Are you [still] relevant?
It hits me every time. I watch as an older person (read: over 24 in this crazy world of Biebers and Zuckerbergs) struggles to retain their tried and true role of being the voice of reason, of wisdom, of experience. Yet, over and over again, I see them in danger of being discarded, not unlike a useless, unrecyclable piece of past-due baggage.
Yet, I know it’s not age or sad state of bodily affairs whereby the physical keeps going south as the mental is continuously north-bound. You see, this kind of loss of relevance can happen to anyone.
Just ask the new kid in the class.
The new kid, who was a football captain in his old school. He is now a nobody.
Or the new co-worker, who used to be the most gregarious in his previous place of work, and is now all but invisible.
Or the new neighbour, who used to host impromptu evenings most weekends, and now spends Friday nights alone, staring at four walls.
Or the family leader, who recounted stories of courage and bravery to a rapt audience, and now finds himself longing for a grandchild, a nephew, anyone, really, to spend more than a cursory and awkward ten-minutes with him.
It’s not about getting old. it’s not about moving away from the familiar.
You see, staying relevant has so many dimensions.
It has to do with being aware of context, for relevance is meaningless without reference.
It means being attuned to nuances in the surroundings so you can update your impact on it.
It means recognizing the part can’t work in isolation, just like even a soloist needs to be aware of the backing orchestra.
Above all, staying relevant means you adjust. It means you learn the new context. Or perhaps the context has stayed the same, but the inhabitants have moved on (cheese, anyone?).
It means you improvise with an open mind.
My gut says, and I’m sure that there’s research somewhere out there to back it up, that staying relevant comes easy to the lifelong learner. I’m sure that staying relevant is second nature to those who observe and seek to merge new information with previous experiene to arrive at brilliant, newly relevant insights.
Just like the ex-football captain learns his new team’s play strategies, the twenty-something and sixty-something alike must continue to learn, to observe and integrate their understanding before scoffing off and dismissing new dynamics as fads that are unworthy of their time.
After all, weren’t we all once those impetous young teens that proclaimed to be misunderstood?
Learn. Every day, and in every which way you can. About life, nature, people, anything at all. Just learn something new each day. It is the one guaranteed way to stay relevant.
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