So, that’s it!

On 1st February last year I start posting here, on this blog. I made a commitment to post something every weekday for a year. This is the final post of that commitment.

It’s been an interesting and educational journey. One I’m glad I embarked on but one I’m equally glad is over.

There may be less frequent posts in the future, or there may not!

We all have heroes. People we look up to. People who inspire us. People we aspire to be like.

Parents, actors, writers, politicians, scientists, entrepreneurs. Each of us has our own list. We look up to them because we see something in them, something we prize and wish to emulate.

But sometimes our heroes fall short. They mess up. They show themselves to be less than we thought. They fall from the pedestal on which we placed them.

We no longer think of them as our hero.

Wait.

Don’t dismiss them. Don’t demote them right away.

No one is perfect. Everyone is flawed. People are made up of different parts. Different characteristics in different areas of their lives.

Your hero doesn’t need to be perfect to inspire you. They just need to set the bar in one area. They can be your hero in that one thing.

Take that thing and study it. Take the good and leave the bad.

Take the parts you like and build your own hero.

It seems obvious doesn’t it? You always need to thank everyone who helped, everyone who contributed. It doesn’t matter if they are being paid to help or volunteering, ‘thank you’ matters.

There’s no need for a big ceremony. There’s no need for a big speech. A quiet word one-to-one is just as appreciated. If you do go for the ceremony and the speech be careful. Leaving people out when what you’re doing seems highly considered makes people feel slighted – regardless whether it deliberate or not.

Thanking people lets them know they are appreciated.

So, thank you! Even if all you’ve done is read this.

Driving the other day I spotted a Met Éireann (the Irish Meteorological Service) van. Nothing too interesting about that. Lots of companies and organisations have vans with their names and logos on them. The Met Éireann van had another addition, it had Met-1 emblazoned on the side, like some call sign or name.

For an ambulance or a police car… ‘car one-five-five come in’. Vehicles that need to be contacted while on the road. Vehicles that a dispatcher needs to be able to identify and direct to crime scenes and accidents.

What does Met-1 need a call sign for? Is it being dispatched to investigate that sunny spell in Meath? How about that freak shower in Longford? Do meteorologists slide down a pole in the Met Éireann building when an alarm sounds? I don’t know and I couldn’t find out. I searched online.

No doubt there’s an explanation. Either that or its the same as giving the car in the Ghostbusters movies a name (Ecto-1) – it sounds official.

This year’s Oscar nominees were announced yesterday. A little while later I read a headline that read – ‘Oscar Snubs: Martin Scorsese, ‘Sully’ & Taraji P. Henson Get No Academy Love’. And they weren’t the only ones snubbed. Not at all. A quick search found several articles about who got snubbed this year.

There’s no need for me to recount all the people who got snubbed this year because none of them were. Not a single one of them was snubbed.

The Academy Awards work by having its members complete a ballot on who should be nominated. Which means that those who were announced as nominated received the most votes in their particular category.

Saying that anyone who wasn’t nominated was snubbed is a complete falsehood. They just didn’t get enough votes to be nominated.

Snubbing is a deliberate act of choosing to ignore someone. Not something that happens incidentally because someone else was more successful. The Academy voters just didn’t think of the person when voting. Maybe because they hadn’t watched the particular movie or maybe because someone else impressed them more.

There are enough articles that can be written from the facts. No need for ‘alt-facts’. There’s enough of those already.

There’s a dividing line between young and old. The tech boundary. It’s a sort of fussy line, not sharp. More a general rule with plenty of exceptions. But it’s there.

We’ve all seen or experienced something like it. The younger lot laughing as the older lot getting social media wrong. The old guy types a question into Facebook instead of Google. The old lady replies to someone’s Facebook status by writing their own Facebook status… instead of replying with a comment on their friend’s status.

The pattern is always the same – older people having difficulty with something younger people breeze through. The older people don’t get it. The younger people find it amusing.

Being relatively younger I find it amusing. Then I wonder what thing will do that to me?

It’s easy to be distracted. But there are levels.

Distraction can take place minute to minute. You could be in the middle of writing an email and decide to check Twitter (or Facebook, or Reddit, or whatever website you’re having yourself).

Your day could suffer from distraction. There’s work to be done but you end up spending too much time on things that matter less.

Worst of all distraction can be long term. We have a plan but never work towards it. Work has distracted us from life and we have isolated ourselves. Or we have become distracted and followed a course that does not lead to the destination we sought and find ourselves years down the wrong path.

No matter the period of time the solution is always the same. Notice, refocus.

Some days I find it tough to get anything done. Difficult to concentrate, difficult to get myself to do the things I know I should do. Even writing this woe-is-me piece my mind wanders. Distracted.

If what was distracting me was something worthwhile I’d say fair enough. But it’s not. It’s just bullshit. The bullshit of the world. The bullshit of my mind. A single thought flares into an immediate change of direction. A momentary lapse of concentration allows a thought (‘check if there’s anything new on Reddit?’; ‘what book will I read next?’; ‘oh, there’s a new email, better read it’) to fire upwards and for the rest of my brain to go wander over.

Distraction is a constant. We pay attention to the wrong things. Or we pay attention for too long. It doesn’t matter that we get distracted. What matters is that we notice and refocus. It’s a muscle to be strengthened. Notice the distraction, refocus. Notice the distraction, refocus.

Notice, refocus.

What you do today defines your future. Your now contributes forward.

Every action counts. Putting in the long hours working. Learning the skills that will help you succeed.

But don’t forget you must rest. And exercise. These too contribute. They mean you are in good condition for tomorrow.

Don’t forget people either. Be social. With family, with friends. It will mean your future is not empty.

There are many ways to contribute to your future. Don’t over contribute in one or the other swill suffer.

The human race moves forward. Always.

Despite appearances, improvement is it’s desired state. Watch the news or expose yourself to any media and you wouldn’t think it. War, poverty, racism, murder, rape, robbery… are just some of the things we see that tell us we’re doomed.

It’s not that bad. People scream when they see the worst but only whisper when they see the good. Ugly and evil get amplified.

The world is getting better. We’re getting better. It’s not perfect. There’s still plenty that needs to be done. There are still areas that need to improve. That we need to improve.

Pick an area. Pick a thing. Contribute.