Victim of too much too soon?

Is it just me or…

Do you also feel things are happening around you in mega-scale, super-speed, and uber-urgent ways?

But change, as you know it, is “inevitable” or something you can’t avoid.

So the only way to move forward is to know what the future looks like.

And discover what’s your place in it.

***

“The Inevitable” by Kevin Kelly is a book published in 2016 (in my second busy season in an audit firm).

If I had read it that year, I would have doubted some of the things mentioned in this book.

But years later, when I landed on this book by chance, I felt that most of the things mentioned already happened.

And if they didn’t happen yet, they’re happening soon and quicker than expected.

Here are the 12 forces shaping the future according to “The Inevitable”.

1. Becoming – tech and culture emerge called the “technium”

2. Cognifying – interlinked cornified objects with a small amount of intelligence will contribute to a cloud-based superorganism

3. Flowing – streams and flows arrive in real-time and on-demand

4. Screening – the emergence of “people of the screen” instead of “people of the book”

5. Accessing – access replaces ownership

6. Sharing – collaborative, collectively-owned groups will revolutionize work, economies, and daily life

7. Filtering – mass customization on demand; filtering and personalization to tailor online experiences

8. Remixing- readily-available content provides opportunities to grab, remix, create

9. Interacting – immersion in virtual environments

10. Tracking – “self-measurement” and lifelogging” to capture lives in a series of videos and photographs

11. Questioning – people will value the power of constant, endless inquiry and debate

12. Beginning – convergence of humans and machines

The future excites me, but I’m also afraid.

My emotions go topsy-turvy.

From anxiety

To excitement

To anxiety

And back again.

To remain in that sense of excitement, I’ve adopted the growth mindset—the belief that nothing is permanent, change is unavoidable, and fear is normal because I’m growing. And so are you, I believe.

We’re on this journey of change and transformation.

And it’s a journey not only exclusive to migrants who pull themselves out of their home countries to live and work in another.

It’s a journey not just for accountants and auditors who face something new for every busy season.

It’s a journey for everyone, regardless of status or profession.

We can all look forward to our future, better selves.

And we can all begin by defining our terms and living life according to our terms.

To make it more practical, we need to set goals, create a plan, and set that plan into motion.

But what if you’re still missing that one key factor?

What's next: learn how to escape the planning fallacy.

Plus, I invite you to self-reflect on these questions:

• What scares you most about the future?

• What will make you more excited about the future?

Welcome to Busy Season Journals—stories and experiences to shape accountants of the future. A newsletter made especially for you by a fellow accountant, adventurer, and coach-guide.

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