Legendary investor, Ray Dalio, founder of hedge fund Bridgewater Associates tweeted recently:
“I think it’s a really good thing to have role models and heroes, which our society is lacking and in desperate need of.”
It is a really powerful statement. It captures the underlying problem building for many years and now manifesting in the form of the many crises the world now faces. A world plagued by short-term thinking and transactional relationships across business, politics and even sport.
When I was growing up there was no internet. My kids call this period ‘the olden days’. I call it the 1980’s and 90’s. Back then your role models were your parents, and your heroes were footballers. Choices were simpler. My role models, by default, were my dad and my uncles, hard-working blue-collar men. My heroes were Michael Jordan, the greatest basketballer to ever play the game and John Worsfold, the tough as nails West Coast Eagles premiership captain.
In the age of social media, how and who people chose to be their role models and heroes is a very different process. From B grade celebrities to Instagram influencers through to YouTubers and TikTokers, the choices are almost unlimited. In the fight for clicks and the attention of followers, the world has degenerated into a free for all of the loudest and most controversial. In many cases, there is no real substance to the people we follow and aspire to be like today. The content as fake as the people promoting them. Even sport today has become a place for highlights and showmanship over team and sportsmanship.
All I know is what I learned. From my dad and uncles, I learned about hard work, being a man of your word and having respect for others. From my coaches, I learned to play the game of basketball the right way, as a team. As a kid, I learned so much from my heroes, John Worsfold and Michael Jordan. Both were extremely influential in how my mindset developed as a person. Both were renowned for their determination and resilience, their refusal to ever back down and their sheer will to triumph in spite of any obstacle they faced. I absorbed all I could from my heroes. I wanted to be like them, and I developed a similar mind set because of it.
I believe to this day that hard work, integrity, respect, and mental toughness are the most important attributes you can have. Generally speaking, I think these are underemphasised in today’s society, and it comes back to the Ray Dalio quote at the start of this note. Today, society is not necessarily lacking the exposure to role models and heroes, but rather its lacking exposure to the right role models and heroes.
But I’m not all doom and gloom, I don’t think all is lost as it often feels to anyone remembering the good old days. Instead, I think these things go in cycles. It’s like the old saying ‘when the student is ready, the teacher will appear.’ Or as history has shown, the teacher will appear, and the student will soon adapt.
One of the most ironic benefits of the difficulties we have ahead of us from an economic and geopolitical standpoint, over the rest of this decade, is that it will lead to society refocusing on what really matters. At that point, we will see what the world needs most, real role models and heroes, who were always there quietly setting the example for when we are ready to see it.
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