My Best Is Still Ahead

Friends & colleagues often talk about retiring early .. maybe at 45. A retired life filled with “not for money” activities – is what many of us aspire for. With this in context, it was a surprise when I stumbled upon a story & a fact involving a couple of luminaries – Mahatma Gandhi & Peter Drucker.

Brushing up on my history a couple of weeks ago during a visit to Sabarmati Ashram in Ahmedabad, I discovered that Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi returned from South Africa when he was 45 years old. This was reinforced when helping my son through his 8th grade history lessons today again. MK Gandhi started tormenting the Britishers in India only after that.

In his interview with Tim Ferris, Jim Collins narrates the story of his first meeting with Peter Drucker – his mentor. Jim asks the management guru, who at the time was 86 years old, which amongst his 26 published books was he most fond of. Drucker simply says “the next one”. He went on to publish 10 more books after this incident.

It’s never too late! The mindset required to keep looking ahead & maximising the impact you can have is admirable. Reminds me of my grand mom – an avid reader through her life, she found herself struggling to hold heavy books in her late 80s. She restricted herself to light & small books. Imagine her thrill when she discovered Kindle! No fear of gadgets, new things to learn .. just the joy of reading into her 90s.

Be The Change

Exactly at what point do we transition from feeling sorry about a problem and become a part of the solution?

This was running through my mind after having participated in a business meeting that contributed about 300 plastic bottles to our environment. This number is but a drop in the overall 100 million bottles that we thrash globally every single day. It’s appalling, to say the least!

Usually, I would feel bad about an incident like this, crib about it to family / friends & forget about it in a few days. This time it was different.

Soon after, I identified a series of events that generate a similar number of plastic bottles every month into the environment. I suggested to my colleagues that we ought to stop this & switch to a better alternative. Most of them supported it whole heartedly. And thus, we have collectively initiated a change.. a change for the better.

Why did I deviate from my usual routine to do what I did. A big part can be attributed to a social media post similar to this by someone I admire. That post was on top of my mind & when an opportunity cropped up, I took action.

Hence this post. In the hope that it will inspire & prompt some more action. It’s a complex issue & needs a lot more of us to be a part of the solution.

DID YOU KNOW

It takes at least 450 years (& up to 1,000 yes) for a single serve plastic bottle to decompose
A million plastic bottles are bought around the world every minute – which breaks down to 20,000 plastic bottles a second
Less than 6% of bottles are recycled globally
Bottled water can cost 10,000 times more than tap water to manufacture
Making a plastic bottle uses 2-3 times as much water as fits inside the bottle
Research has found that 93 per cent of bottled water brands tested contained some sort of microplastic.

Big Hairy Audacious Goals

A awesome note to start the day & week from Measure What Matters:

“If companies “don’t continue to innovate, they’re going to die—and I didn’t say iterate, I said innovate.” Conservative goal setting stymies innovation. And innovation is like oxygen: You cannot win without it.”

Conservative goals vs Big Hairy Audacious Goals.
Iterate vs Innovate.

And a hat tip & best wishes to a mate – Narasimha / DNP / Nampy – of mine starting his own gig. Reach out to him, if you or your team believe a coach can help.