The Faces of Tomorrow

As the years wear on, it is interesting for me to note that all the people I look up to and respect are either dying, or disappearing under the guise of retirement. There are few inspirational figures left. I mean truly inspirational! There may be one or two coming up, but I really worry about the calibre of people we call the ‘influencers’ today.

This anxiety comes from a few factors governing our world today that affect our discovery and interaction with influencers, the main factor being technology. With the proliferation of the internet and its mutated social media ( Facebook, Twitter and blog sites), we are bombarded by the vast choice presented to us in the form of ‘new faces’. I call them ‘new’ because we didn’t see most of them in magazines, or in the news, we discovered them on the net! You could be reading this blog entirely because you stumbled across it, and not because I’ve made waves in the world of thought! I’m actually a ‘new face’ to many of my readership.

Seeing that the internet opens the doors to eyes, it must also give these eyes access to us ‘content providers’. The thing is these ‘content providers’/’new faces’ could be anyone, saying anything, and they will instantly have access to a potential of millions of ‘followers’! How many they actually  access is a combination of popularity and marketing.

As I said before, this is worrying me. Many people have a lot of junk to say, and they get in the way of those who have jewels to offer. That being said, this is also an opportunity, for I believe some who were hindered by needing to be seen on Oprah, can just open a WordPress account like me (hehehe…), and begin to articulate and showcase their offering to the world.

It could be you...

Tomorrow’s faces, are born out of today’s opportunities. If you can seize what is around you right now, you have almost no excuse to start impacting people. Definitely you’ll have to be good at articulating yourself, in a way that can be taken in by others; not only that but you’ll also have to have something worth reading/listening to capture people. (It’s nice to know through Twitter that your car has broken down. It is even better to see an inspiring thought worth remembering and earning the coveted “Retweet”!)

I believe when I have books out, I’ll be able to put barcodes in my references that link your cellphone to this website, to see what I meant in full. I may be years off from doing it, but I have determined that I WILL be a face of tomorrow. However, it starts now.

The opportunities you leverage today, will affect the life you live tomorrow. It is a simple equation with devastatingly beautiful results if you take advantage of it. You may not be a superstar now, but if you can take the little steps now, you’ll be surprised the kind of person you become in a year or two (yes, YEARS, no shortcuts unfortunately). For me, it was starting this blog, aiming to be consistent, taking criticism, hoping to make it to the front page one day…etc. I’ve started, and my idea of the mobile barcode references is just a little bit closer to a reality, because the technology exists, and I already have content! What have YOU got?

I have a sneaking suspicion that most people think that they will just wake up to the perfect spouse and with lots of money, but you only wake up to the effects of a choice you’ve made. If you choose to have a life that is a series of one-night stands, then you will keep waking up to things that have to walk out your door soon. They can’t stay, or last, or grow, and if they have babies, you will call them  ‘mistakes’! However, if you chose to have a life that was a series of strong choices and commitments, you’ll wake up to lasting change, lasting growth, lasting joy.

This is important if you want to be a Face with Substance! It is easy to do something that will grab attention, but hard to do something that grabs attention AND is worth holding onto! This becomes an issue of character, which can only be developed through choices that have persevered long enough to be a part of you. It’s about the heart.

So then I will say this: To be the Face of Tomorrow, you must have Tomorrow’s heart Today!! In other words, it starts now! There is much to be gained, but you only gain it through a journey, not through events. We hear of the events in powerful people’s lives, and end up waiting for something to happen, yet the reality is that there are processes that need to be in place for any event to be of significance. You must BE somebody before you can TOUCH somebody!

So to all my fellow Future Heroes and Faces of Tomorrow, work on your art now. Refuse to wait till a door opens, seize the opportunities at hand now, don’t wait for moments, create them!

The world awaits, but your life doesn’t!

Over.