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Two Great Conversations Highlight All That is Good Right Now

I'm a lucky guy. I have a great family and great friends. I still have my health, more or less. I manage to keep the lights on and the bills paid, so far. I spend my time deeply involved in a fundamentally important industry in a time of great change and opportunity, and have a good shot at making a difference in life. I have a Passion that drives me forward and energizes my life. And, I get to live in a beautiful spot on the planet, in an open society, within a dynamic and vibrant community.

I love living in Austin, the only place I want to be in Texas, which has to be one of the best states in these United States, which is still despite all its many warts and current problems, a country that is a beacon of hope for the world. And from everything I've read about what we know today, in this unimaginably large Universe with billions of galaxies and untold solar systems and planets, the Earth is pretty unique as planets go in its ability to support intelligent life. Whether through some kind of great accident, twist of fate, or Grand Plan, looked at this way, we're all pretty damn lucky, I guess.

I hope by now that you're not thinking I'm secretly BiPolar, and this happens to be one of my Good Days...it is, but that's not because I'm bipolar ... in fact, yesterday was one of those better days that highlight all that is good in my life, and I can only hope I have many more days like that ahead of me, because I know there will be plenty more of the other kind that will challenge my patience and will.

I woke up this morning reflecting on two really good conversations I had yesterday, with two friends I hadn't spent time with for quite a while. And just the week prior I had a great lunch with another friend I had known since 1970, home for the Thanksgiving holiday. And I'm starting to get the emails and invitations of the season, which promise to reconnect me with many more friends and relatives whom I see all to rarely. So, let the holidays begin, a time when we reconnect with old friends, in breakfast meetings, lunches, Happy Hours, dinner and Holiday parties, office receptions - let's all celebrate our connectedness and the richness of our lives!

I'll have to dive down on those conversations in a second post, but for the record, I met my friend Eric Rothfus for lunch yesterday. Eric's one of the more fascinating guys I know - a successful serial entrepreneur, venture capitalist, MIT grad, electronic engineer, vintage computer collector, and fellow Cub Scout dad. Given my Liberal Arts approach to life, Eric and I are in a sense two sides of a coin, which makes for stimulating conversation. Not long after lunch, I had a phone call with Greg Richardson, founder of Civitium, a principal consulting agency and driver of the nascent Municipal Wireless industry. Greg and I hadn't spoken in a while, and he and I always have good conversations comparing notes on how far this Alternate Broadband world has come. Greg's insights on the current events of the past several months are without equal.

Sharing thoughts on where the world is going and having an opportunity to help shape Change and Progress are what energizes me. Yesterday's conversations highlighted for me that there is still so much work to be done, yet so much potential in where we are today regarding technology and cultural change.

I've been tremendously influenced in my life by the thoughts and writings of Joseph Campbell, a professor of comparative religion who spent his life mapping the world's myths and integrating Eastern and Western philosophies - Campbell's interviews with Bill Moyers, captured in the PBS videotape series The Power of Myth in the 1980s, are a must-watch, I recommend them. His classic The Hero with a Thousand Faces inspired George Lucas' Star Wars saga, enjoyed by billions on the planet, in no small part because the storylines of Anakin and Luke, the Empire and the Rebellion, track great themes in world literature. The universal Hero Myth that Campbell documented and studied is the foundation for the best storytelling in Hollywood screenplays. Campbell's principal admonition to his students throughout his career was to "Follow Your Bliss," pithy advice that's easier said than done. Still, if you make the pursuit of passion and fulfillment your guiding light in life, you're guaranteed both a challenging and fulfilling life. It's The Road Less Traveled, tough going, but worth the work in the end.

I've come to realize in the past five years that my life Bliss is helping the world better understand Community, and building strong and healthy communities starts and ends with good Communication. Most of what energizes me, from my participation in a small Episcopal church community, from my leadership in Cub Scouts and Boy Scouts, from my membership in my kid's school communities, and in my daily work with city leaders and communication specialists, has to do with making communities work better, and there's no end in the improvements possible in this area. Most communities are dysfunctional in one way or another, and because they're living and breathing entities, they're dynamic, fluctuating in their levels of optimization, in need of constant fine tuning, maintenance, and care.

Seen in this context, Broadband is about much more than the Triple Play - Voice, Video, and Internet Access - much more than cheap phone calls, abundant entertainment options, or even surfing the Web and getting access to emails more conveniently. Broadband is becoming the connector that makes our lives worthwhile. I'd summarize it thusly:

Broadband is the foundational infrastructure that enables communities to function in today's world, and life in community is the only life worth living.

In my view, the broadband network - today's Internet - is like the electricity grid. It has become a fundamental requirement for the civilized society we live in. Think that's an overstatement? Just imagine a world without the ready access to Energy and Information that we currently enjoy. Many parts of the world lack both ready access to electricity and information, living their lives daily, both literally and figuratively, in the dark.

I can think of no more fulfilling life than working to extend the broadband network as far and wide as the electric network has reached. In fact, when you think of it, that goal is too limiting. We can and will push out the information network farther than the electric network, because wireless technology will let us put access to information everywhere that a person can walk while carrying a mobile device. We can't do that with the electric network, although batteries are the substitute, I guess. And when much of that information we access has to do with connecting to our communities and making them more effective, then that is a very exciting prospect indeed!

This is the beginning of an extended Holiday Greeting to you, my reading community. I don't know you, but I feel connected to you, and I appreciate your continued readership.

Posted on November 29, 2007 at 08:56 AM

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