I retired on Halloween last year. Seemed appropriate.
Since then I’ve been carrying around a sluggish mood I can’t quite shake, the kind that comes from spending decades doing work that paid well enough to stay but never well enough to sing. I know what the problem is. I’ve been waiting for someone to hand me a destination instead of picking one myself.
No more of that.
I’ve known since I was nine years old – when I found a forty-year-old theology book in my father’s house and read it cover to cover – that the average person has as many faces as they have social groups to match. Work face. Church face. Hunting buddies face. I got good at that game. Too good. It became automatic in the worst way, a reflex I had to consciously override every time I wanted to say something true.
That zeitgeist is fading in the rear-view now. Like Thoreau, I have more lives to live.
The funny thing is I’ve been rehearsing for this my whole life without knowing it. From the time I was ten, walking fifteen or twenty miles on a Saturday was just what I did. Leave mid-morning, no destination, no map – neighborhoods, dirt roads, dead ends, woods, swamps. Discovery was the point. The journey was the thing.
Then adulthood happened, as it does. The long walks stopped. But I never stopped preparing to leave. I have a camping kit behind my bedroom door right now – backpack, everything you’d need to walk out and not come back. I always assumed that was a quirk. I’m starting to think it was a philosophy.
I live to go places. In my youth I chose places that fed my soul. In my adulthood I leaned toward places that paid the bills. Now I’m looking for places that do both. I don’t know exactly where they are yet. But I know how to find them. You become a discoverer again.
Over the years, across every swamp and forest and dead-end job and late-night terminal session, I’ve distilled seventeen principles that seem to hold up under pressure. Not commandments. Not a brand. Just the physics I actually try to operate by – tested against real experience, revised when they fail, kept when they hold:
- Start small and build a little at a time; a mosaic is more beautiful than the finest concrete, and way less likely to get you sued for improper construction.
- Say what you mean; because telepathy is still in beta testing.
- Network; because who else will laugh at your “I’m not a robot” jokes?
- Divide and conquer; because life is essentially a giant game of strategy board games.
- Keep it simple; complex plans involve running, and who’s got the energy for that?
- Do one thing well; remember, unicorns are famous for just one horn.
- Be who you are; even a bent wire can carry a great light, especially in a modern art exhibit.
- Build for strength, not just speed; the tortoise won the race, but the hare had more Instagram followers.
- Speak clearly, listen carefully, pay close attention; otherwise you’ll end up in a conversation about quantum physics when you just asked for the time.
- Underpromise and overdeliver; because everyone loves a surprise, especially when it’s not another birthday card.
- Practice the Prime Directive; unless you’re in a sci-fi movie, then totally ignore it.
- Hack; just remember, “try it and see” doesn’t apply to skydiving or lion taming.
- Use what you have; unless it’s a floppy disk, then maybe it’s time to upgrade.
- Use levers, not people; because people are terrible at being levers, they keep asking for coffee breaks.
- Release early, release often; otherwise you’re just hoarding half-baked ideas, and there’s no market for those.
- Distrust all claims for the one true way – except for pizza. Pizza is always the answer.
- Think ahead, but don’t worship your plans; not all who wander are lost – they might just be looking for their keys.
These didn’t come from a book. They precipitated out of everything I’ve lived – every system I debugged, every road I walked, every job that tried to make me into someone else and failed. They’re not just ideas. They’re the map I made by going.
I’m not the average person. I’ve suspected this for a while – possibly since the flying saucer incident, Earth being the boonies of the galaxy and all. But I’m at least self-aware enough to know that these principles aren’t the destination. They’re the journey itself.
I beat Star Trek at its own game. Boldly went. Left a map.
Hey Spock, this way.