My plan is...

At times I've gotten fairly personal on the blog. Every so often you get to hear about the adventures of my kids and a bit about my motivations and philosophies (here and here). I appreciate you reading and hopefull that provides some better understanding of what makes me tick. As if any of you care...

But sometimes I read somebody elses work and it really resonates with me. I mean REALLY resonates. This post by Tom Peters (here) is that kind of piece. Of course, Tom Peters is a legend. He makes a boatload of coin by showing up and waxing poetically on stuff. But this isn't about money. It's about impact. It's about happiness.

I spent many years planning out my career progression. All with the goal of world domination firmly in my sites. When I was a kid, people would ask me what I wanted to do. To make my folks happy, most of the time I said "be a doctor." That's what was culturally expected. I never wanted to be a lawyer, go figure.

But one time, I was actually honest and said "I want to be king!" And I wasn't joking. Of what, you ask? "Of everything!" And that's what drove me for a long time. But as I've aged and passed the point where more of my hair was gray than less, I've had a change of heart.

Why? Because I see what is involved in being King. I've seen the sacrifices and the mangled relationships, the absentee parenting, and the fact that these folks see much more of their co-workers than anyone else. Days, nights, weekends - there is no end. I got to the point where I wasn't willing to make the sacrifices necessary to be King.

Someone else can do that, and more power to them. But they also should keep a good divorce lawyer on their speed dial and a top notch psychologist close at head to help their kids reconcile why their parent thought it was more important to work than to parent.

But this is my personal philosophy. I also believe in "to each their own." So far be it for me to be critical, I've just seen the movie and it's not interesting to me.

So basically, nowadays I live life one day at a time. I could do worse than to emulate Tom Peters and go "from speech to speech and Post to Post and book to book—with no thought about "impact." He also mentions a great quote from Southwest Airlines' Herb Kelleher: "We have a 'strategic plan,' it's called 'doing things.'"

My plan is to have no plan. That doesn't mean I don't think about cool things that I would like to do. Or go all in once I decide to do something. But I'm done trying to figure out how this will lead to that and how that will lead to buying an airplane. I never understood the saying "Success is a journey, not a destination," when I was a marketing guy. Now I get it.

I threw out the financial model for Security Incite once I figured out I could pay the bills. I'm entirely focused on the journey nowadays. I chase projects and opportunities that I think will be fun, where I can have an impact. I turn away work that won't keep me engaged or involve people I don't want to work with.

And I try to get things done every day. And I'm a much happier guy for it. But that's me.