About Wings
It was one of those moments that I was lazing around. In the distance I picked up a familiar melody of a song I listened to a lot many years ago. It was a song of INXS. Yes, I did (and do) love the New Wave music of the eighties. At that time I hardly gave any attention to the lyrics, but now it suddenly struck me like a beam of sunshine on a gloomy day.
It said:
“ I told you
That we can fly
Because we all have wings
But some of us don’t know why”
Here it was, one of the most essential phenomena. Beautifully phrased, sang on the top of his voice. Simply true.
The other day I had a engaged talk with my fifteen year old daughter. She was overwelmed about all the interesting things that she had learned, understood and started to connect to her life. She cried “What am I going to do with all those amazing things that I learned. How can I ever make a usefull contribution to the world out of all this? Something unique coming out of me? I said “ Not to worry, this is the great thing of youth. Just spend it to grow your wings. Someday you will use them”.
I knew this from sometimes bitter experience of feeling completely detached at school, college, university and work. I did not even feel a strong agony, just a feeling of being out of place while the system proceeded. Outside of school the world seemed to turn in reverse direction. I felt a strong soul connection to a group of friends that originated from scouting. We hardly had any programs together, but opened up to each other and just flowed. Recently, we met each other again after 17 years and the flow simply continued.
For 7.5 years, I worked at a company that did not care about me and I did not care about the company. It all made no sense. But I did not want to disengage anymore. I was at the stage where I wanted to take my life head on.
Somehow all those noncommitted experiences from the past had stacked up to a great mountain. A mountain to fly away from. Now I was determined enough to do it. I quit my job, took strides to climb the mountain. Finally, I reached the highest vantage point. For a few times I tried to unfold my wings. And many times I crashed, I picked up myself again, tightened my wings and tried again. One day I succeeded to fly off that hill without accidents. I flew a great distance with a feeling of liberation. That’s when Riksja Travel came to life. A company that is on a journey. A journey where people can feel a strong connection to.
Riksja Travel is inviting people to fly. We specialize in long distance flying. We have developed the Rickshaw Quest, a four day deep search inside yourself. What is your life’s mission, what are your talents, what drives your energy? How do you apply this at work?
In other words, where are you wings and how do you use them? We have created self steering teams where people determine their own routes without the need of traffic control.
Sometimes you might even fly out of the company. Riksja is OK with this as well, as long as you fly long distance to a horizon that is more beautifull than the one you see now. A horizon that requires the full strength of your current ability. The kind of horizon that is a tribute to your wings.
Some people have not yet figured out why they have wings. Some people never will. That is OK too. But it is never too late to start climbing on your own stacked up mountain and make the first delightfull attemps like a young naive bird in early May. They always crash, but never get fatally hurt. And one sunny day they float through the air like no-one has ever seen.
