Deep Life Reflections: Friday Five
Issue 12 - The Odyssey of Belonging
Hello and welcome to my weekly email newsletter, Deep Life Reflections: Friday Five.
Each Friday, I share five things I’m enjoying, thinking about, and find interesting, which you might also find useful.
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Here’s this week’s Friday Five.
1. What I’m Reading
How Tom Hanks Became Tom Hanks. Article by Chris Heath for The Atlantic.
There is a cultural mythology around Tom Hanks. He’s the nice guy, the “avatar of American goodness” as Chris Heath calls it in this excellent article about one of Hollywood’s most enduring and popular actors. Hanks spends over four hours talking with Heath. Hanks is a natural conversationalist, at his most excited when sharing something interesting he’s just learned, such as “You know why there’s so many covered bridges in America?” With this type of energy and comfort, there is a sense that Hanks was always on this journey to stardom. But life stories are never so linear.
Instead, Hanks shares a story from his childhood that may explain something significant about how he came to be the person he is now. As a child, Hanks would take long bus journeys in Northern California to visit his separated parents. He was often alone, and always sat by the window. He’d watch the world go by and ask questions. Who lived in that house? What was on the other side of that barn? Where were all those people going on that plane high above? This released the curiosity in him.
“A boy by the window, imagining what was and what could be.”
These stories gave him some kind of solace during a difficult childhood. In his own words, “I was just like a leaf blowing in the wind.” He wasn’t in control of anything. Focus and ambition would come, but it took time. His journey to Hollywood star was an odyssey as long as those bus journeys across small-town rural America. But they may just have made him into the Tom Hanks we know today. Someone always asking questions. And perhaps surprising us, telling us in captivating detail that bridges in America were often designed with covers to avoid spooking horses by keeping the animals’ eyes on the road.
2. What I’m Watching
The Fabelmans. Directed by Steven Spielberg.
Steven Spielberg is a born storyteller. Some of my earliest movie experiences and memories are from his stories: ET, Jaws, Raiders of the Lost Ark. And nothing influenced those films more than his parents’ divorce.
The Fabelmans is Spielberg’s most personal film; semi-autobiographical and dedicated to his late parents. It’s a film about the power of families—and all their human flaws—seen through the eyes of a child. No heroes or villains, just parents trying to choose between happiness and responsibility, and the quiet, sad realisation that this doesn’t have to be an either/or choice.
Against this difficult backdrop, we watch Sammy Fabelman (essentially a proxy for the young Spielberg) discover his love of movies, and then the love of the camera, producing high-tech home-made films to wow his friends in local theatre houses. One of the most pivotal scenes is early on when the young Sammy recreates the train crash from the 1952 film The Greatest Show on Earth. He feels as out of control as the locomotive on screen, and needs to recreate the crash again and again, so he feels in control. “I need to watch them crash.” This also plants the seed for filmmaking.
This is Spielberg showing us the story of how the magic of the movies came to be in his own life. Of course, it’s the Hollywood version, with a fable-like touch. And it wouldn’t be a Spielberg film without a message of hope and reconciliation at the end.
3. What I’m Contemplating
The childhood experiences of Tom Hanks and Steven Spielberg became catalysts for their creativity. How much of our childhood experiences shape who we are today?
This week I celebrated 17 years at my company, Dell Technologies, a significant career milestone. Earlier this year, I celebrated five years as an ambassador for ASICS as one of their FrontRunners. The reasons for this longevity are the purpose, culture, and people that underpin both organisations. Both Dell and ASICS strive to make a positive impact on the world. Those are places I want to be.
I wonder how much of that desire to make a positive impact comes from my childhood experiences, which were shaped by a supportive family environment, a love of creating and collecting things, and playing in a team—my local under-12 football team, Troqueer Colts, where for the first two years we were on the end of horrendous defeats every week, but eventually improved.
Childhood is an important place. It’s where our worldviews are shaped, our personalities formed, and our future paths subtly sketched.
4. A Quote to note
“Every child is an artist. The problem is how to remain an artist once we grow up.”
Pablo Picasso
5. A Question for you
Can you identify a particular challenge from your childhood that has shaped your character or approach to life?
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Thanks for reading and have a great weekend.
James