How much should we rage vs adapt as we get older?

Quote 1: “Take kindly the counsel of the years, gracefully surrendering the things of youth” from Desiderata by Max Ehrmann. Quote 2: “Rage, rage against the dying of the light” from the poem “Do not go gently into that good night” by Dylan Thomas. I just got back from an amazing journey. Together With two of my ex-Gartner buddies, the incomparable Dale Kutnick and the magnificent changhua li and our families, I travelled to Qinghai province and Tibet. When this opportunity came up, I thought hard about whether to do it, because it was somewhat physically demanding, and at altitudes of up to 5,000 metres. And for those who don’t know me, I am definitely not built for speed. I decided to go for it, because of the awesome companions I would have, and Tibet was the only place on my bucket list. Rather amusingly, after a particularly rigorous session where we climbed hundreds of steps up to the Potala Palace (see photo), where the Dalai Lama used to be based, my friend Changhua went to speak to a monk, came back, and declared that it was confirmed: I was the fattest person to have ever climbed up to the Potala Palace. An accomplishment to put on my CV! As well as the great journey, we engineered a lot of time to talk, and I had a lot of time to think, because of a semi-enforced digital detox. As a group, one of the main things we decided that it would be a much better world if China, America and Western Europe could find ways to be more economically collaborative, less combative. But that is a big topic for another day. I ended up personally thinking about growing older. I am 58 years old, and probably have a few more ‘miles on the clock’ than that, for various reasons. I have hopefully got a good few years left in me, but I am definitely on the trailing edge of my career. Although I have had and am having a decent life and career, I was very ambitious in a number of areas, and it seems like I might not achieve all my goals. Some because they are physical (to do with martial arts), some because my career has taken me on a different path (e.g. making a movie), some for other reasons. As I was thinking of this, I remembered the two contrasting quotes shared at the top of this post. It seems to me that the art of growing older, both in our personal lives and our work, is to find our own balance between these two perspectives. On balance, I probably lean 80% towards #2, 20% towards #1. How about you? #unthink #unask #unlearn #age #ageism #purpose #tibet