There Are Two Of You
In “The Power of Now,” Eckhart Tolle writes about there being two of you.
There is the you in the sense of the “self.” The tangible you, the person that is and the person that takes up space in the physical world.
But there’s another you, the one that can observe yourself. The one that can look at the person in the mirror and say “that’s me.”
Deep right? (I assure you, he explains it much better than I did.)
I can take a step back and observe the me looking in the mirror. I can say “look at that guy, that’s me.” But if there is one me that is and another me that can observe myself, then how could they possibly be the same?
In that sense, we all have two sides of ourselves. We have the physical us, the one we identify with. And we have the metaphysical us, the one that can observe our own selves.
When I think of this analogy, I always see the two sides of myself being far away from each other. There is the physical me, which is trying to get through life at a steady pace, and there is other me, which is racing ahead of me as fast as he can.
My thoughts are always slightly in front of my actions, which means that I am always playing catch up with my own mind.
As of late, I have been trying to deal with it from a slightly different angle.
Instead of trying to catch up to my thoughts, rather, I’m deciding to keep moving at the same speed and find a way to slow my thoughts down.
Meditation, daily journaling, daily walks, and cold showers are my best tools to tire my thoughts out. Eventually, my mind decides that it’s easier for everyone if my mind and my body start walking at the same speed, and that’s when I can get things done.
For instance …
Every time I commit to daily writing, I start to get in my head about it, because I feel like my Substack needs to “be about something.”
It doesn’t. The truth is, I like to write every day because it helps me think. The fact that you follow me is a welcomed bonus.
Or how about this one …
Now that I own 100% of Copyblogger, I can not stop thinking of all the massive changes I should make. I should …
redesign the website
create all these new products
gut the entire site at once to get rid of the zombie pages
I don’t have to do any of that. All I have to do is exactly what I am doing now, except longer.
I get this way because I am afraid to fail, and like you, I have a belief that the antidote to failure is to try harder and to do more.
The older I get, the more I realize that success is less about how hard you work (although that is important), and more about the choices you make.
I am on the right path. I simply need to keep walking, one foot in front of the other.
P.S. - I saw this video last year and it helped a lot. I refer back to it often. I hope it helps you too.
