A boy stargazing, a man planning, an old man dreaming
Pull, Push, Pull
This is my story, it is best told by images, images that delimit my life chapters. It's a different form of autobiography, the story of images -- dreams pursued, aspirations. In mid-career it was still unfolding and I couldn't capture it until now in my late sixties. What strikes me is the strength of the early vision and how it played out over and over.
The current prevalent view of psychology and fate is that environment and genes determine all. This modern view tends to ignore inspiration and serendipity while disregarding adventure
Its tone is often reductionist.
Other older versions of psychology and fate drew a 'soul' or 'myth' orientation for the personal biography. Plato described a 'soul companion' one was born with that guided life. Likewise the Romans named it genius, the Greeks had their myths and talked of a person's daemon, the Christians have their guardian angel. Michangelo said he could see the heart of a subject he was painting.
This, my story, was guided by many versions of fate, of a vision, calling, a daemon. I felt the myth's presence and it guided my early direction as a companion. And the 'myth's vision' came true.
The story is about a dreamer and the lifecycle of a dream. It's about a dream followed and it's about the dream side of entrepreneurship. It's written for young men formulating dreams and for old men who have followed their dream. It's about the stages where the dream becomes materialized and then translated into a business. It's about the admixture of a lifelong dream and the pragmatics of the business bottom line -- -- the dream becoming the main ingredient and the business becoming its stabilizing ingredient, its expression.
This narrative introduction is intended to frame and give the background for a six-piece poem. The first section, stargazing, is about a young man's daydream and belief that he could make an impact and change the world. It's about study and mathematics with the motivation of not doing math but of seeing the world in a different way and going about changing it. It's falling in love with the image of opening up a fresh provocative way to view reality.
At this first formative stage, there was nothing by way of achievement or academic success that would even hint that such an aspiration could come true. An image of having a mathematical breakthrough took root even though there was no hint of how it would materialize. The image held a sense of adventure, excitement, transformation --- the image foretold the experience. It was the image of how I wanted life ---- all I had to do was fill in the breakthrough.
It's in that spirit the story and poetry is written, to persuade dreamers to keep dreaming. I hope these lyrics and rhymes become encouragement for those who dare to imagine big changes. It's about empowering sleepy images into operational mathematics, and then riding the strength of a dream. The story is about the power of a dream.
When I look back at my career it was indeed the images that drove it. Instead of a business plan or career highway it was more of a calling, a destiny, a path. It felt like my education and experience, instead of teaching me about career, were unfolding my inner drive that was there from the beginning. It was more like getting to know myself and what I should be truly doing. The six piece poem is organized in this spirit -- -- each section is titled by an image that was both driving me and guiding me.
The research and discovery phase took eleven years, working with very large complex software development projects and then developing a mathematical theory of the complexity of software. The actual hard-core mathematical research took two and a half years. And then there were several small demonstration projects, a publication, and a few lectures.
At this point the dream began to sprout wings and I would fly to various locations around the United States lecturing on this brand new mathematical theory of software complexity. The story unfolds into an international business from this point. The lyrics tell the great American dream -- -- selling the company at the optimal time and being 'self-beached' with an self-indulgent life of entertainment and leisure.
And then a surprise; a surprise that should serve as a cold warning to any dreamer. Read on.
Image One: " find a breakthrough, tell the world" ---- The learning, Graduate school in mathematics, a boy stargazing
Good students dropping out, everyone scratching to hold on
This my first solo, out of the box decision, had to make it work, only me to rely upon
Fully committed, half decision - half dream
Decision questioned by good students dropping out
Dream reinforced by getting it, beyond doubt
Took me much further than imagined I could go
More appreciated the beauty, grades not a KO
The purity, universality of the theory
The elegant reasoning was pure poetry
Was stunned by the beauty and felt an urge to share the magic
Not cold hard syllogisms, more joyous epiphany classic
Knew I would find a way to make this my life
An image while stargazing, a dream's midwife
More than a career, a calling, destiny set
Other interest on hold, no regret
My call, find a breakthrough, tell the world.
Image two: "found the breakthough: the complexity of algorithms" ----- Ten years later, The Breakthrough
Toiled twelve years in a shared project muck
six million lines of code of error prone software
Felt a dislocation stepping away
Left friends and a good development career
to develop an underlying theory to convey
Spent two years trying mathematical approaches, to a unifying theory
Cajoled and convinced bosses to give me the space, barely
'the complexity of algorithms' was the aim
mathematical rigor would change the software game
Tried two hundred approaches, none good enough
Then eureka, after months of no sleep and exhaustion and apparent rebuff
... it appeared, I knew I had it, was no ruse
Thought it way too good to be true
Put it down to reopen again and again, to double prove
and yes, it was with me, could not disprove
'the complexity of algorithms' based on pure mathematics, but how to explain ?
Image Three........ "Tell the world"
Started to tell the story, first conversational spars
Then conferences, then three day seminars
Grew to fifty two seminars per year, once a week for twenty five years
Had to hire others to help tell the story, it built careers
San Francisco, NY city, Denver, Dallas, Washington DC, Chicago ...
Paris, Rome, London, Stockholm, San Paulo ....
The stargazing boy still excited and telling the story
Wondered how long the dream would last, when started barely,
Twenty five years and still chugging, still magic
Image four: "follow the dream's wings"........... Build a company
The dream was bigger than me
Had worldwide appeal
Instead of following the dream the dream pulled me
I gave the dream wings and it had me grow wings
Needed company and a company to tell the story
One hundred and seventy five storytellers
Automated the math, could watch in real time
Bought by IBM, HP, Procter & Gamble, Nabisco, AT&T, Prime
Me on TV, in front of US Congress, esteem
Things are a-rockin, living the dream
Image Five: "thought I sold the company ...." ......The great American dream
The company has high value
Sold. Lingered as Chairman
Never have to work again.
Life of comfort and leisure
Tennis all day, Tequila all night, hollow pleasure
Went from commitment and burning the midnight oil
to dabbling dilettante, lifeless as a gargoyle
Comfort without challenge, no dream to pursue
Hollow, vacant, void; life turned blue
Thought I sold the company, turned out sold the dream
Image Six: "the story of dreaming"............. An Old man's dream, surprise
Had to rekindle the dream out of a life as hollow as bamboo
The dream's rebirth is the story of dreaming
And following it, giving it wings, and being given wings
It's back on the road again lecturing where my math is being used
This time to hear the dream's story and tell a new story, bemused
To Beijing, San Diego, Athens, Rome, Paris,.....
Surprise, the reward is
not comfort but challenge,
not complacency but commitment
not leisure, but labor --- of love
And to tell a new story
Of a boy with a stargaze.....
Of any boy with a stargaze.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Only now can I understand --- how the myth guided my life. And it still does. I wrote my story backwards, backwards to understand and pay the myth its homage. I now read the story going forward, to honor and follow my dear companion.
