You Really Never Can Go Back – Can You?
I decided this morning that I'd spend a little time updating my resume - specifically, clearing out the stale links after the Big Shut Off in my office. Most of the links were old, and I doubt that there's anyone that's going to miss a few pages on my old projects, or a crypto-quip solver that can probably get spanked by an iPhone app, but it got me looking at what I've done for a career.
Some days it just doesn't seem that cool.
I'm sure a lot of people look back and say the same thing. It's the nature of some people (like myself) to minimize their achievements as simple, or easy at the time. We forget, or at least trivialize, the pain we went through. We look at what we've done as something anyone could do. And it's not fair.
While much of it might not be on par with curing cancer, it was something that took all I had. I wouldn't trivialize the accomplishments of my kids, why do it to myself? Answer: because deep down, we all know our own dirty little secrets. We can't really respect ourselves because we know too much about our failings.
I need to break out of this. It really is a wonderful life. I have done some pretty impressive things - so people tell me. I have lots of interesting and funny stories that I can tell pretty darn well. Maybe that should be the true measure of one's self-worth: How many people would willingly listen to your stories?