It Matters Who Is Telling Your Story
Have you ever wondered how differently your life could be perceived through someone else’s eyes? Stop for a second and marvel at the fact most of life is up to subjective interpretation. Consider these two accounts:
“I am boring. I wake up at the same time every morning. I drink the same brand of coffee, do the same exercise routine, shop at the same supermarket, and take the same road to work. I am a senior accountant at a large firm. Just a tiny cog in an indifferent system. I suck.”
“My dad is amazing. He is so disciplined and consistent. He never fails to get up at 6:00 to prepare coffee and the most delicious family breakfast. His tall and handsome frame make him look like Superman when he puts on his suit for work. I admire how strong he is, especially when he carries four shopping bags from the car to the kitchen in one go. He makes a lot of important decisions at work, leading a team of ten people. He’s my hero.”
Both of these accounts describe the same person, yet they take vastly different perspectives. It can be transformative to renew your sense of self by deliberately adopting a different viewpoint. Who is in charge of your story now? Are you over-relying on a rotten self-image or skewed opinion others hold of you? Take a different vantage point to reinvent yourself without remaking yourself.
Identify who is telling your story and how they are doing it. It matters more than you think.
This piece was inspired by “How to Change Your Mind” (p. 413), where Michael Pollan writes about a type of naturally occurring mystical experience called savikalpa samadhi, in the context of astronauts seeing the “Pale Blue Dot” for the first time. This is also known as the overview effect.
“[…] the ego vanishes when confronted with the immensity of the universe during the course of a meditation on an object—in this case, planet Earth.”