Proyecto Visión 21

Francisco Miraval

It seems that the best way to arrive at the future you would like to arrive is to have a map, created by you, to go from this present to that future, even if at the beginning nobody else but you believe such a future exists for you.

Let me clarify that idea with an example. In the 1930s, decades before maps were made using digital photography taken from satellites, map creators included fake places, on purpose, on their maps. Called “copyright traps”, those fake places helped to detect unauthorized copies of the maps.

In those years, two people working for General Drafting decided to create a “paper town”, called Agloe (using the initials of their names), near Roscoe, in New York. That place didn’t exist in real life. So, if Agloe appeared in a map made by other company, that could mean there was a copyright issue affecting General Drafting.

Just a few years later, Agloe, the fake place, was included in maps by other map-making companies. The creators of the original map decided to sue those companies for copyright infringement and, in doing so, they discovered that Agloe was by then a real place, with its own store and even included in the list of places of the local county.

In other words, because the include Agloe in the map, a place that didn’t exist became a reality. When looking at the map and seeing that place, people went there and a “hamlet” was created. It lasted until 2014, when it was absorbed by a nearby city.

So, as we said before, to move into the future, the first step is to include that future on the map of our lives, even we assume that future doesn’t exist yet. But, once is there, the future we thought was unreal will become real. In fact, it will be so real we will be able to share it with others.

But, why we are unable to include the future we want to reach on the map of our lives? The short answer is because we are our own biggest obstacle. The long answer is that we listen more to the fear and criticism inside us than to the future calling us and, therefore, we assume our fears are telling us the truth.

Those fears, that criticism (even if it is “positive”), those false “good advices” we receive, create doubts about the future we want to create, such as the creators of Agloe were sure Agloe only existed on paper, but not in real life.

Others, however, not knowing anything about the “history” of Agloe, went there, lived there, and opened businesses there. They never had any doubts it was a real city.

The future doesn’t arrive: it’s created. The future is no longer continuation of the past and it’s not static. The future doesn’t wait. So, put the best future version of yourself on the map of your life and go there without doubts or fears stopping you.