On Ego and the Capacity for Trust

It’s 13:45 PM on a casual bright Saturday, the rising and falling sensation of my breath started falling into a smooth peaceful rhythm. I decide I’m saying NO to that job offer. Sitting in my tiny balcony, I feel a soft warm breeze over my face and frizzy hair, and nothing but an absolute relief. A day is considered to be the amount of time it takes the earth to rotate once around its axis. This rotation takes 23 hours, 56 minutes and 4.1 seconds, which is exactly 86,164.1 seconds long and I’ve decided that not a single more day of my life will spent without being true to myself. Period.
The saying “if you’re not careful, you could spend all your time building someone else’s dream”, rang true with how I felt about that career path. I saw the potential future unfold; no matter how glamorous and well-off my professional achievements would be, there would always be no sense of purpose nor meaning in what I’d be doing unless I act now.
As the reality of my upcoming well-packed but dark surprise began to sink in. I could no longer picture myself doing a job that I don’t enjoy. I knew I’d feel trapped, disengaged, uninterested and distant from myself; everything about that place simply felt dull and banal. I breathe out, and feel deeply relieved. Goodbye job offer, there must be some other really interesting stuff I could do on this planet called earth that are way more fulfilling than you. I‘m still not entirely sure what they may be, but I’ll figure that out. Meanwhile, I allow myself the uncomfortable luxury of changing my mind.
They say the richest place on earth is the graveyard. Full of ideas, dreams, aspirations and loads of things we leave untold, undone. The idea of an average life defined as a life of regularity, mediocre accomplishments, usually very little or barely-enough money to survive was my nightmare. I’ve never been afraid of death, health problems, accidents or loss; my worst fear was to live a life of nothingness; sameness without excitement, discovery or challenges.
And so I pushed my self harder and went on, doing everything I thought would bring me the ultimate opposite of this life. For so long, I was able to pull it together and lead what I call an OK life; show an OK smile, an OK interest in my field, people and things, an OK face in front of my clients, colleagues and family, but never an OK human in front of my mirror. I knew deep down that the way I’ve been living wasn’t my call. There was this massive emptiness that nothing could ever fill; it turns out that it’s only after many years of a desperate quest to know, control and be certain that I understood I can’t really know anything for sure, the bravest thing to do seemed to be embracing that fact.
A lots of questions come to mind, I turned to philosophy which reminded me of the two good old Stoic virtues: courage and justice. Yes, it requires courage to be who you really are, and justice to be honest with yourself and not lock your spirit into another predicted failure. I remembered that he discovery of ignorance has probably been one of the most important discoveries in human history. Modern science is based on the Latin injunction ignoramus — ‘we do not know’ fundamentally shifted human progress and advanced how we live, think and create. Perhaps living life assuming we don’t know all the answers, and accepting that no concept, idea or theory is beyond challenge are a good place to actually know ourselves, and start from there onward.
As kids, we learn to look for happiness outside: in the eyes of others, their acknowledgement and approval, their boxes and definitions, their notions of accomplishment and pride, only to discover that in the end, the most important opinion in life is our very own opinion about who we really are, and what we want to do. Some moments of truth can mark our growth journey as curious and complex spirits, and it was only when I accepted my natural vulnerability in the face of uncertainties, and decided to let go of my urge to control the outcomes of life’s formulas that I heard my voice, a beautiful loud one.
I’ve always believed that the most amazing ability humans have is our ability to think and create. The fusion between business and creation fascinated me and deep inside, all I wanted was to think and create, analyse and understand, develop insight and add value. Tomorrow, I join a unique team of business artists united by a common goal — helping clients create, brand and scale business value. Through this, I’ll be learning more and more about myself, customers, life and business. It will take a lot of work to do this, but it’s only me that will transform my ignorance, fragility, inexperience, fear, initiative, kindness and curiosity into an DIY arrow-shaped kite that carries me somewhere new.
