Introduction

Ever wonder why it’s so hard to figure out what to order for dinner? One part of you wants sushi and another pizza while a third part wants some potentially disgusting mix of the two. We exist in multitudes meaning each person has a multidimensional personality. This variety breathes life into our days but can create confusion and misalignment. When our actions have to satisfy a complex set of desires, a correct action may not be possible. We often have to choose a least bad action rather than having the luxury to choose a perfect one. This is because different vectors of our personality have competing interests. These competing interests produce internal conflict in the same way that competing external interests create conflict. We struggle to separate the different parts of us that want different things. Our confusion is not unwarranted. Life often is like looking through a kaleidoscope and thinking its a telescope.

You are made of many Yous … who may want pizza

Here is an example that can clarify how the internal conflict manifests. You are sitting down after a long day of work. You have started a diet and are trying to spend a little less money. One part of you knows you should make that salad from the ingredients in the fridge. Economical and healthy it checks a lot of boxes for the person you want to be. However, you have worked a long week. Your boss has been on you for absolutely no reason. It has rained every day. More than that though, you’ve worked hard this week. Really hard. You deserve a little relief, if not a reward. You deserve to sit on your couch, order a pizza, and take it down in one sitting. All this, while you watch TV, instead of going to the gym like you had planned. So, what do you do. Who do you listen to here. Which version of yourself is right?

The truth is neither course of action is right. Both decisions are just decisions creating their own special future. When taking different actions, it's important to consider two people. The version of you that this action is serving and the idealized version of you that you want the action to serve. Which future do you want to live in? Which action brings you closer that to future. You are what you continually do. Which action is aligned with the ideal version of yourself. The more aligned your actions, the happier you'll be in your life.

Misalignment is the root of unhappiness. Tricking yourself into thinking you’re living one life when your actions run counter to what that person would do creates an illusion in your mind. Enough misalignment will drive someone insane. You feel like you should have made much more progress on your goal, but everything you’re doing actually sabotages not augments your efforts. This misalignment clouds your brain and digs you deeper and deeper into a bottomless pit of unhappiness.

Doomscrolling yourself to sleep

Maybe the pizza example is too obvious. Too much of a caricature of a bad decision. This one will hit closer to home. Have you ever had a night when you’re about to go to bed and then stay up a few extra hours for absolutely no reason. Why is going to bed so hard if you know you want to wake up well rested? Well, bedtime you does not want to go to bed. Why would it. Bedtime you dies when you go to bed. It wants to LIVE. It will do anything to stay alive, which usually means doom scrolling, but it could hide behind a more productive habit like reading. The biggest issue with bedtime you is the incentive to go to sleep just isn’t there for bedtime you. Morning you bears the responsibility for bedtime you’s bad decisions. Morning you would have loved if you went to bed an hour ago… or 3. Imagine how much better morning you would feel! The issue is bedtime you never gets the reward. Bedtime you constantly sacrifices his time for someone she will never meet. That is just obviously not fair! Why give your life away to someone you will never meet.

This bedtime ritual is a microcosm for all our life’s big problems. This is how life becomes unaligned. There is a massive incentive misalignment between the present version of ourselves and any future iteration. The present version has to endure the pain of choosing to go to bed early or experience the joy of staying up until 2 am for no reason. The present version of us never faces the consequences. Much worse, every bad decision we make in the present makes each future version of us less invested in helping the next version of ourself. This pushes us even further from our goal and forces even stronger negative actions to get to the same level of happiness as before. We are digging ourselves into a deeper and deeper hole. This locks us into a negative cycle. The only way we can feel happier in the present is accepting our current misery and working toward a better future.

So our problem is different versions of us, with completely different motivations, are making uncoordinated decisions in their specific time decision window that effects every special condition of us in the future. Who can possibly fix this issue? The holistic you. The complex mosaic of all versions of you that combine into one beautiful being. How do we satisfy that person. The answer is obvious. Like countries at war, the holistic you needs to be the peace maker. We need to work with all the special conditions of ourselves to keep the mothership happy. Sometimes leveraging versions of ourselves and sometimes defying them.

Use the tools we have at our disposal

Seems a bit crazy to think of yourself as not one being but a collection of different personalities that come together to form one whole, but it is obviously true in many ways. The person you are at work is different than the person you are with your friends or family and different from the person ordering dinner. These different versions of you have a lot of similarities, and all have their strengths and weaknesses. These versions create different lenses to view the world and shape our interactions. None of these different personalities is bad in any way because they are you. They just serve different parts of the wholistic you. Some may be closer to the idealized you while others may not serve you as much as they used to. Further, some may not serve the parts of your life that they inhabit, but could be repurposed for other areas. Long term thinking you is great when thinking about dieting or investing, but terrible when there’s a train coming at 100 miles an hour. The point isn’t that any one version of you is better or worse. The point is that we should use our multitudes for their strengths and avoid them for their weaknesses.

