another day older and what do you get...

so I celebrated another birthday on the 17th of this month...

I've been realizing some things about getting older. First off, you start reflecting more on where you've been, where you've come to, and how you've got there. This is a good thing, as long as your past is kept in balance with your future. In other words, as long as your past is big enough to see, but not so big that it obstructs your view of the future...Like my good buddy Randall Holm (a professor at Providence College) says, "it's kind of like your rear view mirror in your car." You need it, but it can't be your whole view.

the other thing I realized is that the older you get, the more you see situations repeat themselves. You see history do a...well... do-over, in some senses. As a child who has touched a burning hot stove element knows the outcome of doing it again, so I now know certain outcomes of certain situations in life that inevitably come up over and over again. You can't always stay away from the burning hot element in life, and as you get older, you start to know how to interact with it...perhaps even use it for good (if that makes any sense). Hopefully, with that knowledge or wisdom, you can have a better idea of how to act and react in those situations because you continue to gain what they call "wisdom of years."

one of the last things that I know is that I really know nothing in the scope of all there is to know... it's funny because I think of the things I know now as compared to three years ago, heck, even a year ago, and I'm amazed...so I think, it will be unreal how much more I'll know 2o years down the road...but what really astounds me is the fact that even then, even by the end of my life, what I know is so, so, SO, minuscule in comparison to all there is to know.

Thankfully, in life, it's not all about what you know...it's also about who you know.