Originally published June 2020.

For just a moment, think back to when you were a kid…

Here’s some questions for you:

• Do you remember anyone asking you if you wanted to go to school in the first place?

• Did you ever agree to sit inside for 8 hours a day, 5 days a week, 9 months a year?

• Did you opt-in to the grading system?

• To be penalized and embarrassed for — what should be — the constructive experience of making mistakes?

It’s not likely that you did…

Here’s another question:

• Have you ever considered what the long-term effects of growing up in this environment may have been in your life?

Hold that thought & fast forward to today:

Everyone knows the world is changing…

The historic shift to a decentralized online world has been accelerated by blockchain technology and the crises of 2020...

Most people are being forced to restructure their lives without a “roadmap.”

This is partly because roadmaps aren’t very helpful in a crisis… and because the old career & life advice is becoming obsolete.

Why?

The Industrial Age is dying a quick death.

And this will be a challenge for many people...

Because as kids, most of us were “programmed” to fit into the old industrial world.

• The “need” to pay a big university tuition...

• The job security of a 9-5 career…

• Pensions…

— All disappearing.

And when you add in the emergence of A.I. and the shift to remote work and location independence...

It’s clear that following the old path is much more risky than it used to be.

The burden of proof — and the burden of risk — is now on the old system…

So what is the new roadmap? How can you adapt?

Where is the “software upgrade” you need for your mind?

Dan Sullivan is the co-founder of Strategic Coach — a company that trains some of the world’s top entrepreneurs...

He recently talked about this new challenge:

“Most of our entrepreneurs, after about six weeks of this situation, are already 80% in the new world. They're in a new normal now.

So whether you've done it before or not, and whether this is familiar to you or very frightening, you're going to have to be someone else. You have to give up a lot of who you used to be or who you think you used to be.”

So… Who are you? Or who do you think you are?

These aren’t whimsical philosophical questions for you to ponder while stroking your chin…

Meditating on these could be the very key to surviving and thriving in the next decade & beyond...

This is because the fast-paced future is creating a huge demand for entrepreneurs and those who have developed entrepreneurial skills…

And part of stepping into the role of an entrepreneur is about releasing yourself from damaging beliefs about who you’ve been, who you are now, and who you are planning to become.

It’s about becoming okay with making mistakes… It’s about adding true value to people’s lives... and about choosing to operate in a voluntary free exchange.

Ideas that may have been talked about in school... But weren’t consistently practiced by the “adults in the room.”

And as it becomes more risky NOT to be an entrepreneur...

This might just be the future you need.

“The really great entrepreneurs I know are more in touch with who they were as children than non-entrepreneurs. Entrepreneurs tend to be very driven for their entire lifetimes by childlike dreams.

When we're children, our dreams are exciting, everything is new, everything is amazing, everything is fresh. And I've encountered 50 and 60-year-old entrepreneurs who are very much exhibiting that same sense of excitement in the present.”

- Dan Sullivan

It can be easy to forget what this joy feels like because it's buried deep under trauma and subconscious programming…

It withered away in a "learning" environment that we were actually just forced into...

But what if you could reconnect with this excitement?

Now more than ever, there's new opportunities for people to:

• Integrate their work with their passions

• Explore new levels of creativity and value creation

• And collaborate with almost anyone in the world instantly

All at a level that was almost impossible in the past...

So, what if you could do all this AND reconnect with the same wonder you had as a kid?

Maybe it's time to unlearn a few things.