Most of life’s lessons are in the movie Top Gun.
Seriously, Maverick and Goose were high-flying prophets from the 1980s. They roared around in their F-14, teaching scores of lifehacks.
“And if you screw up just this much, you’ll be flying a cargo plane full of rubber dog $#^& out of Hong Kong!” Guy who looks like Mr. Clean
OK, I admit, there were cheesy parts — It was the 1980s after all. (The 80’s had more cheese than Wisconsin.) But there’s one scene that speaks to me:
*Spoiler alert*
If you haven’t seen a nearly 30-year-old movie by now, seriously, I don’t think a spoiler alert will help you. But here it goes. Goose is dead (a tragedy of the likes not seen since *Another Spoiler alert* Bambi’s mom gets turned bumped off) and Maverick is completely messed up in the head. He graduates Top Gun on points alone but the smarmy Iceman wins. Boo! Suddenly the graduates are called to the aircraft carrier U.S.S. Enterprise (because apparently they ran out of pilots.) And international incident breaks out! The commies attack with their Mig-28s (that look like F-5 fighters) and Maverick has to go save the day. But he won’t engage. One F-14 is shot down and Iceman, a thin Val Kilmer, is in peril. Oh no! America is at risk.
And Maverick still won’t engage.
“Come on, Mav, do some of that pilot $#&^” Goose (who died because Maverick did some of that pilot $#&^.)
Then Maverick, who has an epiphany, looks at the late, great Goose’s dog tags and proceeds to kick Ruskie *$$. BOOM!
“Mustang, this is Voodoo 3. Remaining MiGs are bugging out.” Merlin (who wasn’t as cool as Goose and wasn’t married to pre-plastic surgery Meg Ryan)
The point is this: He engaged and ended up on the front page of every newspaper in the english-speaking world, even though the other side denied the incident.
I’m at a point in my life where my busyness is choking out my productivity. I know what I have to do. But I’m not getting it done. I’m like Maverick zooming around in his F-14 and not taking on the bad guys.
It’s not time to get busier; it’s time to get more productive. And their is a big difference between the two. I need my moment with Goose’s dog tags.
I feel the need for speed.
Before I lose that lovin’ feeling.