From Corporate Metrics to Southern Italian Evenings
We spend the best part of our lives operating under a grand delusion: that we are in control.
For decades, my career was dedicated to leadership and sales development. Early on, I discovered a massive performance booster for sales teams. It wasn’t a complex algorithm; it was simply getting salespeople to set a clear objective before every single customer interaction. “If you’re going to see a client, what exactly do you want to achieve?” I also noticed that salespeople frequently used shorthand codes or nicknames for clients—reducing human beings to their addresses or the products they bought. My first mission was always to break that habit, forcing them to understand their clients on a personal level and discover what success actually looked like for them.
When I moved into leadership, I saw the exact same pattern. Leaders would create shorthand codes for their team members, completely forgetting to learn them as individuals. Everyone has different motivations and needs. True leadership isn’t about forcing compliance; it’s about tapping into those individual differences while leveraging the outputs you need. You do this by changing your language, adjusting your approach, and establishing foundational group structures—agreements of mutual respect, punctuality, and baseline decency.
All of this is good work. It is important work. But looking back, I realize it was also an elegant way of maintaining an illusion of control.
Because the truth is, as humans, we don’t control very much at all.
The Architecture of Boundaries
This realization hits hardest not in the boardroom, but at the family dinner table.
Now that I am a grandfather and my own children are grown, I find myself still trying to shepherd, guide, and protect them. It is an endeavor that often yields very little immediate return. They are going to do their own thing. So, you coach and you coax. You drop gentle reminders: “Make sure you see your brother.” “Make sure you spend time with your niece.” “Give each other grace.” You spend so much narrative energy living in those storylines, trying to orchestrate harmony from the sidelines.
But loving adult children means letting them go. It means letting them own their own space. And, crucially, it means calling in your own space when the boundaries get blurred. When their needs swallow up the room, people can forget how to show you the level of respect you require as you get older. I’ve had to find the voice to say, “Hey, it’s not okay to treat your dad like that.” My own father was, frankly, a difficult man. Yet, the level of respect and tolerance my generation afforded our parents was immense—perhaps, in his case, too much. Today, those intergenerational boundaries have eroded significantly. The world has grown sharper, more rushed, and far more blurred.
Except, I’ve found, in one specific corner of the world.
Finding the Rhythm in Southern Italy
Living here in southern Italy, I am constantly reminded that respect for the elderly is still a living, breathing reality.
It isn’t about younger people fearfully tipping their hats; it is a genuine, quiet reverence for the voice of experience. There is an unspoken acknowledgement of status: Here is someone who has walked the earth for 70 or 80 years. They won’t be here forever, so let’s look after them. I see it in the multigenerational layout of family dinners in local restaurants, and I feel it on the streets every single day.
When I walk from my house to the supermarket, neighbors ask how I am. It isn’t the empty, transactional platitude of an American “Have a nice day.” It is genuine care.
Just today, two young kids walked past me. My dog, Maui, was off his leash, and I could see the sudden flash of concern in their eyes—Will he bark? I smiled and waved a hand. “Tranquillo, tranquillo, eh? Lui è bravo. È bravo.” Maui, of course, couldn’t have cared less about them. He was far more interested in sniffing the air, wondering if there was food in the grocery bag limping its way into the house.
Letting Go and Chasing the Sun
I spent the rest of my day on the terrace, working on my website and archiving my drawings. I have an exhibition tomorrow. It’s very small, and in the grand scheme of things, not terribly important—but it is a start. It is a stake in the ground for my creative soul.
I sat outside almost all afternoon, nursing a glass of wine, with my big dog lying so close beside me he was practically on top of me.
As the sun begins to go down, the temperature is still hovering beautifully in the 20s. The pace of life here is slow. Wonderfully, beautifully slow. Granted, that slow pace brings its own frustrations—good luck finding a sense of urgency when something needs to be repaired—but as a style of life? It is absolutely magnificent.
I’m sitting here now, contemplating dinner. Do I stay in and make a simple pasta? No. I think I’m going to go out.
I am letting go of the need to plan, the need to manage, and the illusion of control. The exhibition will happen tomorrow. My family will find their way. But tonight, the air is warm, the Italian twilight is calling, and peace is found simply by stepping out the front door.
