2020-10-29 Remember tomorrow

Did you know that rice farming is 10 to 20 times harder than any other kind of farming? Malcom Gladwell wrote about it in Outliers. It’s why discipline is still so highly valued in Asia today. If past generations hadn’t had it, they wouldn’t have survived. In one of my favorite Kung Fu movies, the master says:

“Everything we do is not for today — but for tomorrow.”

He has a point. We are standing on the shoulders of past generations. I was really lucky to be born in Germany, but even my great-grandma lived through two world wars and walked seven miles to work — one-way. She’s one of many reasons I can have a job where I chill on my bed, listen to music, and write, so the least I can do is think about tomorrow and not be so self-concerned.

Not everyone had the advantage of growing up in such a prosperous place, but most of us aren’t trying to catch their own dinner either. We know we’ll be here tomorrow — and because we do, we should make decisions that make it a better one. Even if one day, we won’t be the ones seeing the results.