Amongst the PIPs (Previously Important People)
You are not your achievements
If your so-called achievements are the most important thing in the world to you, well, you’re in for a frustrating life. I’m not without ego—there are things I do out in the world (my career) that I am deeply proud of. I’ll appear on a certain TV show, go viral on X or have my work shared by the freaking President of the United States….and walk out onto the streets with this vague feeling of self-importance that suggests someone might recognize you.
They won’t. It’s not gonna happen. This is very, very stupid. I also find it funny how your children could not care less. If you don’t have kids yet, you’ll see. You could be appointed president of a tiny country in the middle of Europe one day and they’ll just shrug at you. They don’t care—and why should they? Honestly.
We’re all the main characters in our story, I think it’s natural to feel that way when going about your business. The trick, however, is to understand it’s an illusion. Remember: We are not our feelings, and feelings are not innately truthful.
“Alexander the Great and his mule driver both died and the same thing happened to both. They were absorbed alike into the life force of the world, or dissolved alike into atoms.” — Marcus Aurelius
Last week I was having cigars with a group of older guys in my town. Several still work, several are retired. The ones who spend their days gardening and reading now were incredibly successful men in Washington, D.C….Supreme Court connections, Oval Office visits, major agency jobs, you name it. They did big things, and are now done. One of these men sipped his whiskey and grinned, “You’re with the PIPs, Previously Important People.”
I do enjoy being asked about my work. Again, I’m proud of it. But sometimes I really don’t wanna talk about it, because I know in the back of my head that if this is all I can talk about…one day I’ll have nothing to say.
We might all do well to think about this: a day will come when everything you accomplished is not just a footnote, but totally forgotten. It won’t be a century after you’re gone, probably more like a decade.
That is, unless you lived for people. Yes, people. Relationships. Those individuals who invested in people and spent their free time in the company of others—they are talked about for a long time. Across social groups and across generations.
Give it some thought. Where can you invest in people and less in career accolades?
One day soon, you’ll be a PIP. You’d better be ready (myself included).
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“Carried through existence as through rushing rapids. All bodies. Which are sprung from nature and cooperate with it, as our limbs do with each other. Time has swallowed a Chrysippus, a Socrates and an Epictetus, many times over” — Marcus Aurelius