The Climb
I have been back home from school for the last couple days. I have spent most of my time with family. While I always love just sitting around with my family for hours at a stretch, I do carve out time for being alone for some reflection daily.
I have been thinking about what is the single most important lesson I have learned this past year. Maybe it’s not a lesson. Maybe it’s just something I have discovered about myself.
I have learned to appreciate the journey that takes us from where we are to where we want to go. The climb. The process. Not the outcome.
Growing up I have always admired a lot of people. Whether this is in professional context or social sphere, it does not matter. I have just respected where a lot of people currently are. I have been in a habit of putting them up on a pedestal and attributing their current positions in their lives or careers to sheer talent, intelligence, or luck. I never made an effort to understand how they got to where they were. It was always about the end goals in my mind. I would never think that what they have is achievable for me.
I am glad that has changed. I have noticed a lot of change in how I think and deconstruct a lot of things this past year.
I have started to enjoy the process. The struggle. The path to getting to what I want.
For instance, I have enjoyed the process of landing a lot of opportunities in tech. I can proudly say I did not get completely lucky. And, that’s because I can deconstruct the entire process and do it ten times over. Sure, lucky played a role. It always does. I am grateful for how luck played out. But, at the same time, I had a repeatable process in place. That climb increased my odds of getting lucky. While there is lots to learn, I am content with how I am ending 2016 in that context.
For what it’s worth, I have liked the process of actually getting the job more than actually getting the job. I have learned so much during the struggle. It’s insane how much concious observations, rapid decision-making, and long term thinking can teach you.
This mindset applies to a lot of different things. I am just using my career path as an example that I am comfortable sharing.
A lot of the appreciation for the struggle comes from my hunger to get better at how to reverse-engineer what I want to happen in the future. Deconstructing a long term goal into smaller milestones is powerful. Once I have a good sense of the milestones, I deconstruct them into daily goals. Consuming the kind of information I do on a daily basis and writing on a regular basis are two of the daily or weekly goals contributing to those milestones.
I am happy with my progress in 2016. I definitely wish I had learned a lot of things a couple years back. But, what’s done is done. There is so much more to learn and accomplished next year. Everything compounds.
Upward and to the right.
