I used to think careers were like train stations. You pick the platform, wait for the right train, hop on, and voilà; will are taken to your desired destination on a non-stop journey. But it turns out most of us are not standing at a station. We are somewhere in an open field with no map, a broken compass, and a pocket with expired snacks. Most people figure things out while they walk. Some get a little guidance. A rare few know exactly where they want to go. That’s me, unsure in which direction to take the next step, but instead of the expired snacks, I had a half-eaten and melted chocolate bar.
There is a line that captures this beautifully. “Caminante, no hay camino, se hace camino al andar.” (A butchered translation goes something like this: Traveler, there is no path, the path is made by walking). It is a verse by the Spanish poet Antonio Machado that reminds us there is no predetermined path in life. Each person creates their own road through their choices and actions.
It took me until the fourth floor of life to admit what I actually want to do. As I transition from thinking about a career to a vocation, I keep coming back to a simple image. Flight hours. Pilots do not get to skip them. No one wakes up and gets handed a nice uniform and the keys to an Airbus A380. You begin with shorts in a humble Cessna, with an engine the size of a moped and the cargo space to carry whatever ridiculous thing you want to bring with you. You sit in it, and you fly. Again and again.
My year has been one long lesson in this, and probably the biggest learning: just show up. Show up on the good days. Show up on the shitty ones. Show up on the rainy Berlin days where even the pigeons look depressed. Show up during the weekend. Show up on the days when your own mind says something like “ohh common, not today”. Just show up.
These are the flight hours.
The beautiful part is that the Cessna has a charm the A380 will never have. Cessnas fly low. You see details. A small house puffing smoke from the chimney. A weirdo fly fishing in a river. Two horny cows staring across the field at a bull who is having a moment. If you do not learn to enjoy the Cessna, chances are the A380 will feel like a bus with wings. At higher altitudes the clouds get in the way. You lose the small view that teaches you how to pay attention. You learn to fly without instruments. You learn to feel the plane and adapt to its surroundings.
So trust the process. Build your hours. Laugh at the turbulence. Enjoy the strange little plane you are learning in. When the time comes, and you finally step into the big aircraft, you will know how to fly because you showed up when it mattered.
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