Description Prologue | We Had Seen the Future Part 1. Déjà Vu: The Future Pulled Forward Different Stories About Dogs When the Obvious Becomes Not So Obvious Kimchi Stew, Age-Old Problems in Disguise The Future We Already Saw Constant of Change 1: A Fragmenting Society Constant of Change 2: A Longer-Living Humanity Constant of Change 3: The Spread of Contactless Living Don't Just Do It Part 2. Change: The Liquefaction of Values "Do We Really Need to Go to the Office?" Questioning Old Practices The Ground of Our Thinking Shakes Time to Rethink from Scratch Shared Experience, Greater Possibility for Imagination Question Your Own Values Part 3. Adaptation: Updating Our Thinking Adaptation Under Pressure Clear Data, Clear Consensus What We Gained from Crisis: Openness to Innovation What We Gained from Crisis: Rational Thinking When the Whole Process Is Revealed It's Now Hard to Deceive Anyone A Transparent Society: How Well Have You Adapted? Another Moonshot Transparency, and More Transparency Part 4. Growth: Dreaming of Taking Charge of Your Life Cultivating the Heart Over Achievement But Then Reality Check The Worst Kind of Free Rider Wanting Growth, Yet Trapped in a Box If You're an Ordinary Newlywed Couple in Pangyo Awakening of the Self: How to Take Charge of Your Life Everything About You Is a Message Authenticity: Are You the Real Deal? How to Become Real Not Announcing, But Being Discovered Selling the Sum Total of Your Struggles Ten Years from Now Strategy: Rational Thinking, Genuine Professionalism, Mature Coexistence Epilogue | Ten Years Later, May We Feel Embarrassed Again Inside the Book Dare I say it, we had already seen the future. We just didn't know it was the future at the time. We thought it was merely a small, fleeting change, or perhaps an unfamiliar trend. But as we witnessed change after change accumulate and influence one another, building into something larger, we came to understand that the world is connected like a living organism, with a mechanism by which the direction of change reaches consensus. In other words, what we saw back then was the future arriving early. As this experience repeated itself, a kind of mantra took shape in my mind: "What is meant to happen, happens." This isn't because of fatalism or a predetermined outcome. It's because we prefer it, because we want it. At the point where the desires of each member of our inherently social species converge, that is exactly where what is meant to happen, happens. The larger desire generated as individual desires collide, meet, and drive one another forward — that is our future. — Prologue It's been less than 20 years since dogs went from being pets, objects of affection, to companion animals with whom we share our lives. Come to think of it, the very emergence of the word "companion" is evidence that consideration for the other began. Recently, people have even started referring to themselves as "companion persons." Has humanity, once reigning as the master of all things, begun to set aside that status and see itself as a being that coexists with all of nature? Humans fight even among their own kind, yet the concept of "companion" seems to carry a broader, longer-term view that expands the once-narrow notion of community. This may also mean we've grown more humble. We can even precisely measure when this meaningful shift began. Use of the term "companion animal" nearly doubled between 2016 and 2018, while "companion plant" increased almost fourfold. Even without big data, we can infer the rise of companion animals from over a decade of declining marriage and birth rates. Fundamentally, humans are lonely beings who need someone, or something, to be with. — Chapter 1, "Déjà Vu: The Future Pulled Forward" Working hard blindly isn't necessarily the answer. If you work hard in the wrong direction, you'll simply burn out. According to one newspaper article, telemarketing was considered a promising career in 2002. But by 2015, it was named the top job likely to disappear. Someone in 2002 may have staked their whole life on a career that would become a declining industry in less than 15 years. You need to think about direction first, then commit yourself fully. It's not difficult — just think first. Because what is meant to happen will happen. Don't just do it and think later — think first, then do.