‘Getting Serious’ After 3 Years Of Surfing
“After college, I traveled around South America for 3 years, then I got serious and became an accountant with Morgan Stanley.”
I have heard so many variations of this story on podcasts, YouTube videos, and blogs.
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First, you spend multiple years being ‘not serious’.
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Second, you realize you need to take responsibility for yourself, and you ‘get serious.’
I wonder, “Why was he/she being so not-serious for all that time in South America?”
Travel, Explore, But ‘Get Serious’ At The Same Time
Learning about the world, it’s people, and it’s cultures is in many ways a ‘serious adult’ decision, but beyond the intrinsic value of ‘travel as education’, two other things have changed.
First: Today, you can live a life that is very ‘young and frivolous’ in some ways and very ‘serious and adult-like’ in others.
To some, it may seem like a simultaneous contradiction.
Examples:
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Travel Through South America: Visit Machu Picchu and swim in the Amazon River. Also, learn Spanish and meet distribution partners to expand my business.
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Live In The Philippines: Get PADI SCUBA certified and sail around the islands in a boat. Also, learn online marketing while working for a resort.
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Visit China: Go camping in the Northern Hong Kong wilderness and learn to use chopsticks. Also, visit the Canton Fair to meet product manufacturers.
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Spend Time In Mexico: Crash with a friend and take Muay Thai lessons. Also, freelance to earn $5,000, invest it and start an online company that pays me each month since inception.
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Travel Through Africa: Take an overland safari trip from Cape Town to Windhoek, Namibia. Also, listen to business podcasts for the entire trip. Also, learn to build robust, accurate financial statements and projections when I arrive in Windhoek.
You can learn skills and give yourself an education.
You can save and invest money.
You can start a company.
You can learn a lot about relationships, romantic and friendly.
You learn to take care of yourself. You learn to be self-reliant.
You can network, make friends and contacts, and have meetings. (online and in person.)
You can ‘get serious’ anywhere.
Second: Today, you need to get serious. There is too much global competition, too much rapid change, and too much opportunity for any young person to sit on their hands for 2-5 years.
You shouldn’t wait. Millions (Billions?) of young people in Europe, The Americas, India, and China are hungry and working day and night to become the leaders in a 2040 hyper-globalized winner-takes-most world.
We young people all need to get very serious, right now, no matter where we are or what we’re doing.