Question 65 of 365: How do we get there from here?

As much as I try to get excited about of the journey, there is still a really big part of me that just wants to arrive. The point A to B stuff gets tiresome, and I just want to do be done with it. I wan’t to claim victory and not have to see everything through just to prove my point.

In essense, I would like to have a map already laid out and know what the mile markers are going to say. If StreetView can put together a viewpoint of the inside of stores, surely I can see my way to the end of the year or the coming collisions within my life, right?

In Maine they have a saying, “You can’t get there from here.” And I believe that this holds true for a lot of what I am trying to do in starting a new business or in starting a new school. The progression doesn’t seem logical. It seems as though we will have to jump over vast lakes that stand in our way. And if that is the case, what will those jumps be?

I would like to proclaim now that my ideas will be profitable within a year. I would like to proclaim now that education will be better because we have rethought it in this time and space. I would like to proclaim that the networks that I live in will be forever changed because I have taken part. These proclamations are not made out of hubris, but rather, out of passion for making them happen.

And yet, what jumps will let these proclomations come true?

I believe that the first jump will be because of a single person. I believe that a single person that I do not yet know will see what we are trying to do and decide that he or she wants to invest their time and money into breathing them to life. I believe that this person will have a unique perspective that I have never considered. He or she will be able to better see my goals than me and will be better able to articulate them to a wide audience. This person will become my muse for a while. He or she will make me want to work nonstopped to figure things out and prove my worth. This person will not wait for me, but will encourage me to keep up. And I will.

The second jump will be because of a technology that doesn’t yet exist. It will help me listen better to everything going on around me and let me iterate upon my ideas more efficiently becuase of it. This technology will focus my energy on creating something new rather than monitoring what I have already created. It will single-handedly change my discourse to be about making connections and sustaining them. It will change me too.

The third jump I will make to get from here to there will be because of a loss I will undergo that I cannot yet see. I will have to give up a very large part of my ideas or of myself in order to prove that I can go on. I will lose so completely that it will be hard for me to pick up the pieces, and yet I will. I will continue to pursue what I have always pursued: an authentic way to work and learn. And that is what will still be there. The loss will haunt me, but it will solidify my resolve to get things done and I will work even harder to make sure that what I have lost will not have been sacrificed in vain.

While these predictions are somewhat ominous, I think that they are completely true. I beleive that the only way that we can make true strides toward our vision of the way things should be is through loss, disruptive technologies, and supportive mentorship (not an exhaustive list, however). I shall have all three.