Man is a museum of diseases, a home of impurities; he comes today and is gone tomorrow – The Mysterious Stranger, Mark Twain

If you thought last week’s article was simple minded, you’re really going to have a field day with this one because today we are going to spend a few minutes thinking about what happens after you finally realise that you have arrived at your own custom-built “nirvana” which, for the purposes of this discussion, we are going to call “Tomorrow Land”.

“Wait I’m lost, where exactly am I supposed to have arrived?”

“No idea. There are as many answers to that question as there are people here on earth.”

“Now hold on … how can that be?”

“In my experience, we all live in the world we create for ourselves, which means that every person’s world is in some way unique from everyone else’s”.

“Then how can there be one world with millions of people in it? Why aren’t we all standing on individual rocks scattered all over the galaxy?”

“Good question. But what if I told you that your own personal tomorrow land is a little of both?”

“What would that mean?”

“Well, it would be a little like living in a regular house with a special room containing maps for a superhighway to anywhere.”

“Is that possible?”

“This is Tomorrow Land, the key thing you need to understand is that anything is possible here.”

“Hmm. So why are we talking about this?”

“Well, if any of this is true, what do you suppose is the second most common mistake that first-time residents of Tomorrow Land make the moment that they start to understand all of this?”

“Tell me.”

“They start spending all of their time visualising where they want to go next.”

“What could possibly be the problem with that?”

“Perhaps nothing, if you’re very self-disciplined and a really good time manager; but, if you’re not careful you can get your head so permanently stuck in the clouds that you stop valuing all the little things that are going on in your daily life to the point that you can actually miss your own life.”

“But doesn’t Tomorrow Land last for ever?

“That depends on whether or not you then proceed to make the most common mistake.”

“And what’s that?”

“Getting overconfident and imaging that you are skilled enough to navigate without a map.”

“Like trying to cross an ocean without a compass?”

“Rather more like trying to access the fountain of youth with a straw. Even if you manage to get yourself to the right place, you wind up making incorrect assumptions regarding how to use it effectively.”

“But what has all of this got to do with how long Tomorrow Land lasts?

“Excellent question, don’t you think?”

Robin Trimingham is the chief operating officer of The Olderhood Group Ltd and a virtual presenter, journalist, podcaster and thought leader in the fields of life transition and change management. Connect with Robin at https://www.linkedin.com/in/olderhoodgroup1/ or robin@olderhood.com