Future Hope

‘I feel for kids today. Hard to have hope and plan for things when everything is instant gratification.” Says my husband by text to me. In an age of instant gratification and – seemingly – everything you need at your fingertips, how do teens learn to think big enough to dream and plan for their own future. How do they weed out all that is just fed at them to distract, and set roots and nurture interests that might turn into something they are passionate about.

We know the phone has caused problems for our son, with distraction available at the fingertips and focus diminishing. We also would like him to self- monitor and learn to schedule time he looks at his phone. Not allow it to be a disturbance to his day to day life. I can’t be monitoring his screen time when he is 25.

Goals can take a lot of patience and years and years of focus and discipline to accomplish. To be a master at something, can really test your resilience and commitment. I’ve always wished I started my art and illustrating and my goal of creating a portfolio and a book years sooner. But I didn’t, and I am glad I at least started. And even once I did start, I am in my 6th year of working on this craft with (just) a portfolio to show for it. But it takes commitment. I attribute that commitment the fact that I have a portfolio now, a whole collection of pieces. I haven’t always felt inspired. I have gotten frustrated or uninspired when it didn’t feel like anything was moving along or that no one cared. But for this generation that has had a phone screen to look at the second they feel bored or uncomfortable, what then? How do they drill down to pick a passion they can stick to, and not quit when things feel hard or unrewarding? How do they learn to actually change habits and honour their gifts and talents they can share with the world?

Working for something can be exhausting but if you keep pushing through the tough times, the reward will be worth it. Our son is not certain yet about what he wants to do, so it’s also important to me that he doesn’t think small, or feel hopeless. I would like to think over the years I have encouraged him to think big, but I have not been a living example of that for him either.

I’ve told him before that I read that some native cultures in our country believe that the soul chooses which family to be born to, to support their souls development. A few times I have said to him, ‘there’s a reason you chose me to be your mom.’ I’ve said it a few times when I knew he would be inclined to roll his eyes at me. Today I said it as I pulled out my Robin Sharma book, The Everyday Hero Manifesto. ‘I am reading this book to you, we are reading the entire thing, one chapter at a time.’

It seems to me, what’s needed first in this future and hope and distraction dilemma, is to read examples and methodology from this ‘playbook’ of living a purpose driven life, and doing so with gratitude, optimism and grace.

“Thousands of geniuses live and die undiscovered – either by themselves or by others.” Mark Twain

Sending Love,

Devon