The Quarter Life

Lessons from the future: Part 1

2012-02-06T16:15:00.000-08:00

It's a tough question to answer, "What is your biggest failure?" We've all made mistakes on our different paths, some larger than others. But these mistakes are a part of us, they are what make us who we are for better or for worse. Some people, myself included, have taken numerous hard knocks and suffered huge set backs by choosing to ignore, or at the very least, not really listen to advice bestowed upon us. It seems a right of passage to ignore or even loathe your parents and elders as a teenager and perhaps even into early young adulthood; thinking they lack style, knowledge of the latest trends, technological know-how or are just simply out of touch with the times. For most of us this wears off over time as we repeatedly come to find out that we don't really know much about life at all.

There is a wise saying over the west entrance of the library at the University of Colorado: Boulder that reads, "He who knows only his own generation remains always a child." During my time at CU, I came to love seeing this amazing quote every time I passed through the quad. It is a powerful claim of truth in regard to the value unceasing learning and knowledge. Those of us now entering the adult world of life and work are lucky enough to have 5000 years of written history to learn from and study in an effort to avoid the same mistakes and failures of those that came before us.

George Norlin, author of that quote, was obviously referring to the stacks and stacks of books and reference material available inside the campus library, but this knowledge isn't just available from past sources, it can be gained from those older and 'wiser' than us that have navigated the same challenges of life, albeit perhaps under different circumstances. It is in this spirit that this blog has decided to highlight some of these 'insights and lessons from the future' on a monthly basis. These musings of life will come from a wide range of sources and age ranges from those just a few years ahead of us to several generations in front, and contain what each individual feels to be the most important thing they would deliver to themselves as a young and upcoming twenty-something.

The first installment comes from my father, Rodney, age 62.

"Always listen to yourself."

We've all seen the movie Good Will Hunting, and hopefully you remember the excellent scene where Matt Damon asks Robin Williams if he ever has second thoughts or regrets about meeting his wife, and Robin elaborates on his "first date" with his wife while missing a historic game of Red Socks history and lore. If not, check it out below.

When you are young the regrets you have are usually mistakes that you've made along the way that have set you back. If you talk to people with more age and wisdom on their side, you will come to find out that the biggest regrets are the risks they didn't take or the things that they always wanted to do, but never did. Robin Williams would be feeling this exact sort of regret if he wouldn't have done the "unthinkable" and missed going to World Series game with all of his friends.

This isn't a license to do whatever comes to mind, but it is a nudge to weigh your aspirations and goals with situations and associated risks. We are young, the whole world is in front of us. This position gives us the ability to take more calculated risks or missteps without having to face harsher consequences of a more defined and confining life with a real career, a family and larger financial commitments. If you miss these moments and opportunities when they are presented to you, they may be gone forever.

"Be passionate about everything you're interested in."

Not only is it important to listen to yourself and jump on opportunities when they are presented to you, it is just as important to put everything you have into accomplishing these goals and tackling risks and challenges that stand in your way. There is no sense in taking risks if you aren't going to invest all of your energy into making them a success. That simply is a waste of valuable time and energy. This can be related to job searching, traveling, taking up a new hobby or trying to develop new relationships with people. If you aren't willing to put yourself on the line or in an uncomfortable or new situation, you will not get everything out of that particular experience that you could have. The familiar is always easy to navigate because it is just that: familiar. It is much harder to navigate the uncharted and unknown. These are the experiences that push you to grow and learn.

"Be honest, truthful and upright in ALL you do, so you never have to make excuses."

This is an excellent strategy for exuding passion and giving your all in anything you try. When you are honest with yourself and others about your feelings it pushes you to grow and be more in touch with yourself which helps this cycle become more of a habit and a loop of positive feedback. If you fail, don't make excuses for why you did, reevaluate and try to learn and grow from that experience. It is easy to get down on yourself and lie to yourself about why things don't work out or why they aren't how you would like them to be, but when you make excuses for behaviors or lack of success, you allow the problem to grow almost unknowingly. Such honesty allows you to reevaluate and come to sound conclusions about what is working or not working for you as well as place value and importance on the things you love and enjoy.

Honesty acts as an insurance policy in dealings with others whether on the business or personal stage. A reputation of honesty and genuineness brings people to confide in you as well as builds trust and reliance. If you can be accounted on for your fairness and uprightness, it will yield power in the long run as people come to value your judiciousness and reliability as evidence by strong moral character.

