Time. The ultimate currency.
We all are born with a finite amount of time on this earth, some more endowed than others. Much like the currency that fills our bank accounts, for some reason we seemingly never have quite as much as we’d like. While money can be accumulated and grow without end if we play the game correctly, our time in life begins ticking in one direction the moment we open our eyes.
I believe it to be no coincidence that we refer to our daily endeavors as “spending” time. With a currency so finite, each moment of our lives becomes a decision to deplete our accounts by hours, days, years. While financial spending decisions can be assessed based on the level of funds in a bank account, the beauty (or danger) of time is that we never know quite how much we have remaining. When we “spend” our time, we blindly withdraw some percentage of whatever is left.
The question, of course, becomes “What will I do with my currency, my time?”
What people choose spreads the gamut: some dream, some chase, some love, some hate, some work, some waste, some build, some take, some smoke, some drink, some do, and some think.
I believe that the vast majority of the world spends most of their currency doing rather than thinking. Aside from the fact that very few professions pay you to truly think, a better explanation for why the world spends their time doing rather than thinking is that, quite frankly, it’s easier. Real thinking, not simply opinion formation, is challenging work. It’s far easier to go through the motions of the life and responsibilities we know and are familiar with, no matter how strenuous or stressful they are, as opposed to letting our minds take us to uncharted waters where the outcomes are unclear, with the real possibility of having our foundations and fundamental beliefs shaken.
In the last 5+ years, my profession has put me in the position to challenge the “doing” of large organizations by presenting a different way to think about the problems they face daily. While my job itself (on a high level) is to think in such a way that was not or had not been done before, I myself began to fall into the “doing” trap of account management. I spent almost the entirety of my days doing, rather than thinking. So, as has become my calling card, I am taking an extended break, a retirement if you will, to give myself the time to think, rather than do.
Have you ever made it a point to teach yourself how to think? We are bombarded daily with the problems of our lives and the world at large, so I believe it imperative to process it all with both logic and love, with my engineering degree and my heart. I’ve done my best, through many influencers, ranging from John Wooden to Paulo Coelho to Morrie Schwartz to Eli Goldratt, to teach myself how to think, so that when the opportunity presents itself, as it has for me today, I may think clearly.
When we begin to think, often times our mind wanders toward certainty. If we can convince ourselves that we know why something has happened or why a given reality exists, it gives us both a sense of comfort in understanding, and a sense of place or confidence. This tendency of thinking that we “know” can block us, however, from achieving a breakthrough, be it in a work environment, a family issue, or barstool conversations about the world’s problems. If we allow ourselves to believe that every situation can be improved, that we don’t “know” all there is to know about an environment, we remove a barrier to thinking clearly. Travel constantly reminds me how much I truly do not know, enabling me to bring this mindset into everyday life.
Along the same lines, refusing to believe we “know” allows us to challenge the idea that conflicts are a given. Too often, we accept that conflicts must exist between parties or ideologies. We assume that what the old desire is in conflict with the young, that a child’s desires are in conflict with a parent’s, and so on. The trap we fall into is that we assume the true wants and needs of another party, or simply stay at the surface level. Why do we so easily accept this reality that the world is full of conflicts, full of winners and losers? The more and more people and places I visit in my life, the more I recognize just how similar we all truly are. To hell with the idea of conflicts as a given. If we look for the win-win in every situation, our attention turns toward mutually beneficial outcomes, rather than a win-lose, or worse, a lose-lose situation.
Now, the hard one. The laziest opinion to have about a situation experienced is that it’s someone else’s fault. The rich, the poor, the left, the right, this race or that, the husband, the wife, the boss, the co-worker, the coach, the players, the neighbor up the street…stop it, already. Don’t blame. Whenever the answer to a problem faced is that it’s someone’s fault, we prevent ourselves from reaching any real solution. Suspend reality, convince ourselves that people are good and therefore cannot be blamed for their intentions. Thinking in such a way forces empathy with the others’ views, needs, etc. and enables the real problem solving to occur.
Bringing these ideas together: Never saying “I know,” refusing to accept conflicts as a given, and not blaming others brings a clarity of thought that enables us to greatly simplify the world around us. Forcing ourselves to assume the situation can be improved, that a win-win scenario can be found, and that people are good and can be trusted in their actions and intentions will free us from the limiting belief that the world, or our given environment, is overly complex with no possibility of saving.
Now, it’s much easier to think about how these manners pertain to others rather than ourselves. Everyone tends to have opinions about how others should think and live their lives, the difficult part becomes adopting an inward-looking approach to challenge one’s own convictions and actions. This difficulty, this challenge, however, is what I hope to embrace as I live each day on a path towards continued fulfillment in my life. This path, this treasure hunt, will involve unbridled joy, a sense of adventure, primal fear, awe, shared laughter, perhaps some tears, community, unceasing love, tragedy, loss, and a great deal of thinking, and how beautiful it all will be. May it all overcome my very being, the emotions high and low, the gifts of everyday life.
So, as I withdraw an unknown amount of my finite currency remaining, my time, I don’t plan on penny-pinching. During this indefinite trip abroad, my “doing” will hopefully enable my thinking, as I make my way from the foot of Everest in the Himalayas to the plains, jungles, and beasts of Africa.
Come join the adventure if you wish…
…or at least think about it.
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*The ideas around thinking clearly are predominately influenced by Eli Goldratt’s book, “The Choice”