Growing up in New York City meant that you were exposed to Dutch culture, but probably didn’t know it. For example, trading, stocks, investments, markets and all things financial and capital were very Dutch ideas. When you took a girl out, maybe you went Dutch, she paid her fair share as well as you did. This holdover from each nation paying its fair share into the capitalist system regardless of size still exists today in our culture. Everyone should pay their fair share, whatever that is.
My point is, New York City is a Dutch history goldmine, or it was when I lived there. In fact, it was New Amsterdam for a long time. Or something like Noya Amsterterdamm. I spelled that badly, almost phonetically. Easier to do than to look it up. Just a lot of Dutch in this part of the New World is all I’m saying.
And one of the coolest things that we either had or have no idea about was this idea of a Dutch Uncle. This was the guy in your life, older, maybe blood relation, maybe not, almost certainly male, and often seen as having been around and had some wisdom and worldly living under his belt. And the most important thing, he wasn’t afraid of telling you his version of the truth.
Now this might seem like an impossible person to find today in this world of a 1,000 truths, maybe a lot more than that since everyone can have their own truth, but let me put it another way. This is the guy that would explain to you why your idea was a bad idea. And he paid a price for knowing the difference between good ideas and bad ones. He often got left out of the best parities and family activities because he could be so contrary. Who wants a negative Nelson around all the time?
Imagine you are about to marry someone and everyone around you is lukewarm to the idea of your new mate and what life will turn out to be like with him or her. You feel a bit uneasy because of their non approval approval stance. Where do you to get a better opinion of your decision? You go to your Dutch Uncle that doesn’t hold back and tells you what you probably already knew but just didn’t want to face, that this is a bad match for you and you shouldn’t do it.
The funny thing about Dutch Uncles, they don’t really care what you think about their comments. And that my friend, is what makes them so valuable. And that is also what makes them so hard to find today. I mean, how long would a Dutch Uncle last in our Social Media frenzy before they wrote off the whole enterprise as being anti social and anti media? About five minutes I would say. And true to form, the Dutch Uncle would tell you just that, it’s a bad idea to get your info for living and thinking from Social Media.
No, these types are hard to find and probably don’t want to be found in today’s world. A few of them write books, Jordan Peterson for instance. You can see the Dutch Uncle in him. Everyone says go in this direction and he suggests to go in this direction, often, the very opposite of current thinking.
As always, you are free to take your Dutch Uncle’s advice with a grain of salt or take it, Hook, Line and Sinker. It’s your choice, always has been since I was a kid.
I would think that the better thing to do with a Dutch Uncle is to have him on retainer. Get to know him early on in your life and learn about how he makes his decisions and just how wise he is. Then when the time comes for you to make consequential decisions, you will have a leg up on the rest of your tribe.
I had a few Dutch Uncles in my life, mostly Scouting leaders that had accomplished a lot in life and had no axe to grind one way or another. They were simple in their conclusions and somewhat complex in their methods of coming to those conclusions. But they were some of the grandest people I knew. And they are much harder to find today. The search is well worth it though. Allow me to play Dutch Uncle for a moment. READ. Read widely. Read often. Read Strategically. Read to learn. Read to Remember. READ.
The best Dutch Uncles are actually more available to us today if you read a lot. We live in a world that grows more complex by the hour. Making sense of all the choices is impossible and chaos seems to rule. If you are still looking for a simpler way of living you may find that it is almost gone. I have been trying to simplify my life and reduce it to its core parts for several years now. I’ve had some success I think, but there is a cost to that as well. All that is for another post I suppose.
Go find you a good Dutch Uncle, the sooner, the better.