Are you ready to Die?
If you want a good life, I'd recommend taking the following steps:
- Get good test scores by taking test prep courses.
- Do what the teachers say and do it well (for good grades).
- Get into a good undergraduate and graduate college.
- Get into a good job.
- Repeat step 2 (replace teacher with boss).
- Get promoted.
- Save your money.
- Retire.
If you follow these steps you will probably have a good lifestyle, be financially secure, live in a safe suburban community with little league, bring up good kids who go to good schools, take a nice vacation once a year, etc. There is nothing wrong with this.
However, there is a group of people that live amongst us who probably could think of nothing they'd rather do less. Some of these people would rather eat ramen noodles in their friend's garage, take heavy discouragement and even exclusion from family, work 70 hours a week, get paid less than minimum wage, and risk bankruptcy for their dream. At a more extreme level, some members of this group will even risk their life for a cause they believe in!
If sociologists from another world were to look at this, they'd surely investigate more. Why does this group do what they do? What drives them? How did they get this way? The scientists would be surprised to find that many of these people aren't super-smart, super-rich, or super-attractive. In fact, in many cases, they're the opposite. They'd watch them in their daily routines and even be more perplexed. They have parents, hang out with friends, and have cereal in the morning just like everybody else. But, something is different.
I know not what drives me or where it drives. However, as I go farther out into sea, I'm losing sight of the shore. I know things will not be getting easier from here on out. I'm OK with that. In fact, I love that.
The greater the challenge, the greater the courage that arises. Laugh at us now or call us heroes later. It doesn't matter. Our definition of self and success is not a thermostat of changing times, it is a thermometer for changing times!
Posted at October 25, 2005 11:24 PM
