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Stop looking only north

This happened 15 years ago maybe?

Her: Who’s out there that could possibly overtake Yahoo now that AltaVisa, Excite, and Snap are gone?
Me: It’s gonna be someone we never heard of, doing stuff we never thought of, making things we’ve never seen.

There’s a story I’ve told for decades: For thousands of years, the Chinese have been invaded by the north.

  • The Xiongnu (aka Attila the Hun) invaded from the north regularly
  • The Jurchen invaded from the north and controlled China for over a century.
  • The Manchus invaded from the north and controlled China for over three centuries

It goes on.

In any case, they hit on the idea to build a wall. And for the next 1,800 years, they kept an eye on that wall.

Then in 1839, the Opium Wars start – in the south – which led China into the civil wars, WWII, more civil wars, Communism, and now China making Olympic clothing for the US.

My point is that they’d trained themselves to respond automatically to a set stimulus: Blitzkrieg attacks from the north.

But they no idea that they could be attacked – slowly and both militarily and economically – from the south.

By people they’d never heard of, doing stuff they never thought of, with things they’d never seen.

The hardest lesson to learn in wrasslin and in fencing – one I’m still struggling with – is how to stop going for a closed path and see the open paths.

Anywho, tell this story cause I got some interesting news the other day: The guy that made it into that law school just got a pretty good gig somewhere else. He’s super psyched. I remember telling him this story on the phone.

Me: The moral of the story’s this: Stop looking north. You spend all your time and energy looking at this one direction and your threats and opportunities are potentially – and probably – somewhere else completely.
Him: So stop looking north?
Me: Well, stop looking only north.

 

Location: my steamy room
Mood: hot as balls
Music: Walking on the sidewalk, hotter than a match head
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7 replies on “Stop looking only north”

So great to hear good new in such crappy times. Have to make it a point to stop by the local B&N later then.

That's good advice btw.

I know – I was really upset this morning when I woke up and heard about the Batman/Colorado shootings. What on earth is going on with the world these days?

Regarding the advice, I think that good advice should always be passed on.

Ah, Excite. Those were the days! When the internet was young. Now everyone's just trying to buy each other out. It's so much easier to look in one direction than possibly eight. But it might be helpful to remember to!

I always wonder if anyone is still using those site – I actually, just went to the Excite site now to see if it's still alive, which it is.

Blast from the past…

I check from time to time. Last I check my emails were still there lol! Just checked, I don't think it's there anymore 🙁

Man it's looking cluttered these days!

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