Making choices in life and career

To start, let me ask you a few questions-

1. Are you happy with your life and career, so far?
2. Are you anxious about your life and career, going forward?
3. What do you want from your life and career, going forward?

Note that you’ll also have to answer a “Why?” to all three questions! Let’s continue once you’re done.

My theory is that your answer to the first two questions is of little or no importance to your life and career ahead. Whereas, your answer and mindset for question #3 will make all the difference. While it might comfort one to ruminate on how things would have turned out differently or how one could have behaved differently in the past, it cannot be changed now. The only real problem to solve is to identify an aim and figure out how to move towards it, from my current position. If one really understands this, and realizes that most of our mind chatter and confusion related to life and career are focussed on questions 1 & 2, instead of 3, we can pay attention and start making progress by diverting our energies instead, to question 3.

When we start thinking about what should we aim at, we are presented with numerous choices, and narratives of pleasure and fear associated with each path. Everyday we make a choice which adds up to become the story of our journey. Let’s now explore the nature of these choices.

Let’s say we categorise the choices into two groups based on path they set us on to. First outcome involves going through a transformation phase to reinvent oneself while the second outcome takes us deeper into confusion till we find ourselves lost for life. In scenario 1, we’re going to embark on the journey to the promised land. In scenario 2, we’ll keep making things worse and our suffering will intensify.

This forced categorisation raises some questions:

1. Can all available choices be grouped into these two categories?
2. Even after knowing the category of outcomes, how do I know which choice will lead to what outcome?

Let’s start with the first question. What do I mean when I say that the outcomes are of two types — one of a journey to promised land and the other to take one deeper into hell. I’ve done this because I believe this reflects the possible states of our mind when we make a journey. I believe this because I’ve observed this in my own mind and I’ve seen the same theme repeating across religion, mythology, and fiction. To explore its truth would be too hard for me to discuss but it feels relatable when Harry Potter & Voldemort or Luke Skywalker & Darth Vader take two completely different journeys, starting from almost identical places. It connects deeply that I could clearly see one journey as downfall and other as salvation while the characters taking opposite journeys were very similar in their childhood and in their abilities.

Now comes the second question. How do I know which choice is sending me to the ‘heavenly’ state of mind? To be direct, my answer is to make that choice which requires faith in your inner strength and not the one which you choose as a result of accepting your weakness. While this may sound vague, what I mean is that choices that we make thinking that we’re weak tend to weaken us further. Whereas choices where we commit with a deep sense of belief even in the face of fear, tend to make us grow into a stronger person.

Again, more questions are popping up in my mind:

1. Why do we make choices thinking we are weak
2. How do I find out choices where I can commit with a deep sense of belief

I think one reason we succumb to weak choices is that we don’t want to take complete ownership of our thoughts and actions, as if someone else should know better about what I should do with my life. We find it much easier to blame external circumstances and other people, in the way it is easier to blame your boss that you’re not growing in your role. Seth Godin has beautifully put it in his blog post titled The world’s worst boss.

“The only person that’ll be your boss is you, for life. Even if you’re not self-employed, your boss is you. You manage your career, your day, your responses. You manage how you sell your services and your education and the way you talk to yourself.” ~ Seth Godin

A good starting point, in my opinion, is to realise that you’re completely responsible for your own actions and choices and that you’ll take 100% ownership even if things go completely wrong.

Another way in which we make ourselves weak is by having a negative outlook of the world. Where we think that no-one is there to help us, everyone is in our way, and it is getting difficult to survive as things are becoming worse. This pessimistic view of the world makes us go for weaker choices in attaching ourselves to institutions and ideas that give us some identity and offer to protect it.

Now, coming on to the final part of the puzzle. How do I find out choices where I can commit with a deep sense of belief? I’ll actually have to leave this unsolved. If it’s really a deep sense of belief, I’ll simply have to let it act out through me.

Cheers!