There’s been a nip in the air in the UK this week.
Brown and yellow leaves paved much of my run this morning, while dog-walkers, families, friends, cyclists, and wanderers were all out in numbers - enjoying the last rays of late-summer sunshine. Autumn is just around the corner.
The arrival of cooler weather and changing seasons have been a good opportunity to reflect on the year so far, and to take stock before colder months set in and we march toward Christmas.
2024 has been a mixed year.
There have been fond moments and memories created. Smiles shared as the sky bruised purple and orange. The soft hum of boats on the water; wine; waves; crab sushi; the storm’s remnants moving over hills dotted with small houses.
Personally and professionally, there have been challenges. Some of these still persist. But, I’m beginning to realise that this is part of the process - it’s only by navigating these potholes that real growth happens.
Growth would actually be my word for the year.
2024 was the year I woke up and truly realised the epoch we’re living through. A time dominated by technology, political and social fracture, the fallout of economic excess, money printing and inflation, a stock market bloated, but buoyed to consecutive new highs by the rise of AI and the promise of a better future. It was the year I discovered Bitcoin, a Pandora’s Box I hadn’t realised I was opening - the quiet revolution, offering pure freedom and a way out of the current system.
Economically and politically, it feels like most of 2024 has been building toward the final quarter. The global rate-cutting cycle, set to soon begin in the US, and to be followed by a history-defining presidential election.
The consequences of either outcome remain uncertain. Frankly, it looks like the U.S. is running out of steam - nowhere is this better reflected than in the candidates it’s putting forward to represent the free world. A similar situation played out in the UK earlier this year, with uninspiring leadership and voting driven by a deserved anti-Tory sentiment, somewhat mirroring the anti-Trump rhetoric in the U.S. Again, something that could be justified, but increasingly seems to be part of a more sinister movement, led at a higher, calculated level, with potentially fatal consequences - remember the near miss in Butler, Pennsylvania?
It really is crunch time, in the leaves underfoot and in society.
I remain hopeful that more good times will come, not just by chance, but because we will create them. If we can focus on being better to each other - honest, even about hard realities - empowering others and lifting everyone up, while still championing individual success and ambition, a better future is possible.
One thing we should never be afraid to do is to engage in discussion. Question. Reason. Disagree. Be curious about the cosmos around you and how it all works.
Favourite thing I read recently was about the desk used by U.S. Presidents in the Oval Office. Called the Resolute Desk, this was gifted by Queen Victoria to President Rutherford B. Hayes in 1880. It was crafted from the timbers of the British Arctic exploration ship HMS Resolute - a vessel that was abandoned during a search for the lost Franklin expedition, later recovered by an American whaler, and returned to Britain as an act of goodwill.
There’s something about the legacy of an old desk, crafted from a ship that once sailed into the unknown. It sums things up, really, as autumn approaches.
