Joan Marques - Ed.D., MBA.
Burbank, California

The things you learn are but vehicles serving to transport you toward further knowledge and awareness. You can therefore not necessarily cling to the things you learn, because they may become obsolete through changes in time and circumstances.

As a logical consequence to this, you should not be afraid to release thoughts, contacts, and perspectives, no matter how valuable they seemed at one time. For, responsibly releasing old thoughts, contacts and perspectives is a way to enhance your receptivity toward new, more rewarding ones in current times.

People and things serve a purpose in your life, as do you in theirs. However, when it is time to move on, you should do so without regret but with gratitude for the contribution these people and things made to your growth and with hope that you may have done the same to theirs.

The main purpose of your being is to grow: to reach a higher plane of insight, not just in business matters or in intellectual regards, but in emotional areas as well.

And reaching a higher plane of insight is a fascinating journey, because not all of us need the same vehicles or routes of learning to get there. And yet, we may all arrive at this higher plane. But it is important to keep in mind that, as many people there are reaching a particular level of insight, as many roads and vehicles may have led them there. Some may have achieved their growth predominantly through formal education: absorbing lectures and reading books; others through street smartness: meeting people and seeing things; yet others through a combination of both, or through less traditional journeys: abstinence, meditation, and self-mentoring, for instance.

So, can you say, then, that one vehicle, meaning one method to reach a higher plane, is more valuable than another? Of course not! Therefore, should you get blinded by one's titles, ranges, prefixes, suffixes, or the absolute lack thereof? Of course not! More importantly: should you judge one's knowledge on basis of his or her background, experiences, ethnicity, culture, religion, or sex? Of course not! And yet: look around you. Reflect on your own life or the lives of the ones you know: review your and their careers and try to evaluate how many times this very superficial way of judging has either positively or negatively influenced the course of those careers.

How beautiful would it be if people could meet at a certain level of insight and exchange with each other the roads they traveled and the vehicles they used to get there? How enriching would it be for them, as well as for those who succeed them! For these successors may later take note of the records of this shared knowledge, and thus learn about the abundance of vehicles available to reach an elevated level of insight, and perhaps, at that time, add some new ones to the list.

It is all about growth: about reaching a higher plane; about insight; about contentment and, thus, about understanding. You can be a leader of a global corporation or a political organization, determining the fates of thousands with a snap of your fingers, or you can be a home maker, determining what to present your loved ones for dinner tonight; you can be an intellectual, determining how to best transmit your lectures to your students tomorrow, or you can be an average worker in a small, midsize or large workplace determining how to survive between now and your next paycheck; you can be an entrepreneur, searching for the fastest way of earning recognition and achieving growth for your venture, or you can be a convinced loner, determining not to follow any direction but your own.

Regardless of who you are: growth is achievable, and vehicles for growth are available. Learning is not limited to the formal settings, no matter how persuasively society will try to convince you about that. Learning can happen everywhere, but you should see it merely as a vehicle to get to a higher plane: to grow. Because that is the purpose of life.