To build the future you must have opportunity (presented to, or created by, you) and also optionality (think: open-mindedness to every available(or hidden) parameter, opportunity, decision, etc…)
I'm not here to impugn, shun, or forget history and the thousands of lessons she has given to us. History must not be forgotten or belittled.
But what about developing new technology, new business models, new ideas for the way we do things, and more?
If you adopt what is already being done and you do it really well, you will have a horizontal growth outward and may indeed have a very nice business.
But, if you do things differently and risk everything in the face of the status quo glaring down on you unapprovingly, you stand to gain the most.
Sure, you may crash and burn. So what. The payoff is that you could experience vertical growth. This is growth off of the baseline of the way things have always been done.
Think of Google, Facebook, Apple, Microsoft, and more. Modern companies who have created services and products that we never would have thought about. They didn’t expand on what we had, they created something brand new and changed us all.
This leads me to the thought I had this morning about college and structured job training (this is how most people treat college, anyway.)
College stymies open-mindedness (the good kind that leaves you open to adapt and grow when unforeseen events present themselves), closes in opportunity (your degree is for that job type), and generally encapsulates good young minds in a box that ends up limiting both opportunity and optionality.
Opportunities are scary because they might fail and embarrass me or not be financially viable(at least we tell ourselves that).
Options are scary because I never want to be the one who does something first. School has taught me that group approval is paramount.
I'm here to say: Take some risk. Seize the opportunity. Be open to all options (even the ones you don’t see). Don’t worry about what the crowds say you should be doing.