While vision boards help us think about who we aspire to be in the future and what we want to achieve with our life, Dr Benjamin Hardy introduces the idea of being our Future Self now in his latest book.
The idea behind this concept is that we imagine what we want our Future Selves to look like and be that person now. That means making decisions today that are aligned with the image we have of ourselves in the future.
Our Future Self therefore drives are current reality. It helps us see the world differently, consider who we surround ourselves with, the decisions we make, and what we focus our time on.
Create a vivid, detailed image
The more vivid and detailed the image we have of our Future Selves, the more likely we are to connect with them and imagine what our lives will look like the future.
The more detailed your Future Self, the better. The more specific and measurable your goals and milestones, the more effective will be your process and progress.
Focusing our attention
Like the vision board exercise, this will include where we live, how we spend our time, and how happy we are.
If we can clearer picture in our minds, the person we want to become, we can focus our attentions on achieving the goal of becoming that person, and taking action aligned with our vision.
To make quality decisions, know where those decisions take you. Decisions and actions are best when reverse-engineered from a desired outcome. Start with what you want and work backwards. Think and act from your goal, rather than toward your goal.
Thinking about our future shapes it
A mentioned in the post about vision boards, the more we are able to think about our future, the greater our capacity to shape it the way we want it to, and it will influence our behaviour now.
Hardy points out that:
The clearer you are on where you want to go, the less distracted you’ll be by the endless options.
Lacking direction, and without milestones to mark our journey, can leave us going around in circles.
Decisions based on what we want to become
If we want to be fit and healthy in the future, and we are fully committed to this, we’ll carefully consider the diet and exercise choices we make today.
If we want to run our own business, we’ll read books on entrepreneurship, plan out ideas and ensure we network with others in the same position.
We’ll do this more and more over time as we work towards our imagined Future Self – the one with the successful business and the house and holidays to match.
Longer term goals over immediate rewards
We’ll focus less on immediate rewards on more on longer term goals, remain committed to our goals and believe that we can achieve them.
Shifting our goals from fear-based, reactive, and short term to proactive, long term, and love-based is the path for a successful and happy life.
Prioritising the present over the future
It is hard not to give into short-term temptations. We may want to make more far-sighted choices, but we’re impatient and we often fail to defer instant gratification (Ainslie, 1975).
Our psychological make-up is not designed to plan too far ahead. What is therefore needed is a connection to that Future Self.
Connecting with our Future Self
If we see our Future Selves as completely different from how we are now, we will feel less connected to that person.
But if we picture this individual as someone with the same personality traits and core identity we have now, which are stable and unlikely to change, the psychological connection is greater (Urminsky, 2017).
Believing and investing in our future self
The representation of our Future Selves in our mind also must be someone we want to become, not someone we fear we might become. We must believe in them and care for them enough to invest in them, just as we do our loved ones.
Investing is how you shatter the glass ceiling of your current potential and elevate your sense of what you can be and do. This profound behaviour signals to your subconscious that you can have and be much more than your current identity. ~ (Goldsmith and Reiter, 2015.)
More aware of the consequences
As a result of being connected to a positive version of our Future Selves, we care more about our welfare. We’re also more aware of the future consequences of the decisions we make today.
This can result in us saving more, being more self-regulated, procrastinating less, making more ethical choices, being more likely to keep our future commitments, delaying gratification, setting 5-year goals, and valuing the present.
Decisions are also impacted by how far away the future feels, how much money and time we predict we will have in the future, and how emotional we feel about the future.
Selective attention
Selective attention is also at play. Once we know what we want, we’ll see the world through that lens, filtering out information and experiences that do not help us move towards our goal.
Instead, we will see what we are looking for and what you care about. We will see the things that help us move towards our Future Self because that is what your mind is focussed on. It’s what we will naturally pay attention to.
Hope
Having clear goals gives us hope for the future, without which our psychology unravels. As Hardy points out:
Without something specific to look and build toward, the present becomes utterly painful … Without hope, motivation is impossible. You can’t be motivated towards action or outcome without zero hope in its possibility.
Being in the arena
Hardy talks about the importance of being in the arena – being out there working towards our goals and towards our Future Self.
This can result in failure, setbacks and criticism but sitting on the sidelines means we aren’t taking efforts to move forward, and so we will stand still.
It takes courage, grit and perseverance to work towards what matters to us. To face the obstacles that stand in our way and find a way around them.
When we’re out there in the arena, we’re learning, we’re making mistakes and dealing with the realities of the situation. Trial and error may be involved, but always driven by our goal.
All part of the journey
That is all part of the journey, part of the challenge, to become the person we want to be. To become the Future Self we have imagined.
The longer you wait to enter your arena, the more you limit your Future Self. Being in the arena means you’re finally facing and embracing reality. In the arena, you’re no longer afraid of reality because it has become your instructor. Eventually, as your future self you’ll be able to shape reality.
Life changes us
Hardy points out that the Future Self we become might not be the one we expected. We’re all a work in progress. We are not the finished version.
We all change. Life changes us. Ageing changes us. Learning, relationships, experience, success, and failure changes us.
Our interests, perspective, values and goals may all be different, especially if we take opportunities, embrace change, and adopt a growth mindset.
An evolved version of ourselves
We will see the world differently. We will not be the person we are now. We will be an evolved version of ourselves.
The promise of change empowers you to give grace to your current self. You can make mistakes. It’s okay that you don’t have all the answers. It’s okay that you’re a bit disorganised and camped in the messy middle. Things will change. If you’re committed to a certain change or outcome, then you will figure it out.
Final thoughts
What has not been mentioned above is the fact that it is possible to ensure our past does not define our future. Instead, it is the decisions we make today.
While these decisions might be influences by our past, they are ultimately designed to produce the positive version ourselves we picture in the future.
It is also small changes, made consistently over time, that gradually shift us in the right direction. But crucial to this, is knowing where we want to get to.
It’s also crucial to acknowledge that over time we change and evolve.
Our goals might change as a result, and we might decide to change direction in search of a slightly different version of the Future Self we imagined.
The point here, though, is that we can and do evolve. We do not remain the same. We are not stuck in the same place that we are now.
We can envision a brighter more positive future, and it is the decisions we make today that help determine the extent to which we achieve that.
Sources
Ainslie, G., 1975. Specious reward: a behavioral theory of impulsiveness and impulse control. Psychological bulletin, 82(4), p.463.
Goldsmith, M. and Reiter, M., 2015. Triggers: Creating behavior that lasts–becoming the person you want to be. Crown Currency.
Hardy, B., Be your future self now: the science of intentional transformation. Hay House, Inc.
Urminsky, O., 2017. The role of psychological connectedness to the future self in decisions over time. Current Directions in Psychological Science, 26(1), pp.34-39.
