Here and now is all we’ve got.
Tomorrow is but a dream.
What you do here, today, and what you do now are the primary predictors of the future.
Status, condition, experience, meaning, feeling, and fulfillment are all whimsical byproducts of our push within now.
Here > There.
Now > Then.
Gus Levy is credited with coining the phrase ‘long-term greedy’. He chose these words for the culture he built in the 1960’s and 70’s at Goldman Sachs.
On first hearing these words we get a little uncomfortable. The word greedy rarely rings as something pure and worth pursuing.
However, this concept of long-term greed is simply another way to discuss the Law of Harvest and the Law of Cause and Effect.
Long-term greed does its homework.
Long-term greed honors the relationship.
Long-term greed saves a penny, earns a penny, and sees the penny multiplied.
Long-term greed responds and doesn’t react.
Long-term greed sees tomorrow in the moments made today.
We should all be greedy for purpose, meaning, and fulfillment.
Let us not be shortsighted for such a destination…it’s going to be a long flight.
My favorite thought from last year was in an article on Tony Hsieh’s thoughts on ‘accelerating serendipity’.
The last thing we want from our days is for them to be consistently similar.
In the end, our lives and our businesses are ideas about ideas and more often than not our new ideas come to us when our paths have hints of randomness and serendipity.
Read the random book.
Shake hands with the stranger.
Take the long route to work.
Listen to the weird tunes.
This is how one accelerates serendipity.
And then you will…
See what you never saw and hear what you never heard.
Dearest Musician,
This is your time.
This is your canvas.
So gather your instruments, join your fellow musicians, and let your music play.
Know that you are a better teacher for yourself than any book will ever be. Listen to the mirror.
However, it’s not what you know that will fulfill you. It’s what you become when you do what you do and witnessing who that impacts that will fulfill you.
Keep a lookout for the unseen, untouched, and unloved people, places, and things. There is great opportunity in such discoveries.
And lastly, say no to karaoke and yes to something original.
Yours truly,
Two Thousand and Fourteen
Victor Hugo once said ‘music expresses that which cannot be put into words and that which cannot remain silent.’
The same can be said for our lives.
In the end, your music will be what we call your life and your life will be what we call (and what you call) your music.
Few of our spoken words will hang frozen in time, but our action and love will echo for ages.
Couple this idea with Shakespeare’s thoughts, ‘If music be the food of love, play on, give me excess of it.” This now takes us into the law of reciprocation in which all areas of our lives can benefit.
The pursuit of more life begets a deeper and wider life.
The pursuit of more love begets deeper and wider love.
The pursuit of more music begets deeper and wider music (remember, this is that which cannot be put into words and that which cannot remain silent).
More X More = More and More and More and More.
Life, love, and music, when pursued, reciprocate the pursuit with themselves and there’s a fountain flowing deep and wide.
Ashton.Gustafson 