a digital notebook

Uncle Mark’s fourth Duvel.

In order to understand why I am going to write about the future of planning, there are a few things that you should know about my favorite uncle. Meet Marky Mark, the firestarter who sparked my thinking process.

1/ Uncle Mark is cool. When Mark was in his twenties, he wore the shiniest leather jackets. If Pinterest had existed back then, John Travolta would have followed all of his boards.

2/ Uncle Mark knows the world. Mark has explored more countries than Vasco da Gama. He even lived in an Indian Ashram but decided to leave when things became too spiritual.

3/ Uncle Mark is f+cking smart. He was top of class without actually going to class. Every morning he had codex for breakfast.

He can outcool and outsmart you. Especially when you’re having dinner table conversations at family parties. He thinks fast and speaks eloquently. Uncle Mark understands things.

But there is one thing Uncle Mark doesn’t understand. There is one thing that always comes back, and I can even predict when it is about to happen. It’s somewhere around the fourth Duvel and it goes like this:

“tell me Thomas, what is it again that you do?”

The quality of my answer usually makes or breaks the conversation. It is that moment where we can grow to a higher level and drink another Duvel or lose each other completely. It is almost always the latter.

I need too many words to say what I want to do in a future work environment. It looks like I am clarifying my point for myself, and not for my Uncle Mark. I use buzz words like “human behavior”, “disruption”, “design thinking”, “adding value”, “usefulness”, etc. to make myself look and feel good. I use them to show off my expertise.

But actually I don’t know anything.

These Duvel talks are the driving force behind the purpose of my book. I want to gain a deeper understanding of what I am doing now. Furthermore, I want to know where everything is going so that I can understand which wave I need to surf.

So next time I see my Uncle Mark, he is going to hear less quantity, more quality and maybe even coolness. He is going to hear one sentence that covers it all.

That will be my challenge.