I have been reflecting on Paul Allen this week and he just passed away. If you do not know, he was the co-founder of Microsoft. Many would say that without him there just would have never been a Microsoft and our digital age would have been a lot slower in its coming. I saw this image and it really impacted me:
A young Bill Gates, 15, sitting next to his friend Paul Allen, 17. The older geek helping the new geek in his fascination with learning basic computing systems. You can read a lot more about their childhood dreams and ambitions, some of them are funny but most of them are eerie – meaning they came true. Here we have two young friends geeking out on new technology with an aspiration to do amazing things. They did not know what that would be – but you can tell that they thought it would be cool.
In just 5 years from this picture, in 1975 – the duo would form Microsoft. Bill is now worth nearly 100B dollars and Paul died with 20B in assets after giving most of it away. He decided to stop the empire building at an earlier age and went on to other things. The point I want to make is this —–
Did they have a childhood dream that became true, or did they just have a 10 year dream that came true? The distinction is important for you and I. I do not care what age you are – you might have at least 10 years left. Do you have a dream that where you can create something awesome in 10 years?
If teenage college drop out geeks like these two can create the world’s most successful software company in 10 years, then you can certainly create your dream in the time that you have left. So no more excuses. Either start working on your childhood dream or a new dream – does not matter – start making progress today!
Write it down on your 365 list and spend your time on something really important.
Guy Reams (285)
365 Member