Each personality vector is a tool in your tool belt. Used well you can solve any problem. Used poorly, life gets much harder. This isn’t that complicated. We are combining the raw materials of ourselves to build a better life. These parts of you already exist and it’s about stopping in each situation and thinking what part of my personality is best equipped to solve this problem and then calling on that part.

You are Enough

So we exist in multitudes, and we can use this to our advantage because these different parts of ourselves have different skills that help us in the various situations we encounter in life. There is a pull to believe that the answer to life's many questions comes from additions when in reality problems are more easily solved by subtraction. All of our problems start with the belief we are not enough in some way, but we are enough. Life is just about making the best of everything you have at your disposal more efficiently and effectively. Realizing that you are enough and have enough to be happy and successful in life is most of the hard work. This can feel like a constraint at times, but really, it's a path to liberation of the true self in many ways. Failure of the self is often orchestrated when we look outside of ourselves and think we need more rather than appreciating what we have. We're far from perfect, but we on average as imperfect as everyone else. When we understand and play to our strengths, we make the most of life. It is much better to figure out how to run the engine of your life at maximum horsepower than continue to optimize your engine and run it at 25% capacity. We go much further when we leverage our strengths and trust ourselves than constantly worry about every weakness we have.

That's not to say that growth or self-creation is a bad thing, but we are so conditioned to think more is better. Often the focus to double down on what you have gets you further than aimlessly looking for what you're missing. Life is about realizing that most of what you need is already inside of you. It is much easier to utilize who you are in the proper ways than spontaneously generate new parts of yourself. It's an exercise perspective taking on yourself. Your life is defined by what you don't do. There is a near infinite number of places to live, people to meet, and professions to have among other things. Success in life comes not from meeting the most people but having the best relationships. Career success is the result of pursing a path that combines your skills with what gives you meaning not chasing money and status. While vacation and visiting new places is great, a true journey only ends successfully when you finally arrive home. Do not get so preoccupied with side quests that distract you from the main game of life.

What life should look like

The first step to directing your life is self-awareness. Ask yourself in every moment, what do I actually want here and what assets can I draw on for this challenge. Then insert the special condition of you built for this situation. Most of the decisions we regret are made to satisfy a you that you think you want to be but deep down do not want to be. This is a pure misalignment of intention. When you stop yourself, you give yourself a better chance of alignment and success. Every action is a vote on who we want to be now and in the future. Make decisions for the you that you want to be in that moment. Draw on the expertise that you want to draw on. Pave the pathway to success. Dictate your life. This is what gives you agency. Slowly your power and confidence will build. You realize failure is a matter of perspective taking not ingrained in your essential nature.

We also need to realize decisions are complex and we do not always need to draw on the same version of us to make a similar decision. Sometimes it’s imperative for your health that you have a donut. You could have just accomplished something great and that achievement you needs to be rewarded, so the wholistic you can be fueled to achieve more and more. The achievement you needs finish lines and medals sometimes to keep pushing through the different sprints and marathons of our life. There were no simple answers to who you should be in every moment. Life is complex. We are complex beings living in a complex adaptive ecosystem. If it was just A+B = C all the time we wouldn’t be plagued by problems. The truth is, it’s not that simple and it will never be that simple. Slowing down the world to consider which version of me is built to solve this problem, having confidence in that version, and taking the steps to become the person you want to be gives you the best chance of being successful by living the life you want.

Conclusion and Fight Club

How do we bring this one home? This has been like Fight Club the blog post. Edward Norton strives to be Brad Pitt only to realize they’re the same person the whole time. That is what I am saying to you dear reader. This isn’t about being a different person. This is about using all your skills and abilities to become who you want to be inside and out. This isn’t a fast process and may take years, but it all starts with a deep breath and a simple step. Learning new behaviors and crafting new stories for old situations is hard. Begin with mindful awareness of the situation and who we want to be in that moment. Discover who we are really appeasing in that moment. Maybe in that situation we fail. We don’t serve the idealized us. Recognizing failure is the first step to success. If we can start to understand who we want to be, that is a small success. That’s a little victory for the future even if not in the moment. Step one, we become aware we’re not the person we want to be in that situation. Then step two is realizing which version of yourself is fit for the situation and drawing on those skills. Using that vectors of your personality that already exist and acquiring additional knowledge to complement not replace who you are and what you want. Step three, once you’ve discovered the you that you want to be then when the situation comes up, try to be that person. When you don’t succeed the first time, you didn’t fail you just took your first step on the road to success. Eventually through continued application you can become the idealized version of yourself. Then you expand to another situation. Every time it gets easier. Every time your life gets more aligned. Slowly bringing the disparate pieces of the puzzle together to form the clear and beautiful picture of who you are in that moment and creating clarity on how to move forward. Before you know it, the idealized you is looking back at you in the mirror. It’s the journey of our lifetime and no one is better prepared than you are.