth of their life? And be anywhere close to accurate? No one.And no one in their right mind, certainly not myself would’ve placed me in Grand Rapids working for Fidelity. I’m looking in the rear view and still wondering how I got here. I think this is the first time since I left ML that I’ve actually reflected on what has happened. There’s been three chapters of my life since college. Link.
FOOTNOTE 4 