A new decade is a good time to step back and look beyond the immediate. As the world enter the 2010s, and I enter my 30s, that’s precisely what I am going to do.
Looking Back at the 2000s
Looking back, the 2000s gave us the television reality show, the iPod and the iPhone, and Wikipedia, Facebook, YouTube and Twitter. In the process, the decade fundamentally changed how we define our identities as individuals and as groups, how we view the private and the public and how we play the roles of citizens, consumers and creators.
Personally, the 2000s gave me much more than my twenty year self could have asked for on January 1, 2000. In the last ten years, I have lived in five cities, traveled to five continents and lived at least as many lives. Now, a decade later, I am back in the city I started from, and I am beginning yet another life.
Looking Forward to the 2010s
I think the 2010s will help us reconcile the choices the 2000s created for us. The decade will show us that the only way to define ourselves as individuals is by belonging to groups. It will show us that it’s possible to be more private than ever before even as our lives become increasingly more public. It will teach us how to be at ease with our conflicting roles as consumer/ citizen and as consumer/ creator. Finally, it will teach us that nowism and foreverism aren’t really incompatible; that forever is, in essence, a series of nows.
Personally, I’m at stage in my life when I am thinking less about what I’ll achieve this year and more about what I’ll leave behind for the next decade. Here are three things I want to leave behind for my 40 year old self: a fit body he feels at ease with, a body of work/ knowledge he is proud of, and a dozen close friends with whom he can share his blessings.
As CEO of 2020 Social, I build and nurture online communities for Indian and international clients, connect their customers, partners and employees, and help them achieve their business objectives. Ask us how we can help you.
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