Innovation is tricky

Dear Blog Diary,

Sometimes life has you by the balls. How you feel about it, depends on the grip.

Gunpowder was accidentally invented in the 9th century Tang Dynasty by Chinese alchemists in pursuit of a life-extending elixir. What changed warfare forever was meant to give life. Note that the first "gun" wasn’t created until the 10th century, that was functionally a cannon spear.

In the 13th century, Marco Polo connected Asia and Europe which introduced Europe to gunpowder and thus, guns. The evolution of guns boomed. Nothing in comparison to today but from one bullet per minute to four in such a short amount of time was enormous.

Interesting how the Chinese were the first to use gunpowder yet didn't maximize its capability in war. Not only did it take roughly a century to even use gunpowder for war, they had a 400 year head start from the rest of the world. Would rather pull out swords, bows and arrows, hanging onto the past with tradition and conventional methods.

Alfred Nobel (like the Nobel Peace Prize) was the man who accidentally invented dynamite in 1867. Took some tweaking. He burned down a few properties in the process and his brother Emil died in one explosion, but he changed warfare in a profound way. Nobel regretted his invention, seeing its use to kill people.

Where China didn't use it's capability to destroy, maybe they should've. Nobel's invention was used to destroy, yet he really wish it wasn't.

You can hold onto the past where innovation cannot grow in your life, and the other side of that coin is when you don’t like where innovation is taking you. That applies to people in your life, a new passion, an old way of thinking...anything.

Ups and downs, that's how life goes. The worst times in my life came about because of me. The best times, also me! We control so very little and we still accomplish getting in our own way. It's all perspective, but it's also the idea that life doesn't happen around you. It happens from you.

Maybe you hold on to pain, maybe you don't grasp how important something is or could be.

Maybe just depends on the grip. Be open, and remember...you only got ten fingers.

E

#ARTiculate