“Adrian Savage is a writer, an Englishman, and a retired business executive, in that order, who now lives in Tucson, Arizona.” And he writes about “Things I wish I’d known when I was younger“.
Though there’s nothing new or even sarcastic or funny in what he writes – in fact it is probably the simple, candid nature of what he says that attracted me – it still is a good read, if only to reflect on each one of them with reference to yourself. Which is exactly what I am going to do now! At least on some of them…
Most of it doesn’t matter
How true! There have been so many things on which I have spent so much energy and time which, in the end turned out to be such a complete waste. I will have to live with so many lifelong regrets!
The greatest source of misery and hatred in this world is clinging to past hurts
Now what was I saying about lifelong regrets?!!
Waiting to do something until you can be sure of doing it exactly right means waiting for ever
Reminds me of Sartre’s “Age of Reason”. One of the underlying ideas of this book is that some of us or many of us have big ideas and dreams in our head but we never have the courage to execute them and we always find excuses and we always assure ourselves that we will still do it – we are just waiting for the right moment or the right stimulus. And we finally realize that our life itself has been reduced to this waiting, that we are no longer capable of anything else other than waiting.
If you make your work your life, you’re making your life into hard work
Couldn’t agree more! To quote from what he writes, “…work should be a means to an end: living an enjoyable life. Spend as little time on the means as possible consistent with achieving the end. Only idiots live to work.” But there is a dangerous trend in today’s business and corporate world where those very idiots are put on a pedestal and idolized and saner people are looked down upon. As modern businesses stress more and more on productivity, they employ all sorts of methods to squeeze and exploit the last bit out of their employees. (But all their methods are sugar-coated in HR pep talk mind you!) You either play along or get left behind, or in the worst case get fired.
Trying to please other people is largely a futile activity
Now you tell me! That’s what I have been doing all my life! Hopefully, as I get older and more cynical, there will be an end to this.
You can rarely, if ever, please, placate, change, or mollify an asshole
…especially a clever one!!