Reflecting on the future you

AuthorAppleton on May 1, 2017

While cleaning and organizing a bunch of stuff recently, I glanced at a couple of manuscripts that I started writing almost ten years ago. What caught my attention was how well the prose flowed. One manuscript in particular brought me back, it is titled The Death Knight Chronicles and I wrote it as a dark follow-up to the primary The Sword of the Dragon series. After years of published writing under my belt I realized how many highs and lows my career has experienced. I’m sure every writer feels the same way.

Do you ever find yourself reflecting on your past accomplishments, much like you do on your past failings? I do. It is unavoidable when the vision for my writing future is to return to that lifestyle of frequent writing, signings, and some speaking engagements.

Sometimes it is only in looking back at our own life that we can grasp a firm hold on our future.

Stories flowing unhindered by multiplied obligations and responsibilities. Time dedicated to pursuing the passion that the soul is eager to set on fire.

But it is in looking back that suddenly my vision for the future is encouraged. Why? Because suddenly I can see an older, more matured and experienced version of that younger, passionate me. I see myself looking around at my growing family, my children pursuing their own passions. Difficult stages of life behind me, lessons learned, greater understanding achieved. It will be a beautiful thing.

And when that future me is turning pen to paper, so to speak, he will have a deeper well of inspiration from which to draw. God will have imparted experience and wisdom that before could not be communicated by written words.

Younger me had failings and successes, and the words poured freely into the stories and articles he pursued. Today’s me is struggling with different things, and growing through greater challenges, being matured as a Christian husband and father.

Nowadays I have a lot to write but not as much time to do it. Wow, future me is going to have a lot to write.

Q: Are you catching the vision for your future self?

How we create Tomorrowland today

AuthorAppleton on June 1, 2015

While watching the new Disney film Tomorrowland I found myself relating to its overriding theme: Negative thinking steers our world toward a negative outcome. Positive thinking steers us toward positive results. I found myself asking, “What kind of a future world do I want to create?”

Doom and gloom. The news is full of it, and people gobble it up.

I have collected most of the old Disney family films and one I really appreciate is Pollyanna. Based off of the book, this is the tale of an orphan girl who shares her message of positivity with the negative townsfolk. In my favorite scene of the movie she reads to the pastor from the quote on a locket that her father gave to her.

“If you look for the bad in mankind, expecting to find it, you surely will.” -Abraham Lincoln

In the movie Tomorrowland we explore the future that is created by our negative thinking. But what interested me most was considering the kind of future we can have if we approach things from a positive outlook.

If we look back through history there have been times of great darkness that only ended because a few brave souls stood against it. They chose to think positively and imagine creatively. Christian martyrs did not let intense persecution stifle their message, the message of Christ that created western society as we know it. Inventors like Tesla did not let negativity or adversity stop them in their ingenuity. The founding fathers of the United States did not let a tyrant or the cost of liberty stop them from proudly touting that message of a nation under God with liberty and justice for all.

For my part I want to return to the positive outlook. The world I see is cars flying instead of driving. Solar and wind-powered cities… More than this, let’s look beyond the technology and anticipate a society that fears and worships God. Where the young and the old care for each other. A return to the values that made this country great.

We are living in the Future our American ancestors Envisioned. Dreams become reality.

Q: What future do you envision?