Finding Your Own North Star: Claiming the Life You Were Meant to Live

by Martha N. Beck

As any good Buddhist will tell you, the only way to find permanent joy is by embracing the fact that nothing is permanent.

The essential self contains several sophisticated compasses that continuously point toward your North Star. The social self is the set of skills that actually carry you toward this goal.

To find your North Star, you must teach your social self to relax and back off.

The best way to make your fortune in today’s economic climate is to master the spontaneous, creative “not-doing” of the essential

self.

Teaching your social self to pay attention when your essential self says “no” is the most basic way to reconnect the two sides of your personality.

When your essential self knows you’re headed away from your North Star, it can make itself very heavy.

The important thing is to tell yourself a life story in which you, the hero, are primarily a problem solver rather than a helpless victim.

Another reason you may find yourself reluctant to back away from interacting with your Everybody representatives is that you urgently believe that these people must be persuaded to see things your way, condone your true path, and grant you their heartfelt blessing. While their hard-heartedness is their problem, your inability to detach is yours. It’s based on a childlike desperation to control the uncontrollable. Learn to recognize this pattern when it emerges. Then gently remind your social self, over and over, that there is no way you can coerce anyone to change his or her opinions and beliefs.

Anytime you think you don’t know what you want, it’s because your social self has decided you shouldn’t want it.