Never Lose Perspective
My philosophy is to "never lose perspective," but frankly, in the process of upholding that, I always do (lose perspective).
We all do.
As my favorite author, David Foster Wallace, once said:
There are these two young fish swimming along and they happen to meet an older fish swimming the other way, who nods at them and says "Morning, boys. How's the water?" And the two young fish swim on for a bit, and then eventually one of them looks over at the other and goes "What the hell is water?"
DFW's speech to the Class of 2005 graduates of Kenyon College serves not to remind me to try to be the old wise fish, but to remember that I will always be one of the two young fish.
Let that sink in for a second...
You might be wondering: "What's your point?" I don't blame you. It's this: Never lose perspective. Remember who you are. Remember where you are. Remember where you came from. Remember where you're going. Remember who you know. Who you don't know. Who you want to know. Watch. Listen. Experience life to the fullest. These are all of the things that we forget to do on a daily basis. To borrow from some other great writing:
Life moves pretty fast. If you don't stop and look around every once in a while, you could miss it.
That's the kind of perspective we all need in our constantly connected society, and I should know; I love my iPhone, iPad, and Mac as much as the next guy. That doesn't mean that I can't be humble and stop to look around every once in a while. Humility is empowering. There are plenty of people who do not believe that, but there are equally as many that survived on humility: Gandhi and Nelson Mandela to name two. Take that into perspective.