I started my first job in journalism 16 years ago this summer. I’ve been working in email for seven years. I’ve got some experience to fall back on, but sometimes, I fall back on that experience too quickly. Someone will pitch an idea, and I’ll dismiss it. No, I’ll say, I tried that five or ten years ago. It didn’t work.
And when I say “It didn’t work,” what I’m really saying is: “That never works.”
But that’s not necessarily true! What worked a decade ago might not work today. What didn’t work a year ago might work now. And if I’m too quick to dismiss those ideas, we might miss out on a potentially valuable opportunity.
The challenge is seeing something you’ve seen before — for the first, second, or thousandth time — and trying to explore the idea as though you’re seeing it for the very first time.
I was thinking about that last week. Most days, I eat lunch quickly at my desk in the first available 10-minute window after noon. But on Thursday, I had a bit more time. I took my sandwich, went out, and found a spot a few blocks from the office to sit and eat. I’d never sat in that spot before, and started looking around. And just across the street, I noticed a building going up, still half-complete. When I looked up, I spotted something in the reflection of the glass:
The World Trade Center, poking out from behind another building.
I work in the World Trade Center. I’ve seen that building from just about every angle, from Brooklyn and Jersey, from planes flying into LaGuardia. I’ve seen 1WTC a thousand times, but never from that angle. From most parts of the metro area, the building looms above the rest of the skyline. But from here, up close, I saw something different: a stalk of a building, stretching upwards to find a small piece of the Manhattan sky.
I’ve been thinking about that for a few days now. If it’s possible to see something so iconic as the World Trade Center with fresh eyes, what else have I been missing? What else do I need to approach from a new perspective?
I’ve been lucky to have tried a lot of interesting things in my work. Now I’m trying to figure out what else I can try — again, for the first time.
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I took that photo of 1WTC.