It's Your World Now

A few weeks ago, I was having a deep philosophical conversation about life and changes with my friends Nancy and Sue. During the conversation, Nancy recounted a similar discussion that she had had with her father when Nancy was a young woman and her father was near the age Nancy is today. Nancy recalled her father saying, “This is your world now.”

I’ve been thinking a lot about that comment.

The world looks vastly different than it did when I was in high school, or on my wedding day, or on the day my daughter was born, or the even on the days she graduated from high school and college. You get the picture. The world and society are in perpetual change mode. How we respond to change is critical to our ability to survive and thrive.

I have to admit that I’m one of those people who often embraces change. When I was young, my mother was constantly redecorating (she still does), so that may have something to do with my willingness or need to explore new opportunities. In a couple of weeks, I’m moving into my sixth apartment since I moved to Dallas almost 12 years ago. While moving six times may make many people shudder, it’s not that hard for me because I don’t accumulate “stuff.” Instead, I gravitate to experiences.

Any success that I may have achieved is due in large part to my ability to adapt to change. I’ve seen many successful people falter because they can’t let go of some idealized version of how things were done in the past. I was listening to my friend, Dr. Brian Williams’ podcast interview with Beverly Thompson, a diversity and inclusion specialist, who talked about working to narrow the gap between the “Rolodex Era” and the technology generation. She said we need to respect the fact that we are in a different zone today than we have been in the past. One of the things that is constant is that change is inevitable. Change is going to happen whether we like it or not.

That doesn’t mean I’m in favor of changing something just for the sake of change without a thorough analysis of potential unintended consequences. It also doesn’t mean that I have “commitment issues.” I spent the first 25 years of my professional career at one organization and the past 12 years at my current job. I’ve been married to the same person for 40 years. I’m pretty good at commitment!

But I do have a tendency to go into “judger” mode when I hear people complain about millennials and their work ethic. And nothing triggers my ire more than having someone say, “We have to do it this way because that’s the way we’ve always done it.” I have to work really hard to “listen in” and try to understand those viewpoints. Because my experience with younger generations is that they also have a strong work ethic, but it just looks different than mine.

I’ve been fortunate that the younger people in my life honor my life experience and expertise, but they also have very good ideas about how to make enhancements and improvements and are not shy about sharing ideas.

I, too, have reached the time when this world belongs to a different generation. But I remain hopeful that we can learn from each other and co-exist peacefully. Because, we all are inhabiting this world at the same time.