It is never too late to be who you might have become.

“Don’t fear failure so much that you refuse to try new things. The saddest summary of a life is: could have, might have, and should have.” ― Louis E. Boone

English Novelist George Elliot said: “It’s never too late to be what you might have been.” According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, the overall median age of American workers is 42.3 years. ¹ The Average Age of a Successful Startup Founder Is 45. ² We all start life with wild dreams and aspiration but along the way, we forget our greatness hence we settle for less than we can become. As American Essayist Ralph Waldo Emerson quipped “To be yourself in a world that is constantly trying to make you something else is the greatest accomplishment.” It is never too late to be who you might have become, fear is at the root of most of our inaction. The graveyard is said to be the richest place on earth, as we leave our music unsung, books unwritten, hopes and dreams unexplored just because we never dared to follow through with our wildest dreams.

The graveyard is the richest place on earth, because it is here that you will find all the hopes and dreams that were never fulfilled, the books that were never written, the songs that were never sung, the inventions that were never shared, the cures that were never discovered, all because someone was too afraid to take that first step, keep with the problem, or determined to carry out their dream. – Les Brown

Late Bloomer ³

A late bloomer is a person who fulfils their potential later than expected; they often have talents that aren’t visible to others initially. The key word here is expected. And they fulfill their potential frequently in novel and unexpected ways, surprising even those closest to them. They are not attempting to satisfy, with gritted teeth, the expectations of their parents or society, a false path that leads to burnout and brittleness, or even to depression and illness.

Writers

The list of late-blooming writers is as diverse as it is illustrious.

Chuck Palahniuk published his first novel, Fight Club, at thirty-four;
David Sedaris, the humorist, published his first collection of essays at thirty-eight;
Toni Morrison published her first novel, The Bluest Eye, at thirty-nine and won the Pulitzer Prize for Beloved at fifty-six;
Janet Evanovich launched her bestselling Stephanie Plum series of crime novels at forty-four;
Frank McCourt published his Pulitzer Prize-winning memoir, Angela’s Ashes, at sixty-three.

Business

Tom Siebel founded his first successful tech company, Siebel Systems, at forty-one, and his second, C3, at fifty-seven;
Dave Duffield launched tech firm PeopleSoft at sixty-six.
Gary Burrell, after decades of working for engineering firms like Allied Signal, cofounded Garmin, the GPS device maker, at fifty-two.
John Torode started an airplane company, Vashon Aircraft, at seventy.
Billionaire Dietrich Mateschitz, who spent ten years in college and worked as a ski instructor, founded energy drink maker Redbull at forty.
And let’s not forget the greatest innovator of recent times: Steve Jobs. While not technically a late bloomer, his unparalleled second act, in which he launched the iPod, iTunes, iPhone, and iPad at Apple, came after he was forty-five.

Think of the great men and women who continued to pursue their dreams into old age. Think of people like Moses, who at eighty years of age, led 3.5 million people out of captivity. Or Caleb, who at eighty-five years of age said, “Give me that mountain.” Or Colonel Sanders, who at seventy years of age discovered “finger-lickin’ good” chicken. Or Ray Kroc, who, after age seventy, introduced a Big Mac to the world. Then there’s Casey Stengel, who at seventy-five, became the manager of the Yankees baseball team. And there’s Picasso, still painting at eighty-eight, and George Washington Carver, who became head of the Agriculture Department at eighty-one. There’s Thomas Edison, who at eighty-five invented the mimeograph machine, and John Wesley, who was still travelling on horseback and preaching at age eighty-eight. ¹

There’s an old story about a man lamenting that he always wanted to learn to play the piano, but could never find the time because of his other responsibilities.

“Why don’t you start now?” asked his friend.

“Are you kidding?” he retorted. “I’m fifty years old! It’ll take me five years to learn to play well. I’d be fifty-five by the time I become even remotely proficient as a pianist.”

His friend paused, then inquired “So, how old will you be in five years if you don’t learn to play the piano?”

It’s never too late. Each day is an opportunity to begin again; to move in a new direction or to reaffirm the one you’re already traveling in. If you’re honest with yourself, you probably already know where you are falling short or playing it safe. You cannot chase safety and count on emptyig yourself of your best work. You cannot pursue greatness and comfort at the same time. Commit today to stepping outside your comfort zone and set some goals to help you get there. In short, grow.²

Meditation

Daily Calm with Tamara Levitt – Mono no Aware
It is natural to seek a sense of stability and foreverness; change and uncertainty can feel stressful and scary. Recognizing that everything that begins must end is acknowledging our mortality, which isn’t a warm and fuzzy prospect. But there is great wisdom in the view that everything is ever-changing and ephemeral. Nothing is permanent; it isn’t just true of human life; it is a reality that permeates every corner of the universe.
Today the tallest tree in the woods; tomorrow, a log cabin lying on the forest floor. Today a massive glowing star; tomorrow, a cloud of cooling elements. It is understandable to fear change, but there is so much to gain by accepting impermanence.
Our years on earth are so precious only because life ends, only because of the harsh winds of winter that we drink up every sun-drenched moment of summer. Mindfulness encourages us to see that it is not the nature of impermanence that causes us to suffer; we desire to want things to be permanent that cause us to suffer.
Mono no Aware- Japanese word meaning sensitivity to ephemeral, the bitter sweat feeling of seeing things change, a wistful reverent awareness of the transitory nature of existence.