The late golf legend, Arnold Palmer, suggested the most important distance in golf is the six inches between a golfer’s ears. The mind matters when seeking to master a complex skill like golf. So, too, it is with so many aspects of our lives. Before Arnold Palmer, William James, credited as being the “father” of modern psychology gave what may be the shortest speech ever given. In an address to the American Psychological Association and as its President in 1904, James offered a single sentence speech, “People by and large become what they think of themselves.” Well before William James, Marcus Aurelius wrote to himself in Meditations, “The whole universe is change and life itself is but what you deem it.”
Do you believe that you have choices in life? Choices as to who and what you become? Or are you just a product of your past? A product of your environment? A product of your culture? A product of your ancestors? Yes, all of these are influences, but you can choose to surpass them, embrace them, or something else. Our mind’s make meaning, and we live in accordance with the meaning we make. As the writer Joseph Campbell put it, “The meaning of life is whatever you ascribe to it.” We are the authors of our own lives. We get to decide what something means. We should do so in such a way that we make the experience meaningful and helpful. In an earlier article we suggested telling better stories. “Fundamental to the meaning-making process is developing stories. We understand the meaning of our experiences through stories. We understand our identity through stories.” Writes Benjamin Hardy in Personality Isn’t Permanent. Peter Bregman echoes Hardy writing in Four Seconds, “We live by stories. We tell them, repeat them, listen to them carefully, and act in accordance with them. We can change our stories and be changed by them.”
You have more power than you may think. This is the most productive perspective to pursue. It’s true, your life is up to you. Jim Murphy in Inner Excellence writes, “Everyone has a story. You’re the author and narrator of your story; you choose which moments of life have meaning and how meaningful they are. Every moment provides you with an opportunity to decide in which direction your story will head.” Our lives are structured upon the stories we tell. “Stories are the invisible undercurrent that promotes success in a shocking number of the most important areas of life,” writes Eric Barker in Barking Up the Wrong Tree. Regardless of circumstances you have a choice. You can decide how to define your life. You can define your reactions and responses to the circumstances in which you find yourself. Does it serve? Does it help? Use these questions to guide your interpretation of events. If you want better outcomes, tell yourself better stories.
Anthony de Mello captured the power of beliefs in a parable he offered in Song of the Bird. In the parable de Mello writes of a found eagle egg that was placed in the nest of a farm hen. The egg hatches and the eaglet is born and raised amongst and as a chicken. He learns to live and behave like a chicken. He digs around in dirt for scraps and barely leaves the ground. He lives like this for years. As an aged bird, our flightless Eagle sees a majestic bird soaring gracefully in the sky. In awe of what it saw the old bird asks, “What’s that?” De Mello writes, “That’s the eagle, the king of the birds … He belongs to the sky. We belong to the earth—we’re chickens. … So the eagle lived and died a chicken, for that’s what he thought he was.” Our thoughts as to our abilities and identity serve as the ceilings or fences limiting us or as springboards to our expansion.
In The Almanac of Naval Ravikant, investment guru and internet thinker, Naval Ravikant offers, “Life is going to play out the way life’s going to play out. There will be some good and some bad. Most of it is actually just up to your interpretation. You’re born, you have a set of sensory experiences, and then you die. How you choose to interpret those sensory experiences is up to you, and different people interpret them in different ways.” We choose our views. We make meaning out of our experiences. In August 2021, James Clear posted a tweet suggesting, Different meanings can be assigned to the same events. Look for evidence of how the world is encouraging you, and you will find it. Look for evidence of how the world is burdening you, and you will find it. Choose an explanation that empowers you.” We get what we expect, seek a perspective that will help instead of hindering your efforts.
When we’re applying for a job, we prepare a resume. Our resumes are curated to present the best of us and eliminate the rest of us. We’re consciously trying to paint a positive picture of who we are and what we’ve done. A similar objective would be at the heart of what motivates us to post things on various social media platforms. We’re trying to present what is going well. In a post from Tim Urban’s Wait but Why blog, he writes, “Each of us has a personal storyline—a story we believe about ourselves that tends to drive our behavior and become a self-fulfilling prophecy. Scientists and historians talk about the same kind of stories, but in a collective sense. In his book Sapiens, Yuval Noah Harari writes about the “imagined realities” we all believe—not only mysteries like the supernatural or the meaning of life, but seemingly concrete things like a company or a nation or the value of money.
