“First tell yourself what kind of person you want to be, then do what you have to do. For in nearly every pursuit we see this to be the case. Those in athletic pursuits first choose the sport they want, and then do that work.”
Epictetus, via MoveMe Quotes
Telling yourself what kind of person you want to be isn’t the same as thinking to yourself what kind of person you want to be. Telling yourself is definitive—it represents a decision made. Thinking to yourself is undecided—it represents an ongoing debate. And how can you become someone you aren’t sure you want to be?
Before you can become the person you want to become, you have to decide who, exactly, that is. This is why telling yourself comes first. Most people, I suspect, keep a rough idea somewhere in their mind and roughly do what they think they have to do. But, their actions aren’t precisely pointed and are, as a result, ambiguous.
In athletic pursuits, picking comes pre-packaged with the correlated work—there’s no ambiguity. Pick basketball and your work will be dribbling, shooting, and passing. Pick baseball and your work will be catching, throwing, and hitting. Pick volleyball and your work will be serving, bumping, and spiking. And so forth.
In character development, however, we need to draw out our own work after we pick who we want to be—it’s unclear and can be confusing. If we pick kind, for example, we need to decide to whom, in what ways, how often, what we’ll do even if we don’t want to be kind, and so forth. It certainly isn’t as simple as dribbling, throwing, and spiking.
But, here’s the thing: it can be. To whom? Everybody. In what ways? Smiling, saying “Hi” first, complimenting, contributing, and listening. How often? In each moment. And if I don’t want to be kind? Create a boundary, remind yourself of your “why,” and spend some time improving your state. And lo and behold, you’ll have your work drawn out for you.
It’s only simple after it’s drawn out—not before. Before we decide who we want to become, we’re essentially moving our pencil across a blank piece of paper arbitrarily. Drawing happens, but without an outcome that we actually desire—because we haven’t identified what that outcome is! Once we decide, suddenly, our hand guides our pencil in an entirely different way. And what was once random and confusing, becomes pointed and clear.