Be a Land Rover, Not a Tesla
Play the long game with your career, your family, and your legacy.
Ten years ago, we brought home a used Land Rover Discovery.
At the time, it was just a practical decision. We needed a family vehicle that could handle Montana winters and kid chaos. Nothing particularly profound about it.
But kids have a way of turning ordinary things into landmarks.
On the day we pulled into the driveway with that car, my daughter Kiera climbed into the back seat. She was little enough that her feet didn’t touch the floor. I strapped her in, shut the door, and in her mind we’d just acquired a spaceship.
Fast forward a decade.
Last week, that same kid — now 16 — slid into the driver’s seat, adjusted the mirrors, and slowly backed the Discovery out of the driveway for the first time.
My wife stood on the porch.
I stood in the passenger seat, trying to look calm.
And somewhere inside, my brain was yelling: “When did this happen?”
A few minutes earlier, her 4-year-old sister Charlotte had been “driving” the car in park, pink winter hat pulled down over her ears, hands gripping the wheel. Another tiny human who has no idea she’ll probably be backing it out for real in ten years.
Same car. Same driveway. Same family.
Completely different season.
We rarely feel “ready” when it’s our turn
Watching Kiera drive that day, I realized something that applies directly to your career:
You almost never feel ready when it’s finally your turn.
When I was 24, I made a million-dollar decision on a drilling rig at 1 a.m.
When I was 30, I was responsible for a $400M portfolio.
In neither case did I wake up that morning thinking, “Yep, today I’m absolutely qualified for this.”
You grow into the responsibility by doing it, not by waiting until your confidence catches up.
Kiera didn’t become “ready to drive” last week. She became ready by:
Riding in that car thousands of times
Watching us drive
Listening to a hundred small reminders and corrections
Finally sliding into the driver’s seat and trying
Your career works the same way.
The compounding nobody sees
From the outside, careers can look like a series of big jumps: promotions, new titles, big moves.
From the inside, it feels more like:
One more email written clearly
One more conversation with your manager
One more problem you quietly fix without drama
Those are your driveway reps. They don’t make headlines. But ten years from now, they’re the reason people trust you with bigger decisions.
We overestimate what can happen in a year.
We underestimate what can happen in ten.
Especially in your 20s.
Three questions for your next ten years
If you’re early in your career, here are three questions to sit with:
What “vehicle” am I learning in?
Not “Is this the perfect job?” but:Am I learning from people I respect?
Am I close enough to the work to see impact?
Does this environment reward integrity and effort?
Where am I getting driveway practice?
Where can I practice leading without a title?
Where can I communicate to non-technical people?
Where can I safely try, fail, and adjust?
What story do I want the next ten years to tell?
Ten years from now, what would you love to say about:The kind of problems you worked on
The kind of teammate you were
The kind of person you became
You don’t need every detail figured out. You just need a direction and the willingness to keep turning the wheel.
Your driveway is enough
It’s easy to believe growth only happens in big, shiny moments — new job, new city, new company.
But most of the transformation happens in normal places:
Your inbox.
Your 1:1s.
Your notebook.
Your “driveway.”
Ten years from now, you’ll look back at where you are today and realize: this was one of the most important training grounds of your life.
Treat it that way.
And if you’re an engineer or scientist in your first decade trying to sort all this out, that’s exactly who I build for. At shawnisakson.com I share frameworks, stories, and a course called Foundations to help you navigate this season with more clarity, less panic.
You don’t have to sprint.
You just have to keep driving.
