We decided to travel the world for one year with my wife and our two daughters. Beside the great family experience I firmly believe that one should take at some point during a career one or several longer breaks in order to take some distance and rebuild some energy.
When I came out of school 20 years ago like any fresh graduate student I was looking for challenges that would contribute to my own experience and also participate to something greater. At that time I was able to learn poetry by hart in a couple of hours so as other writings; I could read technical as well as philosophical books in a couple of days. In the same day, I was also able to run 20 km or play a football game with my friends before going out for a party.
I was convinced that every problem had a solution and that the world as a whole was heading for a better future. In fact, the last sentence is already an analysis done with my today way of thinking. The concept of problem itself was completely foreign to my mind. I had enough energy to participate to any project and take the challenges. There never were problems; it was just about being convinced and motivated.
I’m now 44 and I’m less and less able to do all these thinks. I’ve been said that this is a normal process and that it will even get worse by getting older.
As I try to be pragmatic, I decided to do a kind of assessment in order to get some facts and confront them to that mainstream statement.
1. How often did I learn poetry by hart in the last 6 months? No. This is too ambitious! When was the last time that I did it? Wow! Frightening.
2. What was the last technical book that I read? And what was the longer period of concentration I could organize in order to really focus? Ouch! What a pity.
3. My weight increased about 10 Kg and I probably lost 30% of my muscular power in the last 20 years. They say: “You are in a pretty good shape for your age” … Really!
Is all this really happening because I’m getting older? Not so sure.
I remember many years ago the champions were “old” and unable to compete after 30. There are probably many other examples but I like tennis. Roger Federer did an amazing comeback and it is said that he has never been in such a great shape: he is 35. We could also mention the Williams’ sisters or Rafael Nadal…
Without being a tennis expert, it is interesting to notice that in order to come back they all had to take time to strengthen again their body, learn new thinks in the context of an ambitious strategy and rebuild some energy.
Those examples should inspire us. Whatever job we do, champion or traditional worker, we don’t invest enough time in building ourselves. We had all a huge reserve coming from our education period but at some point it’s not enough anymore because the world has been disrupted to some extent.
Our reserve, even if it has been enriched by many personal experiences, is not anymore enough to overachieve in our competitive ecosystem. We have lost the way to embrace new paradigms and the way to learn new things.
The question that comes to my mind and that I will try to answer in the coming months is related to the rest of my career. Should I start the first day of the rest of my career by stating that I am a very experienced worker and that this is what I have to bring to an organization?
The other option would be to take the time to rebuild all the capabilities and come back stronger, obviously with my personal experience but also with what have been lost through the years.
It may not work! Maybe I’m simply too old. Let’s reopen the discussion in one year, or in 6 months to check where I stand in that process.
Beside that I also believe that our Worldwide Tour will be a fantastic experience for the family and especially for our daughters.
Notre balade autour du monde / Our WW trip 