By: Jack Laskowitz
Vice President
PAYIT DIGITAL GOVERNMENT
Dear Jack,
You’re hosed. That’s it. Good luck. Wish I had a better story to tell you.
Kidding! You know that. It’s going to be great. Clearly, every minute won’t be great, but if it was, would it really be great?
As your grandma used to tell you, you’re constantly making memories. Here are a few pointers to think about as you travel along this journey so the memories you make are the best ones, and there will be some awesome ones.
Finally, before you read all these nuggets of wisdom, know that you won’t be perfect. Far from it. You’ll struggle with spending too much energy seeking approval and acceptance from other people and from avoiding conflict. That means you’ll try to provide diplomatic answers too often. If you stop reading now (well, in a moment. Bear with me!), know this: be yourself. Trust your judgement. Speak plainly, clearly, and stand behind your convictions. Just do so with an openness to be wrong and give yourself the grace to evolve your thoughts and opinions.
Okay, on with the show:
Time – do something with it.
Some people will have all the recommendations on the best shows and movies to watch or the best video games to play. It may suck in the moment to not be that guy. Don’t worry. You know what that means? You’re not spending HOURS of your life behind a screen doing very little. Worst case, just look up some rec’s on Reddit as a gap filler.
We’ve all heard that time is your most precious resource. Think about how you spend it as an investment of your time. Are you investing that time in yourself? Your health? Your family? Your career? These investments should pay dividends, and that’s not always just financial.
Consider spending some of your time where you have a passion or a purpose greater than yourself. You likely won’t paid for it (that’s what we like to call a job), but guess what? Some of these experiences will be the most valuable of your life. Sometimes just minutes or hours of your time will improve the entire trajectory of the lives of other people. Along the way, you’ll generate lasting friendships from networks you’d otherwise never touch. Will it be easy and tons of fun the entire time? Heck no. It will be something better: fulfilling. You’re going to find that people like to set the camera lens on themselves more and more. Don’t get sucked into that. Find your focus outward. I promise you the inward benefit is immense.
You’re probably asking, “why is he mentioning all this ‘hard work, not fun’ malarky?” Here’s the best analogy I can give you. You know when you’ve done an hard workout or intense run? It was awful and/or painful while you were doing it. Your muscles literally stopped working after a while. Why did you do it? Because you know that it made you better. That extends beyond physical fitness. There’s bad stress (“you’re terrible! Do a better job!”), and then there’s good stress (“this is hard, but it’s so worth it!”). The good stress is the same as a hard workout. You’ll be better in the long run!
Leave the Joneses to themselves.
There are going to be more instances than I can count where you’re going to compare yourself to others. It’s going to be a struggle. You’re going to fall victim to this. A lot. It’s easy to do! You want to be successful. You look at others that you consider successful. It can lead to unhealthy thoughts. Should you be competitive? In the words of Hulk Hogan, “hell yeah, brother!”. BUT… should you feel like a failure because someone else has done something better than you? No, silly. Someone somewhere is always going to be better than you. Appreciate them for the talents God has given them, appreciate (and use) what He has given you, and seek to find the behaviors that helps these people be successful. Then move on and get to work!
Find ways to measure your success in different ways. Do you feel as if you’re giving your best? Are you investing your time the best ways you can? Are you bringing joy and belonging to others? These will be much better barometers.
Oh, and you won’t nail it every time. As one of your mentors will say, “nobody bats 1.000”. He’ll also tell you that it’s inevitable you (and he) will screw up. It’s how we respond to those moments that counts the most.
Conclusion: we’re all gonna die.
Unless there’s something about science I haven’t heard about, we’re all mortal. There’s a time when our parents are going to die, when our friends die, and when we die. We don’t know the time nor the order. At some point, there’s a date where no tomorrow comes for each of us. Don’t allow that to get you down, but let it motivate you to take advantage of every moment we have. Allow those moments to become memories, living on well beyond our time. Frankly, even those memories fade, and we’re left with the ripple effect of our efforts to leave this world a little better than when we entered it. If you love someone, tell them. Romantic, friendly, or caring love – share it.
Bonus: If your kids love a game where you say “glow” and not “go” when they want to race up the stairs to go to bed, for the love of Pete, just spend the 2 minutes doing that. They’ll get more out of that than ten vacations. This ain’t rocket surgery.
It’s going to be a lot of fun. Enjoy it. Jack
