Don't give up on your dreams even in your 50s. Even Pikotaro succeeded because he didn't give up for 14 years.
Everyone, didn’t you have all sorts of dreams when you were little?
Those wonderful dreams you each held—have you forgotten them now that you’re an adult?
This time, I’d like to suggest that, as you settle into your work in your fifties, you try chasing those dreams once again.
Introduction
I think everyone had an incredibly big dream when they were a child.
“I want to be a professional baseball player!” “I want to be an idol!”, and so on.
And then, when we reach a certain age, we start to have more realistic dreams, don’t we?
"I want to do design at an automobile manufacturer," "I want to become an airplane pilot," and "I want to run a coffee shop," etc.
And by the time they became working adults, didn’t many people end up taking jobs as employees at the largest companies possible, either due to family recommendations or in search of a stable life?
I never intended to become a corporate employee either, but in the end I chose stability and I’m still a company employee in my late forties—this is Okaken.
As soon as I became a company employee, I forgot what I had originally wanted to do and devoted myself to my company work.
I think that is, as a matter of course, a good thing.
In your 30s and 40s, it's only natural to work hard toward getting promoted at your company—thinking about your family and life, and also to find your own sense of purpose.
And now that I’m in my fifties, I’ve reached a point where the end of my corporate career is in sight, and I’m wondering whether I will stay on as an executive from here or simply reach retirement as I am.
Maybe it's about time you remembered your own dreams and thought about living a life without regrets.
I will introduce people who don’t give up on their dreams even in their 50s, and I will also talk about my own desire to make my dreams come true in the future.
Even Piko Taro succeeded because he didn’t give up on his dream for 14 years.
taking the world by storm with PPAPPikotaroMr./Ms. [Name] has been in the spotlight for having appeared on the TV show “Money no Tora” in 2003.
The TV show “Money no Tora” is a program where you present your business plan to prominent entrepreneurs, they decide whether to invest, and you can actually receive real investment funds.
At that time, Kosaka Daimaou (who later became Piko Taro) gave a presentation 14 years ago to entrepreneurs saying he wanted to pursue music activities, but it did not lead to any investment.
After that, for 14 years, he kept working as a comedian, mixing music into his routines and the like, but it seems he went through a long stretch where it didn’t go over well.
And then, as Piko Taro, he uploaded PPAP to YouTube and became a huge hit.
I was 43 years old at the time.
As you know, its breakout has been nothing short of phenomenal.
This succeeded because I didn’t give up for over ten years.
Of course, if you give up, there can be no success.
Reset your life in your 50s and make your dreams come true
Before I became a company employee, during my student days, my idea was still rough, but I wanted to run my own business.
It could be a small eatery, a general store, a furniture workshop, or even an ironworks—anyway, I wanted to live a life not belonging to a company as an organization.
However, in the end, coming from the circumstances mentioned above, I naturally joined a company, and even after changing jobs, I ended up relying on the stability of being a company employee.
I’ve heard that what people regret at the end of their lives is not being able to do what they truly wanted to do.
I don’t want to end my life that way, and the number of years I can keep working at the company is starting to dwindle.
Maybe it's about time I started seriously thinking about the road ahead, as I'm reaching the midpoint of my life.
When I thought that, I figured I might as well start my own business—the self-employed work I’ve always wanted to do—so that I won’t have any regrets in life.
These days, we often see people with a variety of titles—what you might call an entrepreneurship boom—pursuing their activities in their own ways.
Things like marketing, which would have been difficult a while ago, have become relatively easy to do using the internet and social media, thanks to the IT revolution and the rapid spread of the internet.
I'm already in my 50s as a company employee, and I can't see a future ahead.
It may still be possible for me to make a late-blooming impact, but in my case the move also involves a transfer that could be seen as a demotion, so I’d like to reset my salaried career up to now and rethink my life plan from here on.
I haven’t thought as far as whether I’ll retire early from my company job or work until the mandatory retirement age.
Either way, you should choose the path that leaves you with no regrets in your life.
If you want to make your dreams come true, you have to step outside the bounds of the company.
After working as an employee at the same company for over 20 years, my way of thinking and the scope of what I can do have probably become aligned with the standards of a company employee.
When I was talking with a senior colleague at the same company and said, “I want to move to the Kansai area,” their response was, “Which office do you want to transfer to?” When I added, “Leaving the company is also an option,” it turned into, “Which company are you planning to switch to?”
This suggests that it is taken as a given—and fundamental—that we, myself included, are company employees.
In this way, they’ve become unable to even consider stepping outside the familiar framework of their company.
Perhaps that's the case for most office workers, isn't it?
If you leave your company, I think it’s normal to look at job ads or go to the employment office.
However, that still keeps you within the bounds of being a company employee, so you can’t achieve your dream.
No, if someone’s dream is to be a company employee, that’s perfectly fine.
Therefore, to step outside the confines of such a company framework, I recommend building networks with people outside of your work-related company connections.
If possible, it’s best to be involved in what you want to do in the future.
I’ve been dating people I met through social media, and the moment we started meeting in person and seriously talking about each other—not just online—I felt my world expand tremendously.
And as I connected with various people, I started being able to think about many possibilities for what I might do in the future.
The world of a company and its employees is narrower than we realize.
By getting to know people who are active in other worlds, you come to realize that.
Also, no matter what you do in the future, connections with people are important.
Most connections with colleagues at a company disappear once you leave.
After you retire, you don’t want to end up isolated with no one around, so I recommend expanding your network now while you can.