"There's no success like failure and failure's no success at all." -Bob Dylan-

Bob Dylan always had a way with words and lyrics and using them to describe the nuances and experiences of life, and this line from his song Love Minus Zero/ No Limit struck a chord with my dad and embodied the message that he wanted to share with us and the one thing he would give back to his young adult self. It is ok to fail, in fact if you aren't failing then you aren't trying, you are stagnant and most likely not moving forward. No one is perfect, and we can never expect to be. Life is about learning and experiencing as much as you can, while learning what works for you and what doesn't. No two people are alike and everyone has their own strengths and weaknesses, interests and dislikes. The importance is in learning the differences and how to play to your strengths.

Failure is a critical step in the process of moving towards success, and at the same time is the exact opposite of success. It is a necessary irony of life. How you respond to your failures and how you gauge the risks and rewards of your choices is what counts. Are you learning and moving forward or dwelling on all that went wrong? All of the greatest minds, the wisest thinkers, the biggest innovators, the most impacting entrepreneurs; what they all have in common is that they have failed and failed time again, but learned valuable lessons from those experiences to be more successful in the future. They weren't afraid to put themselves out there and try something new or different. Our failures become more important than our successes because we learn even more from them.

Obviously risk taking, and putting yourself out there and trying new things comes more naturally for some. If you are someone that struggles with this idea, try and put yourself around people who it comes easy to. I am a firm believer in the idea that who you associate with and hang out with has a direct impact on the decisions and actions one takes. This isn't to do any disservice to agency and freewill, it is a simple truth to the social nature of human beings. People can't help but rub off on each other, which is why it is important to associate yourself with people who have the qualities you would like to develop. It will help you immensely, I promise.

I'll leave you with Bob Dylans song Love Minus Zero/ No Limit. This version is live from is album Dylan Live 1975. The song was originally written as a tribute to Dylan's future wife Sara Lowndes (Wikipedia). Like many Dylan tunes, the true meaning of this track is elusive, on the surface it can be read about love and a great woman, but there are many nuances and turns that leave the true meaning open to interpretation, which is what makes any song great. At any rate it is a great song about finding out what is really important in life. Until next time best luck in your endeavors and please feel free to comment below about important lessons and failures in your own life and how they have helped you grow. Thanks for reading!

The seven best Apps you don't have

2012-01-24T23:54:00.000-08:00

Let's face it, it's only a matter of time until the latest and greatest iPhone and Android come blazing onto the market and make your old smart phone obsolete and outdated. If you are anything like me, you either lack the funds necessary to keep up with constant turnover that is this insanity of techno-development, or you simply aren't nearly as concerned or insecure about what you do have as t.v. and big business would like you to be.

Regardless the silver lining is that there is a solution to revamping your smart phone almost as fast as they can create the next best thing, and that answer is the ever-growing app market for our much loved devices. New apps are constantly being released and these days it is virtually impossible to keep track of the growing demand and supply of these megabytes of joy.

According to techcrunch.com, the Android App market was expected to surpass Apple's App Store in August of 2011, and was on pace to have 700,000 Apps available by the beginning of 2012, nearly 200,000 more than Apple's store. While numerous Apps are available on both platforms, it doesn't negate the fact that there exists many more applications than anyone has time to explore. Unless you are subscribed to technology blogs and news sites, or an avid fan of programing and App development, it is impossible to keep up.

Luckily for you, in my search for some new, fresh updates for my phone, I stumbled across some pretty cool Apps that I think any quarter lifer might want or need, but that they may not have known about or even knew they needed. Thus this blog brings to you: The Seven Best Apps to Navigate Your Quarter Life".

Google Music- Free (99 cents for iPhone)

Have you ever gone to play a song on your iPhone or Android only to remember that you recently removed it to make room for your newest and hottest tracks or new App that you recently discovered? With Google Music you never have to worry about missing one of your favorite songs due to lack of space on your phone again. Google Music lets you store up to 20,000 songs from your personal music collection on your own virtual cloud and makes these songs available for access on your mobile device. This app also provides access to music to purchase on the Android market. The only major drawback is that it can take some time to upload a boat load of songs to your cloud, but once they are there you are ready to rock and roll, anytime anywhere.

Click For iPhone Click For Android

Currents- Free

This App provides a simple interface for compiling and accessing all that you like to look at on the web. Whether you are trying to stay up on the latest tech gadgets and discoveries or looking to keep tabs on your favorite celebrities and entertainment news, Currents allows you to pick and choose which webpages and news sources you want to follow and provides easy access to them all. The user interface updates content regularly and provides it to you for offline viewing. Whether its blogs, news, or entertainment you like to follow, Currents will keep you in the loop. After you download this great App be sure to add The Quarter Life to your reading list. ;-)