When Harry met Harry

When Harry met Harry

You probably have a friend like Harry from the last chapter. The one whose life conundrums you have dissected over a thousand bottles of wine. From your side of the table, the changes they should make are so apparent (‘Dump him! Quit! Go blonde!’) Yet all your friend ever does is moan, ‘no, but…’ 

(What you might not have considered, incidentally, is that if your friend reads this, there is a good chance that it would be you she was thinking of right now. It is far easier to offer advice to others than heed it ourselves. He says, writing an entire bloody book on the subject…) 

So if you’re struggling like Harry, then try this eccentric exercise. 

Make a list of all the grumbles and problems you are facing. Before you can move forward, you need to cast light upon what is blocking the way. Feel better for venting all that? Good. 

Now, get in a fresh round of drinks, swap seats with an imaginary mate. Change hats, and now you become the benevolent-but-firm adviser. 

Read out the grumbles list and listen to your good-looking friend complaining about all the obstacles in their way. (Wow, they really do naval gaze and feel sorry for themselves, don’t they?) When your friend eventually pauses for breath, dispense your advice. Tell them the solutions that are clear with the benefit of not being tied up in emotion and baggage. 

The reason this thought experiment has power is because, deep down, we generally know the right course to walk in life. We could work things out ourselves. We know why we should do something. We understand how to do it. We can see what the first step should be. But when you have skin in the game, it is hard to get started and much easier to hide behind excuses and a good old grumble in the pub.

Our heads are really not our best allies! For example,

We know we want to lose a little weight, but still we eat all the delicious crisps.

We know we have a large pile of engaging books piled on our bedside table (what the Japanese call ‘tsundoku’), but we scroll vacuously through our phone instead.

We know we’d like to be fitter, but we turn on our favourite TV show instead of tying up our trainers.

We know how delighted we would be to look back on a life lived adventurously, but instead we…

These are the result of present bias (putting more emphasis on ‘me right now’ than ‘future me’), and it is a pretty universal curse we all suffer from.

This is a simpler version of the wake-up call of writing two obituaries for your life; one that follows your current trajectory and one for the life you wish you dared to live. You might consider scribbling two quick iterations of these on facing pages of a notebook for ease of comparison. 

If, after all these exercises, you are still undecided about which direction you genuinely want to go, then the tiebreaker comes from tossing a coin to decide. 

Heads, you get your head down in the office and hope for promotion every couple of years until you’re 65. Tails, you quit and start building wooden boats. It’s only a game, so there’s nothing to fear. 

Toss the coin and let the universe decide… 

I’ll let you into a secret. This is not about trusting your life to a coin toss. You are not letting the universe decide. When the coin lands you will notice that one outcome leaves you feeling slightly thrilled, the other a little deflated. You now know from deep inside your heart which direction you truly want to go. Whether to honour heads or tails.

OVER TO YOU:
Write on a piece of paper, 

‘I have a choice to do _________ or remain doing ______________'

Now toss a coin and let the universe decide.

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