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Woody Guthrie from Wikicommons
After watching the inauguration and knowing the challenges that we all face, not just back in home in the United States but here in Britain and all around the world, I still retain my optimism, although some accuse us Americans of allowing that to slip into naïveté. My optimism is tempered by an awareness of the severity of this economic crisis, but I’ve always been realistic and pragmatic. To me, it’s part of the values from my family and from where I grew up, the Midwest in the US.
It’s at times like this I think back to Woody Guthrie and his songs of hope during the dark days of the Great Depression. The next few years aren’t going to be easy, but together, yes, we can. Woody once said:
I have hoped as many hopes and dreamed so many dreams, seen them swept aside by weather, and blown away by men, washed away in my own mistakes, that — I use to wonder if it wouldn’t be better just to haul off and quit hoping. Just protect my own inner brain, my own mind and heart, by drawing it up into a hard knot, and not having any more hopes or dreams at all. Pull in my feelings, and call back all of my sentiments — and not let any earthly event move me in either direction, either cause me to hate, to fear, to love, to care, to take sides, to argue the matter at all — and, yet … there are certain good times, and pleasures that I never can forget, no matter how much I want to, because the pleasures, and the displeasures, the good times and the bad, are really all there is to me.
And these pleasures that you cannot ever forget are the yeast that always starts working in your mind again, and it gets in your thoughts again, and in your eyes again, and then, all at once, no matter what has happened to you, you are building a brand new world again, based and built on the mistakes, the wreck, the hard luck and trouble of the old one.
more about “Steve Jobs’ 2005 Stanford Commencemen…“, posted with vodpod
Steve Jobs is a great story teller, and he’s proven that you can tell stories through computer hardware. This is a little less fluid than his normal delivery, but the story is fascinating. Love what you do, and a lot of things will follow from there.
Steve says:
Your time is limited, so don’t waste it living someone else’s life. Don’t be trapped by dogma–which is living with the results of other people’s thinking. Don’t let the noise of others’ opinions drown out your own inner voice. And most important, have the courage to follow your heart and intuition. They somehow already know what you truly want to become. Everything else is secondary.
more about “Things to do before I’m dead: Learn t…“, posted with vodpod
OK, that’s a bit of a morbid way of putting it. I don’t plan on dying anytime soon, but I fear that I’ve been putting things off for a while. When I moved to London in 2005, I didn’t know how long I would be here. When I left the US, I was told that it would be a year long assignment, but when I landed I was told that it might only be six months due to budget cuts. Then, six months grew into a year and a half, and then I changed jobs, and it’s almost four years later. Everything has had a temporary feel about it, even after I met Suw and we got married. I still feel as if I’m living out of a suitcase. Longer term plans that take a little time and preparation were put on hold.
It being a new year and old, I’ve thought about dusting off some old dreams and moving towards them. I’d really love to learn how to fly. Growing up, my family had a single engine plane, a Cessna 172. We used to fly it on short trips. My brother once took the passenger-side controls for a brief time, but I was too young ever to fly it before my parents sold it. It was one of the reasons why I was interested in flight and originally studied aeronautical and astronautical engineering at university. Looking at a video like this, it reminds me of why I have always been fascinated with flight, and it makes me want to commit to learn how to fly.
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