"Yesterday's gone. Tomorrow's a mystery. Today's the one that actually shows up - so show up for it!" - Futurist Jim Carroll
The final part of my short 6-part series revisiting my archives - a journey through years of morning posts that began with writing my newest book. Where else could it end but here: with the word I've used more than any other. Tomorrow!
I've spent my entire career thinking about tomorrow. It's right there in the job title!
But here's the confession thirty years on stage never quite prepared me to make: tomorrow was never actually the point. Today was.
Every trend I've ever tracked, every disruption I've ever forecast, every keynote I've ever delivered about "what's coming next" - all of it was really just an elaborate argument for what you should be doing right now.
Yesterday's gone. Nothing about it is negotiable, no matter how long you sit there rehashing it.
Tomorrow's a mystery - and I say that as someone who's spent thirty years getting paid to guess at it for a living! The trends can tell you the shape of what's coming. They can't tell you the day, the hour, or how it will actually feel when it lands.
Today's the one that actually shows up. It's the only part of the timeline you get to touch.
"What seemed impossible yesterday is today's opportunity and tomorrow's reality" (2017)
"Your personal headline for tomorrow is based upon the decisions you make today. Choose wisely!" (2017)
"Don't talk about what you'll do tomorrow. Do it today." (February 2023)
"The future is no longer about tomorrow - it is about today!" (November 2021)
"Be tomorrow. Today." (September 2023)
"Your tomorrow starts today. Why wait?" (October 2023)
"Anticipate tomorrow - but act today!" (November 2021)
"Do something today that your tomorrow will thank you for!" (July 2020)
Read those and realize the future isn't a place you arrive at.
It's a place you build, today, one decision at a time - and you only ever get to build it from wherever you're standing right now.
The people who thrive - in business, in careers, in life - aren't the ones with the clearest ten-year plan. They're the ones who show up for today.
Not perfectly.
Not gloriously.
Just consistently.
Today keeps showing up. It has never once failed to.
Meet it.