On our way back from training my son and I stopped at the traffic lights.
“Papa, is that not the house that belonged to your old Science teacher?”
“Yes son, he was a good teacher”
“Is he still in hospital, how old is he?”
“Yes he is still in hospital, doing well, around 70 I think”.
“That’s old!”
“No it’s not”.
My Science teacher is more than double my age and retired, although a little unwell, he is coming along very nicely in life. However, it got me thinking that, I am now at the half-way stage until retirement (I will work 70 I think) so what have I achieved so far and what is in store for me down the line?
So while sipping on a cup of coffee that lunchtime, I started categorising my life so far:
[Note: I am 35, not ashamed of that number, may look slightly older as the “grey hair community” have began their invasion on the “black hair community” > no racial overtones please].
Here’s a sneak preview, years 0 – 5, the rest this week, it’s too much reading in one sitting.
Years 0 – 5: After 9 long months floating around in the mother capsule, being protected from the fires around me, I got the call from the outside world that I was required for a mission still unknown to me.
Apart from getting up to no good, always getting into trouble, I don’t remember much. Maybe some time spent at a play scheme, I can vividly recall making some friends, who by the way I still keep in touch with.
Apparently I got lost in India while on a visit to a Holy Shrine, for approximately 10 minutes. Though my parents had given up all hope of finding me (they were hundreds of people around), two very nice chaps (who spotted me with my parents earlier) found me and handed me back. It’s a massive sticking point in my mind, I could have been somewhere else today, adopted by someone, it puts everything into perspective when I look at where I am now.
Most Memorable Achievement > Visiting the Holy City of Amritsar and partaking in the Sikh tradition of having my hair combed.
Potato Sandwich 
35 eh? I’m 200 yrs old. That’s a good thing you got back to your parents safe and sound.
That’s 35 earth years 🙂 I was there in the Dark Ages.
Yes, everytime I think of that it gives me the chills, what if?
35 isn’t old …. For some it’s just the beginning of even better things to come…
I remember getting lost once as a child. It’s one of my earliest memories and most frightening ones. We were visiting some house where there was a huge gathering, might even have been a funeral. I wondered of outside and got lost. All I remember is walking and walking around in circles and all the houses looking the same and eventually the distraught tears. Finally someone found me and took me back to my mom. And in typical fashion I got told of for wondering off!!
I think the only people that got told off that day were my parents, by my grandfather, who loved me dearly. I tell you what, if I had got lost, I don’t think I would have met up with my parents like it happens on old-skool Bollywood movies….
Have a nice day.
Dude, although age does not dictate how you live your life. Never sit back and think you have enough time on your hands. For a long time now – even as far as being a kid – I understood one thing in life above all other things – and that is “never let any opportunity go by”.
I have seen people with massive potential simply watch their life go by – why because they always wanted to start tomorrow but tomorrow never came.
Dude, don’t just be a Project Manager, be a life Manager and never let an opportunity go by.
Cheers dude, totally agree.
There’s more to just working, you have to expand your horizons and do as much as you can on a personal level. If you want to write a book, do it! If you want to swim the Thames, do it! Not sure what we are all here to do, but the sooner we figure that out the better.
Trust me, I never let many opportunities drift by, but they have to fit around my mini family, my boys are paramount to our future and although some of us run in pursuit of gold in the hope that it will provide a better future for our kids, when get there, we find that we don’t recognise the very people who we are killing ourselves for.
Thanks Bro.