4 lessons from my first 44 years

Oh my days that sounds so LinkedIn

Birthdays don’t hand you wisdom. They hand you a hangover, a salt shaker of new grey hairs, and a reminder that the clock is still ticking whether you’ve figured your shit out or not.

This year I turned 44. That weird middle lane where you’ve taken a few swings, face planted a couple of times, and figured out that there’s no decent 100% full game walkthroughs for life on YouTube. You have however collated a fine garage full of junk by now though, a broken umbrella, some old carpet, a scar you can’t remember getting, a box of receipts from 2017, a thing that you’d not describe as a fetish but is more than a preference, and a selection box of hilarious stories you can’t share in polite company.

I’m not selling enlightenment, I had a five spices beef Cup Noodle for lunch and I’m wearing a Mr Greedy Christmas shirt in September. But I’ve spent quite a lot of time getting introspective recently, and I think these are the four lessons I’d scrawl on the back of a napkin and hand to either of my children at their wedding reception as the secret to happiness.

Do something you love with people you like

You can get rich working with soulless vampires who’ll throw anyone within reach into traffic to get ahead, You can climb ladders you don’t care about to castles in the clouds that are mostly full of angry geese and people who eat bones recreationally. You can fill your days with meetings about emails that were forwarded by the half eaten sausage that lives in the corner office that suck the oxygen out of your lungs, in hope that one day if you push enough colleagues into traffic you can get your own corner office.

What a terrible fucking waste.

The real jackpot is building something of substance that you feel invested in, alongside people who don’t make you want to fake your own death every Sunday night. There’s a well tread maxim that if you find something you love it’ll never feel like work, but the real gold is learning that if you’re spending your time with people who make you laugh and feel worthwhile, even the most meaningless nightmare fuel of a day can be recalled later on with a smile.

And if you’re not going to be rich, you may as well be fulfilled. If that’s painting pictures of Daddy Pig in a bikini, spending five evenings a week performing live jazz to a dozen people in a Belgian waffle cafe, or recording videos of you reviewing world crisp flavours, do what you need to find joy. You’ll often find life costs more than those vocations are willing to pay, but you can find a low commitment job working with people who make you laugh and feel worthwhile to plug the shortfall.

Outwork your potential

Stick around long enough and you’ll meet an endless parade of “talented” people. When you’re young, it’s older folks hyping up some prodigy with “so much potential.” By your forties, it’s the guy in your hometown telling you how he could’ve been in Oasis if not for one cruel twist of fate.

The truth? Everyone’s got talent. Potential’s cheap. Most people would rather talk about it than eat microwaved lasagne in a service station car park at 1am after driving three hours to play for nine people who are more concerned about smoking Vogue cigarettes than watching you in the back room of a pub.

What matters is the hours no one sees. Staying on court when everyone else has hit the showers. Choosing work over Stardew Valley. Late nights, early mornings, scrapping for every inch. Kobe called it Mamba Mentality.

When I was a kid in the hardcore scene, a lot of us carried the Bhagavad Gita in our back pockets. Krishna’s line stuck with me: “Thy right is to work only, but never to its fruits.” Took me years to get it. But it’s simple really, don’t chase the reward, chase the grind. It’s Mamba Mentality.

I’ve never naturally been the smartest or the most talented person in the room, but I’ve outworked my potential and that’s why I’m still here, still in a Mr Greedy shirt, perching a Cup Ramen on a five hundred page book about developmental psychopathology on my lap, both of which I’m ignoring while I write this ill timed blog.

Your potential doesn’t mean shit unless you grind it into something real.

I am because we are

The lone wolf solopreneur self-made man myth is bullshit. Every good thing I’ve ever built had a choir of other people’s fingerprints all over it. Friends, partners, family who dragged me onward when I was half asleep and running on fumes.

Ubuntu means I am because we are. You only get anywhere worth going because of the people beside you on the journey, the people you meet in the villages on the way who show you a passing kindness and those who want to see you make it.

I’d be nothing without the people I’ve chosen to build a life with. None of us would, pretending otherwise is just ego cosplay. People who remind you of why you started when you’ve forgotten, who stand in the cheap seats and scream your name when the stands are otherwise empty.

Go it alone if you want, just don’t expect victory to taste of anything except ash and hair spray.

Pressure is a privilege

If your stomach’s doing kickflips, it means you’re in a room that matters. That you’ve stepped into something real, something most people are too scared to touch.

You only get so many cup finals, so make them count, breathe in the anxiety and bathe in the experience. If you’ve been in one of my teams, you’ve heard the speech before a big event: one day you’ll be my age and laugh about all this. The fear, the sleepless nights, the self doubt, all lost in the wind. What you’ll remember are the stories, crawling into bed at 2am sticky with champagne, the absurdity of it all.

Most players never get to play in a final, they’re watching from the stands. You’ve earned the right to be in the spotlight, so don’t waste time questioning if you should be there, focus on going home soaked in champagne carrying the trophy.

Pressure doesn’t guarantee victory, it doesn’t protect you from failure, but it’s the proof you’re alive. And if you ever stop feeling it, maybe you’ve stopped chasing something with substance.

Most people are happy to sit in comfort, cashing the cheque and scrolling their evenings away, unwilling to better themselves or risk the embarrassment of amateurship or failure if they try something that pushes their potential.

Which brings us back to the secret of a happy life: Surround yourself with people you like, do something you love, do it together and accept that if you work hard than you may get lucky and not just be happy, but get a trophy or two too.