Good morning & happy Monday!
“We live life forward, but understand it backward.”
Søren Kiekegaard, Danish philosopher, 1813-1855
A few weekends ago, I took my family on an end of the summer weekend getaway. My wife was enjoying a quiet morning while I took my 11- & 13-year-old sons to a theme park. In the rental car I was searching for a radio station and came across a classic rock station.
My sons and I were enjoying listening to some of the great rock classics … “We Will Rock You” by Queen and “Stairway to Heaven” by Led Zeppelin to name a few. Then something happened that I was not expecting … and I am not at all happy about it!
A song from my teenage years, “Lightning Crashes” by Live, played. At first, I was thrilled, and I tell my boys, “This is a great song!” as I turn up the volume. But moments later I think to myself, “Wait a second, why is THIS song being played on the classic rock station??? This song was just released. It’s brand new.”
Well, it’s not brand new … it was released in 1994, I was 14 years old at the time, so it’s now 31 years old!
This fact was not lost on my sons who quickly pointed out that my musical era is now considered classic rock.
I would like to throw the red challenge flag, but I’m fairly sure that upon further review it would be determined that a 31-year-old song would indeed be considered a classic.
How in the heck did the music I enjoyed listening to as a teenager now make it to the classic rock channel? I’m not that old!
But father time is catching up to me as it catches up to all of us.
This got me thinking about how I now look back on the 1990s with great fondness and nostalgia. In my mind I have classified that decade of my youth as a time of good music (I stand my ground on that one 😊), a time of simplicity, a time of great memories.
However, the 1990s brought the fall of the Berlin Wall, the fall of the USSR, the Los Angeles riots, the World Trade Center bombing, genocide in Rwanda, the OJ Simpson trial, the Oklahoma City bombing, the Bill Clinton / Monica Lewinsky scandal, the Columbine High School massacre, and the Y2K panic, just to name a few. It was a challenging decade, and yet I look at it with great fondness now.
Why?
I think the answer, at least in part, is because I now have the advantage of hindsight and knowing that everything turned out alright.
Of course, when I was living in the 90s, I didn’t know that. I knew that the world was an uncertain place. I had no idea where I would attend college. I had no idea what career field I would be in. I had no idea who I would marry or how many children I would have. I didn’t pay too much attention to the news, but what I did see didn’t exactly instill a great deal of confidence.
And yet, here we are.
We all survived the 90s.
And the 2000s.
And the 2010s.
And now halfway through the 2020s (the decade sure got off to a rocky start with COVID).
The further in the rearview mirror the memories go, the less stressful we remember them. It’s so interesting how that works.
Remember how stressed you were about the political candidate who disagreed with you about how to run the country? Be it Clinton, Bush, Obama, Trump, or Biden … the narrative amongst those who disliked him was always ‘the sky is falling.’
Well, the sky didn’t fall. The country didn’t collapse. The world did not end.
I think these are good reminders periodically because I know a good many of us find ourselves in a place of anxiousness today. The future is anything but certain and can be quite scary. What will AI do to our world? Will there be inflation? Deflation? A stock market drop?
And yet, when we look back at this season in our lives, are we going to regret being fearful when we should have been enjoying and embracing these precious times?
What a shame it would be for us to worry away our limited days.
A respectful question: Could these be some of the best years of our lives and instead of enjoying them we are fretting about them?
So, here’s my idea to ponder this morning: What if we live today as if we have the advantage of hindsight? What if we approach our decisions today as if we were looking at them from a future point of view?
Put another way: What would a future version of yourself advise you to do today?
How different would our decisions be? Would we be better investors? Would we be better spouses / parents / children? Would we live more enriched lives?
I believe the answer to all these questions is “Yes.”
So, my friends, let’s live the YES of today instead of the WHAT IF of tomorrow!
As Jesus says in Matthew 6, “Can any one of you by worrying add a single hour to your life? … Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own.”
We will prepare for the future together the best we possibly can, but we will refuse to let worry and anxiety rob us of the joys that today brings.
Thank you for sharing your life and your journey with me. It is an honor I treasure. Please let me know if there is anything we can do to support you along the way.
Make it a great week ahead.