When I turned 25th, my dad sent me a text message: The first 25 years you learn, the next 25 years you gain experiences, the next 25 years you share your wisdom and the last 25 years you live of your memories. Make sure you have lots of them to go back to.
I loved the text at the time and truly it made an impression on me. Today, several years later, I agree with the statement only to a certain point. I think that we all learn all our life and also can share our wisdom all our life. We need to be open to receive and give and that’s also true about the experiences and wisdom we share with the world.
Let’s have a look at little kids. How much life experience do they have? What can they teach us? For example – their honesty, the purity of their expression, the spontaneous and exciting approach to life, the constant exploration, surprise and admiration of simple life beauties. As you see, they learn and yet they share so much! Maybe not cautiously but it’s up to us adults to be open and ready to receive their wisdom. And the same is for other ages and generations. They each have something we should be open to at all times and something to give back… The teens and up have much better technical skills, they have different priorities than the ones more experienced in life. Again, there is something to give and take, learn and share no matter of the age.
But now we get to a point where certain societal expectations start to “chase” us. For example – go to school, study hard, get a job, buy a house, get married, have kids and work hard to support yourself and your family. Such is life! And now, I come across so many of us who are challenging the traditional route of life. A lot of us go back to school, leave their careers which were paying them well for something they were more passionate about. A lot of people explore their passions because they were so focused on the traditional trajectory that they completely forgot what to do in their spare time or for fun! And this is not being judgemental, this is just to point out that we sometimes get so focused that we forget to live our own life! It’s not bad at all, it’s good to be focused, but let’s be mindful of WHY we are doing this. And as far as we have the why and it’s a good one, it’s OK!
But what happens many years later is the realization that sometimes we’ve been doing something because it was expected or just because we were told to do so or we didn’t think about what we want to do or simply didn’t know what to do. And then, we wake up one day and realize that we are tired and there’s nothing else for us to focus on outside of our daily routine. And yes, that’s a wake-up call! It’s the right time to pause and ask yourself. Am I living my own life or a life someone else told me to live? Do I know why I am living the life this way? Do I have the right reasons why? Is there something I’d rather be doing? No, I am not pushing you to do something irresponsible and too crazy! I am just making you think – What (if anything) can you do differently and create the life you want so you constantly have great memories and can always share your gifts, help others and learn from them to make the world a better place for everyone? And that’s my mission as well. To make an impact on people’s lives, to help them achieve their full human potential. PS: Are you on your journey yet?!