Like Arnold Palmer, the financial author Dave Ramsey writes in Baby Steps Millionaires, “Sometimes the biggest obstacle we can face is between our own two ears—our state of mind. Poor is a state of mind. Belief is also a state of mind.” Tom Asacker, in The Business of Belief notes, “Stories are powerful. Because we all become the stories we tell ourselves.” Therefore, according to Ryan Holiday writing in Courage is Calling, “We have to tell ourselves a story—about history, about our lives—that emphasizes agency, progress, the chance of redemption.” In Before Happiness, Shawn Achor echoes Holiday writing, “So if your reality is a choice, the important next question is: Have you chosen the one that will help you harness your multiple intelligences to their fullest potential and lead to greater success and growth? And if not, how can you select a more valuable one?”
We’re advocating for adopting a perspective that assists as being more productive than one that’s absolutely accurate. Seek your MVP or Most Valuable Perspective. Your MVP could include three aspects or 3 A’s. Is it accurate? By accurate, it doesn’t have to be 100% truthful. Is it feasible or probable? Could your interpretation be plausible? This is what you’re seeking to access as accuracy. Second, is it actionable? Does your interpretation provide a basis from which to act? Finally, does it assist? Does your interpretation provide motivation to act? Does it allow you to take constructive steps forward? If yes, to accuracy, actionable, and assist, then it’s a useful perspective or interpretation of events. Craft your MVP to tell yourself a better story, giving yourself a chance. Own your responsibility for creating constructive narratives.
Evolutionary biologist Bret Weinstein talks about what he calls a “metaphorical truth”—a belief that’s not true, but one that enhances its believers’ survival chances. One example he gives is the belief that porcupines can shoot their quills. In fact, they cannot—but those who believe they can are more likely to stay far away from porcupines and therefore less likely to end up hurt by one.2Human history is a long progression of human behavior, and human behavior is largely driven by human beliefs. And as Harari, Weinstein, and others point out, what has mattered most in our past is not whether our beliefs were true but whether they drove the right behavior.” In a New York Times article advocating for the advantages of superstitions or “magical thinking” stemming from the sense of control or meaning these beliefs provide. Do your beliefs build you up? Does your interpretation of an experience inspire further action?
In The Contrarian’s Guide to Leadership, Steven Sample and Warren Bennis contrast two historical views of leadership. Leo Tolstoy believed that events and circumstance created leaders whereas Thomas Carlyle believed that leaders hone history. The latter is the empowering perspective advocating for individual agency. Sample and Bennis write, “The exquisite part of all this is that a given leader at a given moment never knows for sure whether he is acting as an architect of history or simply as history’s pawn. If he’s like most human beings he wants desperately to believe the former. And contrarian wisdom would argue that that is the morally preferable approach: A leader should always act as though he himself, not history or fate, is responsible for his actions.” Accuracy isn’t clear here. We can’t know for certain whether it is events that develop leaders or leaders that determine events. However, the perspective that will inspire initiative is the one that believes leaders make a difference. That’s the type of belief we’re trying to promote.
Consider that placebos are a form of mental medicine. The pill provides no pharmacological benefit. It is simple sugar. Yet, benefits are “felt” by some takers. The act of taking “medicine” helps us to feel better. Our beliefs can serve as personal placebos. It’s useful to see your mind as malleable or as James Clear puts it, “Your mind is a suggestion engine. Every thought you have is a suggestion, not an order.” This tells us two things. First, we don’t have to accept what our mind puts forth. We can pause to ponder our mind’s output and opt to discard its offerings that don’t serve. Second, we can seek to shape the suggestions our mind provides. Clear offers, “Your thoughts are not orders. Merely suggestions. You have the power to choose which option to follow.” At the end of the day, we’re striving to develop and pursue personal principles. As James Loehr puts it in Leading With Character, “Core beliefs are those that we have actively and intentionally thought about and embraced. They become fundamental to how we operate and behave in the world.” Proactively construct core beliefs that build.
Consider the glory of stories. Stories are what make us who we are. They become the basis of our values. They are reflections of what is most important to us. They are how we learn. They are how we share things with others. In the Upside of Stress Kelly McGonigal points out, “We all tell stories, and the stories we choose to tell can create a culture of resilience.” We’ll end with some questions posted by McGonigal, “How do you tell the stories of your family? Your community? Your company? Your own life?”
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