Traversing Tribes

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Us baby boomers can offer real value to our communities and society. Our experiences, acquired maturity, introspection and empathy can offer stabilizing forces as we navigate rough water. Assuming our rightful role demands that we venture outside our tribes and build understanding and trust with other tribes. News flash, we don’t think the same way as our younger generations (and races). I recently participated in a brainstorming session with students at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute and I was impressed by the fundamental difference in how baby boomers and millennials approach understanding and solving problems. It would be easy to discount the millennials’ ideas as naïve and overly idealistic. Similarly, it would be easy to discount the baby boomer ideas as “old” and “stale.” What’s exciting is when members of different generations (i.e. tribes) strive to understand each other’s thoughts, opinions, and beliefs and merge differences into truly creative approaches and solutions. As I once read, sometimes you have to dress new ideas in old clothes to convince others to adopt change. This is our challenge as we try to mend the deep fissures in our society.

Although I value the aging process as an opportunity to answer life’s more fundamental questions, I am committed to staying current on cultural and technology trends so that I can build conversations and trust with people different than me. In addition to listening to my kids, I also follow online several thought leaders including Seth Godin, Tim Ferris, James Altucher, Aaron Renn and Kevin Rose. These are my scouts from younger generations that help mitigate the risks of personal embarrassment (of course, I’m still good at this). Maybe you should find your own scouts? Hell, I’ll share mine. I’m drawing the line when comes to wearing a man bun though. Now, that would be pathetic.

#Traversing #Tribes