​Before email became synonymous with spam and junk, there was the original junk mail arriving in your mailbox – repetitive flyers; free offers for crap; packages of coupons you had no use for; people and businesses seeking to sell you services you didn’t know existed. Sounds kind of like email today, eh?
 
The reason I bring this up is that a friend mentioned how much he likes receiving snail mail today. He looks forward to opening his mailbox and is ever-hopeful he’ll find a letter inside, hand-addressed with something important inside. Of course, the snail mail junk-senders know this emotional tug and have learned to create a handwritten look-alike that makes you think you’re getting something personal, when it’s typically another insurance policy request or some other phony way attempting to suck money out of your bank account.
 
He reminisced about the old days. “Remember how when you first started receiving emails and it was exciting? You couldn’t wait to open them up. And, all you ever got in your mailbox was junk.”
 
Email was great. Instantaneous communication. Letter writing with an immediate response. You more quickly connected with friends and colleagues. You improved workflow, stayed in touch with relatives or friends who lived airplane flights away from you.
 
Then, of course, the spammers attacked. The same vile BS you received through your mailbox slowly wormed its way over to your electronic inbox. First it was to pick up your $2.1 million dollar extravaganza from the Nigerian prince who loved you so much he was willing to give his money away with no holds barred. Then it became everything from testosterone supplements, immune-boosting super vitamins, women from overseas who love you without even knowing who you are.
 
Email became overwhelming. The “delete” button was your most important decision of the day. Scan, delete, scan, delete. Then, as your junk email box filled (at least you could delete junk email all at once as opposed to having to check to see if the communication had any relevance to you), once again there was too much information to cope.
 
You shut down. You stop paying attention. You don’t read your emails. You don’t respond in a timely fashion, whether personally or professionally. Not good.
 
As my friend noted, this is when he started to become nostalgic about snail mail again, and enjoying going to the mailbox on a daily basis to see if there were any personal surprises for him in terms of a letter or birthday card.
 
Mostly, he is still disappointed. But, sometimes a nugget appears.
 
He recently received a lengthy letter. I forget who it was from or the subject, since it ultimately wasn’t relevant to me.

What was relevant was how it ignited his happiness. He was so pumped. “A LETTER! SOMEONE CARED ENOUGH TO WRITE ME A LETTER!”
 
We’ve come full circle. Now, with texting reaching the spamming stage, we turn off to that method of communication. We stop responding or we delay reading messages. Who knows where this will take us in terms of staying connected with others?
 
Maybe need to go back to sending smoke signals. Make the fire, figure out how to do morse code by sending up cloud smoke in different sizes and shapes. Nah, forget about it. The wind would blow it away, and the message would never get to the audience.

​Moving on with your life is an under-recognized positive quality. It is much easier to remain mired in the past, complaining about things, pointing fingers at what has gone wrong.
 
The importance of looking forward and embracing change versus looking backwards and whining about what didn’t work out came home to me recently after reading a lengthy column in the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel. Several years ago, a MAJOR project – Foxconn – hit the headlines. After significant negotiations, tax breaks, public policy decisions, etc., land was selected in the southeast part of Wisconsin, near Racine and Kenosha, to construct their facility.
 
Flat screens for televisions and computers was the expected output of the facility, projected to require a humungous acreage and tremendous amounts of water, requiring home buyouts to service the facility. What Foxconn said it was going to do in terms of production and output is not even close to what has occurred. That is not good for the local community, nor for the state of Wisconsin. Emotions run high. Billions of dollars are involved.
 
The column in the MJS summarized much of this. But, that wasn’t the point of the writer. She wanted to look forward, figure out what came next, and see a decision made that recognized current circumstances and brought a positive business climate in Wisconsin. Made sense.
 
She moved on. She thought about what should happen next. She wrote about multiple options that could make the best of a poor situation, and improve on it.
 
There are many times in life we need to move on. Not just in situations like Foxconn, where huge amounts of money and complicated technical and speculative questions had to be addressed to handle things in the best interests of the state.
 
Sometimes we need to move on by downsizing our house. The kids are gone. You don’t need space. You may not be able to keep up with maintenance or want to do something else rather than do yardwork and fix up your house. It’s time to move on.
 
You may have a worn-out bicycle that you keep taking in for repairs. It spends more time in the shop than under your butt. It’s time to move on, and purchase a new set of wheels.
 
Logically AND intuitively, I believe we often recognize when it is time to move on, but we don’t get there. Inertia takes over. We won’t make a decision. Something holds us back (“I love that bicycle and just can’t part ways with it.”).
 
And, it can be easier to complain (as it this case about Foxconn), rather than looking at the way issues stand today, realizing the original postulated scenario ain’t working and ain’t going to work, then regrouping with up-to-date data, recalibrating, and making an informed decision to move forward.
 
That was the essence of the woman’s column. I hope a lot of people read it, because her points were deeper than the sole issue of Foxconn’s future. Her point goes to the heart of how too many of us operate daily – by looking backwards at things we can’t change, and complaining. Instead of recognizing where things stand, and figuring current circumstances out to make the best decision for the most benefit in the future.
 
We have big windshields in cars and small rearview mirrors. Because it’s more important to see the road ahead than to look behind us. Look ahead with a fresh light, and try something new. Let the tired past go. You aren’t going to change it.