In 1973, I had an opportunity to be appointed to the US Naval Academy. I had met all the academic requirements and passed the physical exam. All that remained was to have my congressman write a letter of recommendation. Before he could do so, I needed to let him know whether I intended to accept. I talked to people I respected and after a lot of soul searching decided to remove my name from consideration. He thanked me for notifying him. The process was well-documented – my mother saved the correspondence.
I’ve sometimes wondered how my life would have turned out if I had become a midshipman and later an officer in the Navy. The window of opportunity was narrow – only a few weeks – and I made a choice that affected my entire future. Yet, my life has been good, and I have few regrets. To this day, as much as I deeply respect those who serve our country, I believe I would not have been a good fit with the US Navy.
Almost everything in life involves acting within a certain time frame, a window during which a decision must be made or when our actions can have maximum effect, for better or worse. Before I met my wife, I had a chance to form a long-term relationship with someone else, but simply put, I blew it. The window closed, or more accurately, slammed shut. It occurs to me that divorce is usually the outcome whenever a married couple misses the window of opportunity to address their problems.
Advertisers often tell us there is a “limited time offer” – we need to “act now” or “miss out.” Back when I was learning to navigate DOS 2.0, I believed Microsoft would be big, but a combination of being risk-averse and having no money to invest meant I would miss out. Sometimes the window is real, but mostly the call to “act fast” is a sales ploy, or part of a dangerous game. Economic bubbles happen when too many people try not to miss out.
Generally, acting in a timely way offers the best chances of success. If one quits smoking soon enough, their heart and lungs can recover, and they can enjoy a longer life. If a student gets his work done on time, he can maximize his chances of earning a good grade. If a sales agent follows up quickly, she can increase her chances of securing a regular customer. If I perform regular maintenance on my house, I can increase its resale value. If I do the same with my car, I can minimize the chance it will break down on a road trip. As Buckminster Fuller might say, “anticipatory action is preferable to delayed action.”
Sometimes we have a window of opportunity to address a long-term problem. If we miss that window, as we did with pollution in the mid-twentieth century, we later end up with an expensive “super fund” solution. Procrastinating with problems always means larger price tags in the end. This is precisely why we needed to act on infrastructure maintenance decades ago. We have missed window after window, and this will cost trillions going forward.
Believe it or not, the window is closing on actions needed to address climate change. If we miss our window, it will become exponentially more expensive to deal with increasingly harmful effects. For many of us, it has been easier to delay, debate, “wait and see,” say “not in my backyard,” or deny the problem exists until it directly affects our corner of the world. Nevertheless, we can’t count on any of the major problems we face to simply go away. That would be magical thinking. None of our problems have ever become easier after the window closed. They have only become more difficult, more intractable. Companies have gone bankrupt and wars have been fought after missed opportunities.
I remember a sign from my first visit to Niagara Falls: “Point of No Return.” Past that point, the current is so strong there is no turning back, no escaping your fate. The same is true for the “event horizon” of a black hole. When an airplane reaches the half-way point of a flight, there isn’t much to be gained by turning back. In either case, you must forge ahead and take your chances, even if they are slim. It seems to me failing to address climate change and other existential problems will be like passing the point of no return above Niagara Falls. We will end up taking our chances. Windows of opportunity do not stay open forever. It’s best to act before they close.
MurrayWorks 