Truth Corner
I tell the truth about my life in this corner. I tell the truth about who I am & what I experience.
There are lots of resources on how to make decisions out there. There are lots of thinking models and comparison frameworks to make the best possible decision possible for your future.
Now, there are two reasons as to why I think most of them are bullshit.
Most of them comes from the assumption that there is a “best” option in the first place.
I would argue that there is no such thing as the optimal decision. This kind of thinking comes from our illusion of being able to control what happens to us. It is like when you are first introduced to pyhics and newston’s laws. Remember those problems you were asked to solve disregarding the effect of frictional force (eventhough you know in real life they are there) to make sure you can use the easy formula in the beginning.
That is our minds right now, living in the illusion of control, endlessly trying to make our enviroments submit to our will.
So if you are still in the illusion, you spend hours imagining future and forecasting the outcomes of your actions, possible ROI to make sure you make the THE BEST FUCKING decision ever.
But you can’t really know which option was better simply because you will never get to experience what it was like to walk the road not chosen. You simply CAN NOT know.
There isn’t a best choice, even if there is, trust me it will not come from your mind’s ability to forecast. I want you to recall all the horrible things your mind foresee that never happened. How many times your mind misled you on what your boss was about to say, why your boyfriend was distant, why you had to isolate or how the vacation would solve all your problems. You simply can not trust fully a mind that is so hectic.
For some people-like me- the very act of planning the future becomes an escape from real world.
I get a weird kick from imagining future scenerios in which I am successful, eccentric and influencial. It is a very pleasant feeling to imagine all the different people I can become, all the life paths available if only I commit. So I stay in the pleasant feeling, unable to commit.
Even if I commit, it comes from a place of attachment to the future Sinem who is successful, eccentric and influencial thus single failure is enough for me to spiral into not feeling “worthy & enough” and abondon ship.
Recently, I had a huge realization on how much time I spent imagining future Sinems when all the big decisions I made in life came from quick sudden realizations & actions.
I planned and disccussed in my mind for months if I should move to Europe, while I got the job I had from only one day’s of motivation & effort.
I searched for online courses and different education for months and Altmba came to me during a regular day on its own without my effort.
I looked for all the ways I could make work suck less while the shift to my new role (Learning & Development Manager) came from other people’s suggestion as they saw my passion.
I knew I would go to brasil to do the retreat because simply the idea did not let me go and tortured me until I committed.
So none of these decision came from my hour long planning and imagining cycles. They came naturally, or they had a big hold on me until I committed or they came from a spontaneous realization & action.
None of them and I mean none of them are result of my amazing ability to plan a fine-crafted future for myself.
Now I just see the in-efficiency of the time I spent on imagining and re-imagining and evaluating scenerios. That constant attention & effort that could have been easily utilized in this very moment and had more profound impact on my future as a result of it.
So what is your alternative FLUX?
See, I am very good at pointing out problems but not solutions aahah :D But I would say what I am doing right now-since all these are recent realizations.
Everytime I start to think about a potential future version of me, I put her into the water in my mind and watch waves take her out of my sight. I let go of psychologist Sinem, youtuber Sinem, female monk Sinem, HR Lead Sinem, Organizational Consultant Sinem, freelance journalist Sinem, Mindfullness Coach Sinem, writer Sinem, Sinem in a future relationship, Sinem in a future community, Sinem in a future ANYTHING. Basically, I spend a lot of time instead of planning the future, watching waves take away my future.
I ask myself “What do you want to RIGHT NOW?”, “What feels true RIGHT NOW?”.
And I do it :) Or at least I try to. And when I fail, I tell myself:
You did your best, you will do your best tomorrow. You ALWAYS do your best any given day.
So dear reader,
You did your best today, you will do your best tomorrow. It is time to let go of some of the “future” burden from your shoulders.
Little Gems
I read, I listen, I watch everyday. As I heard Rebacca Solnit say “I want better metaphors. I want better stories. I want more openness. I want better questions. All these things give us tools that helps us with amazing possibilities and terrible realities we face”. Here, I share some of the little gems I found in the process.
✍️A quote I am obsessed with:
“Life gives you plenty of time to do whatever you want to do if you stay in the present moment.” — Deepak Chopra
📚A book passage worth reading:
There are possibilities available to your future self that your current self wouldn’t be able to consider. All your mind can pull from is what it’s known, and if you’re trying to build a life outside of that, then you’re going to have to open yourself to the possibility that not only is there a path toward, but that it may very well lead somewhere better than you thought it would.
When You're Ready, This Is How You Heal- Brianna Wiest
🎧A podcast to really listen:
This is the only decision making advice I would listen to.
💡A concept that makes breathing easier (and I am a fan of those):
Be patient to get there faster. Giving things time and space to unfold. Not trying to escape life by moving at warp speed. Not expecting instant results and then quitting when they don’t occur. Realizing that we often do things quickly — not better, but quickly — to gain time. But what is the point if in the time we gain we just do more things quickly? I have yet to meet someone who wants their headstone to read “he rushed.”
📹A video to induce “A-ha” moments:
Any time you voluntarily let up control, in other words cease to cling to yourself, you have an access to power. Because you are wasting energy all the time in self defence. Trying to manage things, trying to force things to conform to your will. Why don’t you stop that? That wasted energy is available.
Therefore, you are one with divine principle, you have the energy.
When you are trying however to act as if you were god, that is to say you you don’t trust anybody, you are the dictator and you need to keep everybody in line, you lose divine energy.
What you are doing is self defense.
The more you give it away the more it comes back.
“You don’t know what you want to do until you are quiet and than it tells you”