Surrender | A Vision of the Future Instead of a Memory of the Past

We can surrender to our past or to our future. It’s your choice.

By default, we are surrendering to our past on a regular basis. Our present day consists of reworking, reliving, and repeating our past. In a way, it’s all we know. We know the past because it’s happened, we experienced it already. It’s a known entity.

Better the devil you know than the angel you don’t. Or maybe, “Better the past you know than the future you don’t.”

In order to arrive in our future, at least the future we’re striving towards, we need to consciously live as if the future were already here. As if what will happen tomorrow happens today.

If tomorrow were here, if tomorrow were today yet the tomorrow of our dreams, how would you act? In terms of surrendering, if your dream life or future personality were here today and you were today the person of tomorrow you have been working towards, wouldn’t it relieve some of the stress and effort and “trying” you’re currently exuding and give you extra energy to make it truly happen?

In other words, if we can manage, even slightly, even if it’s just a smidgen of a sampling of a piece of our future selves, to act as if our future self is already here, we have crossed a line already towards becoming that person.

Yes, it’s a bit of “fake it ’till you make it” but those are words describing the same thing. What if we lived our future self until we became our future self? At what point does “acting” as if it already happened merge with actually already happening?

You know when you’re stick or hungover or have a pain or ache? All you can think about it when it will be over. If you’re smart, you’ll occupy yourself with other activities than moping around moaning and groaning about how terrible the present moment is and you’ll “do something else.” Ideally, that something else is something you would do if you weren’t hungover, sick, or in pain.

At some point, something shifts. Often, it comes along without really noticing. There usually isn’t a lot of fanfare and fireworks but it’s often more of a case of, “Oh, hey, wait a minute. I feel better. When did this happen?”

Ideally, we’ll go ahead with our future selves (not hungover, etc.), act as if that was in the past and we’ll move into our future.

Let’s pick on a random stranger and choose something that hurts. Volunteers? OK, fine, me.

I’d like to be on more podcasts as a guest. “Gee, Bradley, how does that happen? Are they going to call you out of the blue or are you going to need to systematically research shows and then contact them directly?”

Yes, uh, the latter.

So what’s happening?

Uh, nothing. I suppose I’m waiting around.

“Gee, Bradley, why don’t read a few paragraphs back in YOUR OWN BOOK and take actions based on who you want to be in the future (someone who wants to be a guest on more podcast) and take action by contacting them (oh, I don’t know, aim low, contact one per week) and keep records and make it happen.

Can you see how this “future” action will turn me into my future self? I want to be on more podcasts. I’m doing, ahem, nothing about it currently (and haven’t done much about it in the past) yet I even know what to do! I have the steps, I even have a list of podcasts yet I don’t contact them. #notrocketscience

The memory of the past is me not being a guest on podcasts. That memory I’m continuing to achieve (but doing nothing) so that my present is also of me not being on podcasts.

The vision of the future is being a guest on podcasts. In order to achieve that, I need to act like someone who is on podcasts. That person regularly reaches out to podcast hosts requesting a spot on their show.

Sound easy? Sound simple?

That’s because it is.

Does it take a bit of effort? Yep.

Does it take a mindset shift? Oh yeah.

• Possible: live your present just like the past
• Impossible: skip the present and make the past the future
• Repossible: act now as if tomorrow is today

Photo by Wyron A on Unsplash