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The best way to predict the future is to build it

Francisco Miraval                                

This year is almost over and because the New Year is about to begin we instinctively think about what we did this year and about what next year may bring, But, as somebody once said, it is always difficult to make predictions, especially about the future. For that reason, instead of trying to anticipate the future, it is better to build it.

How do you build a future? First, you must accept that the future is no longer a continuation of the past. It is true that for millennia and up to not so long ago the future was guided by the past and the idea was to keep things the way they were, perhaps with some small improvements here and there. But that’s no longer the case.

Change happens very fast and it is constant. As a consequence, the present can’t be used as a model for a future that is (will be) totally different from the present.

I recently overheard a group of college students talking about this topic. One of the student said with an undeniable high level of self-confidence that, “We will adapt to anything in the future!” Another student immediately answered, “How are you planning to adapt to the future where you can’t even imagine the future?” A good question, indeed.

Three decades ago, the movie Back To the Future anticipated that by 2015 we would have flying cars and landing zones in our cities. Obviously, it is not going to happen. And what could happen in three decades from now, in 2045? According to futurist Ray Kurzweil (now at Google), we, humans, will become immortal beings.

In other words, we went from imagining the future as some kind of a better present to imagining the future as a total transformation of ourselves. For that reason, there is no continuity between the present and the future and, since the future is now unpredictable, our only option is to build it.

In addition to accepting the discontinuity between the past and the future, another element to take in consideration when building a future is that not everybody belongs in that future. Perhaps it is not up to us to enter into that future, in the same way that the generation of Israel that left Egypt didn’t enter later into the Promised Land.

I am not promoting any kind of unhealthy auto-exclusion from the future, but a healthy realization that there are things in life, including the future, which may not be for us. In my own case, I will never be a professional athlete and I will never travel to the moon. Those are very nice and desirable activities, but they are not for me. In the same way, future activities and the future itself may not be for me.

What you should do when you realize that the future is not a continuation of the past and that perhaps you are not part of that future? Move aside and salute those marching into the future.

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