We don’t start acting like our highest self once we become them… at some distant and arbitrary point in the future.
We visualize, channel, and call upon the thoughts/ beliefs/ actions of our highest self NOW and slowly, slowly…
After having acted like them for long enough… embody and become them in a not-so-distant and deliberate point in the upcoming present.
Try removing yourself from ALL current sources of outside influence (e.g. media, friends, parents) and write.
Write like hell.
Write everything that’s circling in your mind.
Then, re-read what you wrote and write whatever else comes to mind from those writings.
Then, just sit in the quiet for a while… pay attention to your wandering mind.
See if anything else comes up.
If it does, write all of whatever that is out, too.
Continue this process until the sediments of your mind have settled—maybe not completely… but, enough. Enough to have gained some clarity over the situation.
Then, look with fresh eyes at what was causing you to not feel like yourself.
And act accordingly.
Lesson: it’s hard to know what’s affecting you when you’re in the middle of the affecting environment. You need to remove yourself and purge your mind so that you can look back at the environment(s) you were in with fresh eyes.
P.s. I also published: Feeling Lost? Phil Stutz Says Don’t Try To Figure It Out. Here’s Why:
Nobody clapping for you is an excellent time to quietly get back to doing purposeful work.
Standing ovations are obviously the goal. But, never forget that with them comes a wave of distraction/ obligation/ requests that can easily prevent you from being able to do the purposeful work that got you on that stage in the first place.
And doing more purposeful work is always the ultimate win—even more so than the standing ovation(s).
P.s. I also published: 52 of the Most Impactful Lessons I Learned in 2022. I hope you’re making time to do some quality reflecting too—before we cross the threshold into 2023.
The first five were from Stephen Parato:
Which inspired these five from me:
I’d love to keep the list going… either journal or reply… what are some “real” measures of success to you?
Why waste even a minute of your life’s most precious resource looking at shit that makes you feel terrible about yourself?
What you have right here—at the tips of your fingers—is the very means to your most realized self. What you also have is the very means to your most unrealized, latent self.
It is no small thing to realize: thumb taps and mouse clicks drastically change lives.
P.s. I also published 48 Brianna Wiest Quotes from The Mountain Is You on Self-Sabotage and Healing
“Sleep is temporary. Grades are forever.”
Was said to me in a joking way the other day. Jokes aside, this is a truth that far too many people believe to their core. And let me be the first to say that this couldn’t be more backwards.
It’s the sleep that leads to a better forever and this twisted emphasis on grades that couldn’t be more temporary.
P.s. In case you missed it, you can read the best of what I posted to MoveMe Quotes last week, here.
Before you start mega-phoning your New Year’s resolutions and lining up at your January 1st start line to sprint towards a new reality… it’s imperative you take a look back.
How did things play out for you from 2022? 2021? 2020? Etc. Can you dig up a record (or three) of what your goals and action strategies were from then? How they played out? What you were experiencing as you went?
This exploration will give you trends and insight that could be essential to playing out 2023 differently… more strategically… better.
Side note: if you don’t have a record like this, and you think having a record like this now would be valuable, maybe it’s something you could start this year?
Main train: One of the first quotes that I remember feeling deeply impacted by, as cliché as it sounds to me now, was: “If you keep on doing what you’ve been doing, you’ll keep on getting what you’ve been getting.”
History may not repeat itself exactly—but, have no doubt: history rhymes.
And 2023 will rhyme with all of your other years and resolution attempts.
So, don’t forget to look back before you floor it forward. You might learn something about yourself that’ll impact your pace, direction, ambition, accountability, strategy, etc. that you hadn’t quite internalized before.
And maybe it’s that one realization that’ll actually make 2023 your best year ever.