Sometimes you just want to take the easy way.
Over the course of the last couple weeks, I spent some time out of the office enjoying time away at our cabin in Northern Wisconsin. During our time away, on three different occasions, we spent time on the Flambeau River – two days kayaking and one lazy day floating down in inner-tubes as we watched the world go by ever so slowly. When we are able to do this, we can look for bald eagles perching on the high nearby pine trees. We can watch the fish jump out of the water and landing leaving ripples from the splash, which they created. Each one of these trips, we took the easy way because each time during one of these trips, we went with the current, and isn’t that the way it is with most people’s life of planning financially for the future? We all like to take the easy route. Let’s go the route that everyone else takes, lazily down the river, just like we did in our inner-tubes or our kayaks.
Here’s the thing to remember: 150-200 years ago at the very spot where we were spending leisure time going down the river with the flow, there were voyagers at one point in time who were canoeing up stream, going to places unknown, searching for opportunity, searching for the promise of a better day for themselves and for their families.
So instead of taking the leisure route of just going with the flow, going with the current, sometimes we’ve got to turn around. We’ve got to paddle upstream to see things we haven’t seen before. It requires additional effort, additional time, and additional planning.
Who will you be this week? Will you be a down-streamer? Or an up-streamer? Think about taking the harder route to discover new possibilities others are missing along the same journey.
