Quit Trying To Become A Better Person — Transform
Considering that the theme of this website is Practical Personal Development, the title Quit Trying To Become A Better Person may come as a bit of a shock to you. This site has been a bit of a journal for my personal development endeavors over the past year and a half — you may be thinking, why quit now?
I’m not exactly quiting, I’m simply reinventing some definitions and making distinctions as to what life means. If you remember, the first of 5 ways to maximize your mind to achieve your goals, is to define what you want. Below you will find my mission statement, with character traits that I want to be, not traits that I want to become.
The truth is that trying to become a better person has the dangerous potential of leading to unhappiness. Happiness is important to all people, and after I conducted the Happiness Project I created what I think is an excellent definition of what Happiness means.
“Happiness is being the creator of your experience, choosing to take pleasure in what you have, right now, regardless of the circumstances, while being the best you that you can be.”
~Alex Shalman
Why can trying to become a better person lead to unhappiness? If you want to be optimistic for example, you just want, you aren’t being. If you act virtuous, you aren’t virtuous, you’re just acting the role. What if for a moment you believed that it was possible to just be the best you that you could be right now? Sure you might be a better version of you in the future, but all we have right now is — now — and we can choose to be the best version of us.
I have been reading and re-reading my mission statement below for a couple of years. This is who I am, with no doubt about it in my mind. Have there been times in my life where I have not acted in accordance to this mission statement? Of course! I’m far from flawless in that respect, but whenever I catch myself, or someone calls me out on it, I get myself right back to who I am.
My Mission Statement
- I am an outstanding human being in every respect
- I am honest, kind, loving, loyal and true - to my family, friends and everyone who knows me
- I am a positive, optimistic, confident, warm, friendly person who is admired and respected by everyone
- I am an excellent parent (when I have kids), a fine employer and I do my work in an upstanding fashion every time
- I uplift, encourage and inspire everyone I meet - everywhere I go
- The possibility that I have created for myself and my life is the possibility of being someone who operates with the greatest good of all in mind, and the possibility of living in the present.
The mission statement focuses on character traits in the present tense. I chose the tense very carefully here. If I had used future tense I would always be trying to become an outstanding person. By using the present tense, I allow myself to be outstanding — right now.
How does this fit in with constant and never ending improvement? For me, part of being the best me that I can be, is improving on different areas of my life — daily. In fact, it’s the only hope of ever achieving the greatest day of our life. If I want to run a mile at a certain speed that is faster than I’m physically capable of running today, I will have to train and improve daily in order to reach my goal. However, if I want to be kind and compassionate, I merely have to create that possibility for my life and transform.
Create A Possibility
Create a possibility for your life. Copy/paste the following sentence into the comments section and fill in the blank. Once you share it with us, go ahead and write down the possibility on a piece of paper and index card and carry it with you daily.
The possibility that I have created for myself and my life is the possibility of being ____.
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Hi Alex, i didn’t get your sentence here…
However, if I want to be kind and compassionate, I merely have to create that possibility for my life and transform.
that possibility that i’m kind and compassionate?
Btw, I recently go through an exercise, shared by my friend. It’s useful to find your career direction, the one that fit you the most. Interestingly it’s similar as your personal mission… we have to list down all of I am …., not I should …. , It’s about who you are right now and how you can grow with who you are, with what you have, strength and limitation… You got it right Alex!
Robert
Robert, you’re correct about the meaning of that sentence. Thanks. =)
I’ve always focused on personal growth rather than achievement in the worldly sense. I think of myself as a garden…I’m constantly gently pulling the weeds and nurturing the flowers. So even though I’ve used a lot of positive, present-tense, affirmations in my life, similar to your mission statement, I identify more with the gardener rather than the garden. It’s a liberating way of looking at things, because it gets my ego out of the way…I don’t identify with my actions, I focus on my purpose, larger vision. Interesting.
Thanks for the food for thought! I’ve Stumbled this article.
Hey Alex, I agree that “being” is much more fulfilling than “trying to become.” I think that self-improvement is a great, fulfilling process that will ultimately lead to greater clarity, depth, perception and HAPPINESS in our lives. With all that said, I think that it is important to be grateful for who we ARE at this exact moment / “in the now,” and that’s where we will be able to be the most happy. It can be difficult for some people to stop focusing on “what they should do” rather than what they should “BE.”
I understand your post and really enjoy the work you’ve done here with your blog. This article definitely made me think. Keep up the great work
I would love to hear more about how you view yourself as a gardener. I remember Steve Pavlina using a similar metaphor when he described his physical body as an avatar in a game and himself as a player. I agree that there are huge benefits to dropping ego, but on the other hand society would never be developed if ego did not exist.
Alex,
You reminded us that everyone should have a mission statement. With that said, Zen Buddhists have tendency to live in the present and do best now where we are with given circumstances. What we do now shapes our future. What we think of future by ignoring present shakes our future.
Shilpan
You are now all you will ever be If you believe in yourself as the spirit within your body, rather than the personality surrounding it. Attaining success, therefore, consists in being yourself and being grateful for who you are. If you seek “Human” success, you will become a karmic prisoner and beholden to all those to whom you owe favors. Be here now and mind your own business and leave others alone and don’t allow others to tell you how to live or think or especially how to beleive.—
—Doug
The points mentioned in the article are worth concentrating upon. I think that these would surely help a person change himself.
Every one is not successful in life and every one is not perfect in life. If one wants to change some of his attributes than it is very difficult he should totally transform himself and show the world that who he was and no who he is.
I like it, that you have a mission-statement and that you frequently come back to it to find direction in it. I love your statements 2,3,4 and 6. They have the possibility to guide you through everyday decisions and that is the purpose of a mission-statement.
But i think statements 1 and 4 could be more useful. How can they guide you in a everyday-decision? For me they are not specific enough to help you.
Especially statement 4 (familiy) covers a very important topic but it has no message on its own. Of course all the other statements help you with this topic as well and i think thats the reason it may work for you.
Thanks for sharing your mission. I think everybody needs one and all in all your statements belong to the best i have ever heard of.
Hi Alex,
I like your happiness definition…
writing this kind of statements will require a deep understanding of our true values… and I remember when I wrote down my values the first time, I got a VERY clear vision of who I am & what I want.
but, writing a clear vision-mission statement is NOT easy to do. considering that self-improvement is on-going process. so, from time to time, you will update your personal ‘agenda’ as you learn & grow.
While we all should strive to improve, we are (in a sense) already perfect. There is always more to achieve, always a greater mountain to scale. But in a spiritual sense we are all that we need to be, and we can rest secure in this knowledge. Thanks for a great post, as always.
I’ve been blog hopping all night and read lots of blogs within this field of self-discovery etc. and I was wondering when I’d come across a[n obvious] Landmark Graduate! Keep up the great work with your website!
//The possibility I am inventing for myself and my life is the possibility of being an open, trusting, courageous, honest and loving person. To be myself with everyone because I am me.
//I am giving up lying, letting my fears stop me from doing what I want to do and running rackets on people.
//I have taken responsibility for my actions in my life and if I lie, for example, I will take the responsibility to face the consequences and to complete the action so I can move on from it as a complete person.
This has stuck with me ever since my ‘genesis’ on 7th August 2005. Complete transformation and I’ve been on cloud 9 ever since, pretty much. Powerful stuff!