This one is a little shorter, but it's something I've been thinking about a lot lately. Society is incredibly fast paced these days. Instant gratification has taken over enjoying the journey, everyone is in a hurry, and everyone wants to keep moving to the next thing in life before they've hardly finished what they're doing now. Kind of an exhausting way to live, dontchya think?
When making aviation a career for example, the natural progression of training and building flight time makes it easy to get used to always having somewhere to go or something to work toward. Just passed your Private Pilot checkride? Great, start working on instrument training! Just got your CFI ticket? Great, start teaching and building time so you can get hired at an airline! Just made captain at a regional? Great, start putting in applications at a bigger airline of your choice. Ultimately, you'll wind up where you want to be for the rest of your career. But then what? Where does the desire to keep moving end and the ability to simply be content come into picture?
Enjoy the Journey
These are obviously all aviation examples, but the desire to keep moving onwards and upwards exists in many industries. Maybe you want to become the head surgeon at a hospital, or an executive at a big company on Wall Street. Whatever the case may be, don't forget to enjoy the journey that is required to get to that point. There's plenty to learn and experiences to cherish, and if all you're focused on is tomorrow and not today, you might end up feeling like you forgot to enjoy yourself along the way. Right now, I am focused on enjoying my airplane and the type of flying that we do with it. It's a little missile with wings, and we take it into many airports located in the tiniest towns you may never hear about which present different challenges than the larger airports. Oftentimes it's quite a bit of fun getting to land in some of these places, but they are places you could never get to in a larger jet. Once I move on, I probably won't ever do this kind of flying again.
Be Better Every Day
Whether you've just started out on your career or you've made it to the top, there is always room for improvement. Another way we can slow down is simply to be present and focus on small wins each day. One of the aspects I love most about aviation is that there's absolutely no point in which anyone is a complete master. We're all guilty of a firmer than desired landing here and there, whether or not you're a new flight instructor or a 20,000 hour airline captain. If you believe you've reached perfection, you really believe there's nothing else to learn. This just opens the door for complacency and stagnation. So, set a goal to learn something each day.
Take a Break
Give yourself a break sometimes. Sometimes we're in such a hurry to keep up our momentum that we forget to take a break and burn ourselves out (article about that here). Don't let yourself get to that point. Take an evening to go out with your significant other, or give your friends a call and catch up. Go for a hike and enjoy the scenery, or take 15 minutes to close your eyes and simply breathe. Find a cool hobby that speaks to you.
We're really not here for all that long, so take the time to enjoy the little things!
Notes
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