You don't know what your future self wants
- Sep 22, 2023
- 3 min read
It's actually a TED talk.
Last night, I was listening to a TED talk - You don't know What Your Future Self Wants by Shankar Vendantam (check it out here) and it was such an eye-opener. For a long time, we've been asked to set goals and keep working on them, but has it ever happened to you that after a point that goal seems meaningless to you? More or less it doesn't make sense to you. It must have happened, very certainly. And that is okay.
In the talk, the speaker says something similar to this - "the current you and future you are two different people and we assume that they'll be the same more or less, or even better and we make that judgment based on our current situations which is a little absurd" and isn't it true? The point I am trying to make is that you'll never know for sure what are you going to become. He explained the concept of the Ship of Theseus which states - whether an object which has had all of its original components replaced remains the same object. (Wikipedia)
Now, how is a ship even related to human identity here? We, humans, are an ever-evolving species building slowly with the information that we consume every day. Therefore, if a part of us gets replaced every year then are we even the same? If you think about it, those parts of us that change replace the old ones and are generally better so it's a paradox in itself that we'll ever be the same.
A month back, I deleted my 3-year, 5-year, and 10-year plans which obviously might sound like an impulsive but it made a lot of sense after doing it. It brought me to a realization that I should choose what is important and let go of what is not. Moreover, there is no written guarantee that it'll happen in the expected time frame because there is always the factor of uncertainty that will exist. There was a quote I came across a few years back that said,
People underestimate what they can do in a day and overestimate what they can do in a year.
and to date, it holds true. We set these unrealistic goals because we want to achieve everything immediately but that is the thing about life - you will only get what you are meant to have and can handle.
Oh and please don't misunderstand me here. I am not saying that you shouldn't have goals. Having them in fact, not having is just pure stupidity. All I am saying is that give yourself the freedom to achieve them in their respective time frame. Buying a house in 3 years is not possible for me at the moment but maybe 10 years later, it might be. The point is just because you cannot do it right now doesn't mean you can never do it. You can, and it'll need time and you must give it time. Yeah, you can of course set a time frame but don't be rigid. By all means you can always aim to achieve the goal in the time frame but are not bound to necessarily accomplish it. Which is what people fail to understand. And let's not forget the fact that everything in this world comes with a price and it'll cost you something and most of the time it's not even monetary. You might get a high-paying job, but it'll cost you your mental health; You might get a low-paying job, but it'll cost you mediocrity; You might get a fancy job, but it'll cost you your personal life; and so on. These are just examples. The point is life will certainly amaze you if you allow it to.
You and I may not know what our future self wants but we can certainly set ourselves up to become that future self. If you don't make a choice for yourself, it will be made for you. If you don't choose for yourself, something will be chosen for you and as someone who has firsthand experience in this, my suggestion would be - choose something that you won't regret choosing in the future (Gotta save this story for some other day).
Moral of the story: have an open mind and practice freedom.
- Written by Vanshika Patil.
Comments