Life: REALITY, RISK, REWARD
Life: REALITY, RISK, REWARD
Sometimes I say things like “It may not be healthy to exist with human self-awareness.” Provocative? Perhaps. Do I truly believe it? Absolutely. It would be much easier and less stressful to have not existed. Had things been different I could have been a different person with different genetic material. But I also wouldn’t experience life as the same subjective *me* if that were true. It’s strange to contemplate.
We humans come online, and then we have to figure out what our lives are about. It’s not an easy thing. It’s physically, mentally, and spiritually demanding, even damaging at times, and involves playing the best cards we've been dealt. So, it may not be healthy to exist with human self-awareness. But, paradoxically, it's our responsibility to work on this even though we didn’t ask for it, and to do it as a collective. To echo a common sentiment, you get out of life what you put into it. And you can’t ever stop putting into it if you want a worthwhile result.
Here's another way I think about it: life is not only full of risk, it IS risk. And that’s the reality. But it can be deeply rewarding. It’s weird - always warps my mind to systematically think about and describe. Let me develop that a little bit…
We exist. Didn’t ask to, but we do. Here you are. Here I am. Here we are.
All existence occurs in the present moment. Can’t happen any other time. The past is an analyzable RECORD of (y)our actions in the present. (Y)our future is a malleable RESULT of (y)our actions in the present moment. We examine the past and use the lessons learned to determine how to best shape the future through our actions in the present. That process is called “history”. We keep generating more history. That’s mind blowing. How does that keep happening? What is the raw material that goes into the ongoing production of history? Will we ever run out of history to make?
I call the present moment the Realm of Action. Actions happen from something akin to what we call “will” - the agency that allows us to make choices (or at least seems to, depending on your interpretation of the debate around the concept of free will - more on that). Plants don’t make choices per se, so I don’t include them in the Realm of Action. Animals make choices, but they’re not aware of the process. We metacognitive humans ARE aware, and that’s the source of our anxiety and regret. I reiterate: it may not be healthy to exist with human self-awareness.
Here’s the key point: beings of action take actions in EVERY moment. We can’t help it. Even if we don’t want to, we must. We can’t stop the flow of time and the existential friction that comes with it. Actions in every moment. Each and every moment. Not negotiable. After a certain amount of time we can look back at our actions and see that they tell a story. Do you ever look at your own story? That’s one very important aspect of self-reflection. If we don’t like the story we have created we are tempted to avoid telling it to others, and ourselves.
That’s the REALITY.
It’s also a RISK. Why? Because every action is an investment. Every action. Every action moves some kind of initiative forward, indicates your interest, builds something, creates something. So what are you investing in? Is it meaningful? Is it building the future, culture, and relationships that you truly want in all spheres of your influence? What future are you shaping based on the lessons in your past? What is your ongoing investment returning?
Get it?
If a life of agency forces action in every moment, and every action is an investment, and every investment is a risk, that means that life itself is a risk. Again, not one that any of us asked for, but that’s the reality just the same.
The REALITY is that we can't help but to take actions in every moment. The RISK is that you will not take actions that ultimately create a story you are happy to tell. The REWARD comes when you awaken this.
How do we navigate this?
When you truly grasp the reality of all this you see just how profound is the question “What will you do next?” It’s really the only question we can ever answer, and it’s one that we can’t ever escape, no matter how hard we try.
So, after reading this, how do you answer that question? What DO you do next? What investment will you make? What risk will you take as long as you must take risks anyway? What strategic framework builds the grammar of your actions and what purpose infuses their meaning? That’s the conversation I am here to have with you, and it makes a major difference.