I have always been fascinated by how thought-provoking flights can be. Knowing that you are by yourself with little to no real connection to the rest of the world for a few hours allow you some quality time to self-reflect. As you hear the clicking sound of feelings from experiences settling in their rightful places in your brain and the revelations that you deducted out of those learnings keep flowing into your mind in disguise of fancy words, you find yourself regretting having left your laptop in the overhead compartment.
Nowadays, there is another hot topic that never ceases to impress me. The pace at which we are experiencing change lately has reached a level to cause unlearning to become more important than learning. Regardless of the level of our potential, we are all operating with a limited set of resources. Even the most well-endowed person would be limited with the energy and time available to them at any given time. Information flow, on the other hand, is accumulating through the collective effort of most of humanity and progressing at a much faster pace than a single person can absorb.
Unlike the previous generations, we no longer have the luxury to be able to accumulate experience and knowledge that will lead us to a peaceful retirement. Unlearning is now a more essential skill than learning in the first place, as we need the freed-up processing power and peace of mind to be able to re-learn new things from scratch rather than running into conflicts with the current (well, previous) status quo.
The next generation? They bring a ton of energy to the equation and are very well-situated as well as promising to shape a better future for themselves, as opposed to what we have been able to achieve so far. On the flip side, being as successful in having their voice heard at an earlier stage in life comes with its consequences. This might be the first generation in the last decade that actually managed to pull off having their demand to learn by themselves through experience embraced by their predecessors. This means they will first go through the partial recurrence of history in disguise, before forming more settled opinions around life.
This is a very exciting time for the ones that are actively participating in the game of life and striving to contribute and be part of the newly shaping world order. As the battery of the laptop slowly drains and the flight is beginning to descend, humble recommendation is to make an intentional effort to constantly remember challenging ourselves and others on what can be unlearned to prioritize what’s important at the time. Also, make the decision that has been lingering, try a new approach, take the flight. If the initial intention is genuine, it will all be worth it.
Seattle Diaries 