We live in uncertain times: Can climate change be stopped? Can global violence be stopped? Do young people have a future? The questions go on and on.
Why is this topic important to me?
Not only humanity lives in uncertainty, but also each individual. We humans all have similar worries:
Is what I’m doing right, is it good? Can I fulfill my wishes, satisfy my needs? Will I find friends who are good for me (and vice versa😉) and the „right“ life partner? Can I achieve my education, my career goal? Have I made the right decision? Have I chosen the right career, the right goals?
I am afraid. What if I have an accident, if I or my loved ones fall ill, if my life changes from one day to the next due to a stroke of fate?
The security I long for in life doesn’t seem to exist – neither through preventive medical check-ups nor through insurance or unexpected wealth.
What are the important basic insights for me?
In the decades of my life, I have been able to feel that there is a „law of provision“ (as the American pastor Norman Vincent Peale once called it) when I simply try to do my best.
My management coach Jörg Radl from Freising (who sadly passed away far too early) put it in a similar way: „The path is built for the walker.“
These are helpful signposts for me:
- Follow your heart – live your passions, it doesn’t matter if you have several and some days they seem incompatible.
- Work on something that is bigger than you. Something that you think is meaningful. It doesn’t matter if you are sometimes unsure, your gut feeling will tell you the way.
- What matters is your attitude „Do you want to be the passenger or the pilot of your life?“ and the tactics you use to pursue your goals and values.
Allow me to say a few words about point three: you can’t control everything in life, but you can sense balance. Like in the water, for example: you won’t be able to stop the waves, but you can feel balance.
Food for thougt for children
As many paths lead to the same goal, I can only give my son tips that are based on the findings of many smart people and that I share based on my own experience:
- Cooperate with others. Use this super power of the human race, as our Minister President Winfried Kretschmann recently put it so beautifully. This proves the African proverb „When many small people, in many small places, do many small things, they can change the face of the world.“
- If you don’t know how to behave in uncertain situations, use tried and tested principles of action as a guide: Goals should be generalizable (because all people/living beings want to feel good), consider whether you could harm someone with your action (including future generations).
- Take care of your health, pay attention to good relationships and personal growth – this is more important for your long-term well-being than, for example, the accumulation of „likes“ from people who don’t know you or the accumulation of material things.
Then you will flourish and be able to live with uncertainty!
Translated with DeepL.com (free version)