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when individuals think or journal in third person rather than in first person—for example, “John is running into challenges with his start-up that seem insurmountable” versus “I am running into challenges with my start-up that seem insurmountable”—they also evaluate themselves and their situations more clearly.
Collectively referred to as “self-distancing,” practices like those outlined above allow us to remove our emotional selves from highly charged situations, paving the way for more thoughtful insight and subsequent decision-making.
Regularly evaluate your passions as if they belong to someone else.
Think grove and moore when they fired themselves and hired themselves as the new ceo of intel during the memory chip crisis
In order to prevent ourselves from succumbing to passion-driven autopilot and to reclaim at least a modicum of say in the matter of how we spend our time, attention, and energy—that is to say, how we spend our lives—we must recalibrate our perspective.
When we lose perspective—when all we can see is our passion—we lose the ability to choose what we want to do with our lives.
Works that move us help reshape our perspective.
Feeling awe forces us, even if only for a brief moment, to zoom out of our own lives and passions and realize that there are things beyond them.
we must deliberately and actively seek it out.
Writing some two thousand years ago, the Stoic philosopher Seneca advised that people “place before [their] mind’s eye the vast spread of time’s abyss, and consider the universe; and then contrast our so called life with infinity.”
We should somewhat regularly reflect on mortality instead.
Keeping death at the forefront of your mind is one of the best ways to ensure you live the life you want to live.
Buddhist practice of the Five Remembrances is a practical way to gain the perspective that death affords.
You are of the nature to grow old. You are of the nature to have ill health. You are of the nature to die. All that is dear to you is of the nature to change. Your actions are your only true belongings; they are the ground upon which you stand.
consciously choosing how you spend your time and energy, that you never lose sight of the fact that time is both finite and the most precious resource there is.
On the Shortness of Life Life Is Long If You Know How to Use It. “What will be the outcome? You have been preoccupied while life hastens on. Meanwhile death will arrive, and you have no choice in making yourself available for that.”
It’s important to remember that there is no such thing as a “right” choice, and that the choices you make may change over time.*5
Pretend a friend is in the same situation you are and then give advice to him or her about what to do.
Become a student of mortality:
Becoming more self-aware is so important because it affords you the ability to evaluate the tradeoffs inherent to living a passionate life, and allows you to choose how to channel your passion.
How can we lose our passion without losing our self?
We must deal with not only losing a large part of our identity, of what makes us who we are, but also losing something into which we could channel our intense drive—which,
Some people are able to move forward in a more hopeful manner.
they are not consumed by missing and longing for their passion.
What people like Lukezic who move forward from their passions in a productive manner have in common is unyielding ownership and authorship of their stories.
We literally cannot do or feel anything without creating an accompanying narrative. One of the defining features of the human species is that we are programmed to construct stories to make meaning of our lives.
we are just now beginning to learn that the stories we tell ourselves don’t just describe our actions and feelings after the fact, but also influence our actions and feelings prior to life events and as they are unfolding.
In other words, when their story changes, they change with it.
Importance of crafting and editing your internal narrative
“there is something deeply built into us that needs story itself…we cannot become really true human beings for ourselves without story.”
it is imperative that you take control of your story. You must tell yourself a story about yourself that goes beyond seeing your passion as the sole source of your fulfillment and identity.
You should recognize and accept how your passion changed you and then constructively integrate those insights into a forever unfolding story,
you should focus on the positives: what you gained from your passion; the underlying characteristics that fueled it and that can now be directed elsewhere;
When you lose a passion, you should feel pain and grief. What we are encouraging, however, is consciously choosing to encode in your memory, via story, the positive aspects of your passion that you can take with you and build upon in the future.
In a sense, you don’t move on from a passion. You move forward from one.
it is far more effective for individuals to create their own unique, forward-looking stories.
Take the time to look inward.
“Trapeze artists are so amazing in so many ways,” Wambach’s friend says, “because they are grounded to one rung for a long time, and in order to get to the other rung they have to let go. What makes them so brilliant and beautiful and courageous and strong is that they execute flips in the middle. The middle is their magic. If you’re brave enough to let go of that first rung, you can create your own magic in the middle.”
he had constructed
his own identity as a failed runner and blown out of proportion the degree to which the outside world actually cared.
for an entirely different population, he’s known only as a coach or, for those reading this book, perhaps only as an author.
In other words, our identities are constructs that result from what we reflect on others and what others reflect on us.
The story we tell ourselves about ourselves is who we become, and it’s important to realize that until the day we die, this story is forever unfolding, constantly changing along with the ebb and flow of our lives.
the story you tell yourself about yourself, is critical to moving forward from a passion.
build upon the lessons learned and experiences gained from your past in whatever it is you do next.
create some time and space to reflect upon your passion and the impact it had on your life.
The only thing that shapes your identity more than the pursuit of your passions is your internal narrative: the story you tell yourself about yourself.
This is empowering: If you can take control
of and write your story, you can take control of and write your life.
While it’s unhealthy for it to remain your entire identity, it’s equally unhealthy to deny how it might have shaped you.
An equal challenge is bucking current trends that favor instant gratification and instead actively adopting the mastery mind-set: maintaining drive from within; focusing on the process over results; not worrying about being the best but worrying about being the best at getting better; embracing acute failure for chronic gains; practicing patience; and paying full attention to our
pursuits.
