Today is my two year anniversary at SolidFire.
Today is the day Prince died.
Now, on the face of it, these two things have nothing to do with each other. But, if you’ll forgive me the personal digression on a blog that most have come to expect nerd things from, it feels like those two statements pretty much sum up the high and low nature of my life these days.
Today I celebrate the beginning of the best job I ever had.
Today I mourn a musician I loved.
Today I look back at the circumstances around how I ended up at SolidFire and the cost associated with that process.
Today I celebrate incredible musical talent.
Today I look at the people I’ve met and become close to because of SolidFire and count my blessings.
Today I regret not making more of an effort to get to see one of the most singular musicians of my generation live.
Regret is an interesting thing. No matter how much it hurts after the fact, you never know if you are putting in enough work, or the right kind of work, to avoid it. You never know if what comes next will be better or worse. You never know if you are holding on too tight, or running away too soon. I regretted how I left my job previous to SolidFire, but it ended up being one of the best things in my professional and personal life (#bestjobieverhad). I regret not making more of an effort to see Prince in concert, and that is something I’ll never be able to do now.
An old friend of mine died a couple month ago, and at his memorial we laughed about how “his feelings had feelings” and I recently I’ve gotten to know well how that feels. Life has been pretty overwhelmingly lately, and and trying to walk the line between looking forward and looking back is hard and uncomfortable for me. I’m a relentless optimist, but when you are faced with so much change, and so much emotion (positive and challenging) coming from so many directions, it gets hard to keep your footing. Today was a tough day to start with; Prince was the part that finally knocked me down.
We all want to live a life with no regrets. The trick is knowing how to put the right energy in the right place with the right people so that life is just life, the living is easy, and regrets are not part of the equation. You get to have no regrets by being the best human you can be, and by committing to yourself to get just a little better every single day and surrounding yourself with people who care about you. I’ve been working really hard on this lately, but there’s a lot more to do. I want life to be easy. Natural. Much less dramatic than it has been lately. I want to be happy and grounded and good for the people around me, and the communities I choose to belong to.
I regret not getting to see Prince in concert. In the grand scheme of things maybe it’s not all that important, but the finality of that regret, the lack of ways to atone for it, make it seem more significant. Can I make it the last thing I ever regret? Probably not. But maybe, if I focus on the right things and work to improve myself and my life a little bit every day, I’ll surprise myself.
Sorry for the detour into introspection. I’ll be back with funny memes and my patented, optimistic version of the Care Bare Stare™ as soon as I can.
Do your dance
Why should you wait any longer?
Take a chance
It could only make you stronger
It’s your time