You live in incredible times. So why aren’t you making the most of it?
50 years ago Russia had just sent the first person into space. Today if you’ve got enough money, you can book a joyride to do the same thing yourself.
25 years ago the world wide web didn’t exist. Today you can find out anything you like in seconds while standing on a street corner most anywhere in the world.
Even a decade ago the first iPod hadn’t yet been released, the human genome was yet to be sequenced and Nickelback could have a number one single despite having no musical ability whatsoever. Well, perhaps not everything has changed…
Life expectancy is way up. Poverty levels are in decline. Cheap flights let you see the world and cheap technology keeps you in touch with it. Food is more plentiful. The gender gap is much smaller. In fact, other than those hairy Canadian rockers, in the last half-century your conditions in life have improved dramatically by almost any measure.
Anything is possible.
So why doesn’t it feel that way?
Why do you work longer hours than your parents did?
Why has microwave pizza and a can of beer become your dinner of choice?
Why has your earning power increased dramatically yet you’re only a couple of paycheques away from disaster?
Why has your waistline expanded every time you try on a new pair of jeans?
Why have your relationships gone to crap?
Why do you spend your life in a cubicle doing a job you hate, hanging in there for a weekend that’s never long enough?
Why?
Because although technology has changed dramatically in the last few decades, our thinking hasn’t kept pace.
Because your government, your employer and your society much prefer obedience to independence, and do everything they can to maintain that status quo.
Because advertisers and the media ram a dream down your throat that is actually anything but, and you believe them.
Because you’ve given up the fight.
Do you remember back when you were a kid and your teacher asked you what you wanted to do when you grew up? I bet you wanted to be a rock star. Or a fireman. Maybe you thought you’d be a doctor, or a famous explorer. Travel the world. Climb Mount Everest. Fly to the moon.
I guarantee you didn’t say you wanted to be a wage slave, doing a job you can’t stand for a company you couldn’t give a shit about.
I’ll bet you didn’t say that your greatest desire was to live in a huge house in the suburbs that you couldn’t afford and to fill it with crap you don’t need. Odds are that you didn’t think that tuning into Survivor would be the highlight of your week.
Of course, It’s just easier to do what everyone else does. Just go with the flow and stick it out for the next forty years. Buy that enormous house. Sit at work for 60 hours a week hating your life. Watch that stupid reality TV show. If it’s good enough for the people around you, it’s good enough for you, right?
Like hell it is.
Einstein didn’t discover the Theory of Relativity while sitting on the sofa eating corn chips.
Hillary didn’t stand at the top of the world because he got lost on his way to the shopping mall.
The Beatles didn’t sell a quarter of a billion albums by getting sensible jobs at the local supermarket.
They didn’t give up on their dreams.
Why have you given up on yours?