I was happy until...

Plans. Love them, hate them. Can you live without them? Strategic plans, life goals plans, plans, plans, and more plans.

• How can I know what to do next without a plan?
• How can I not make a mistake or fall if I can’t see where I am going?
• How would I be perceived if I had no plan?

— I need a plan. #recognize

Reminded are we at every intersection that a plan is a must. The mind struggles when It cannot see where the next step is. Its forecasting capabilities and expectation calculations needs are like a hungry baby crying for mama. They need it; they want it now, no questions asked.

Yet, imagine taking a step, trusting in the lift of your foot to land without seeing it. It’s such a scary thought, especially when the stakes are high. When the decision on where that step lands will define your destiny.

The plan could fail, and often it does, but gosh, what would life be if you did not have one? It feels so nice and cozy to be cradled by a plan that your mind trusts. Whether it’s true or not is beside the point, but darn, it feels so warm in its embrace.

— Be happy, be in control… #understand

The terrain mapped gives us a sense of confidence that is so hard not to trust. In that prison, we feel comfortable navigating. And whatever is beyond is uncertain; no matter if it is true freedom or not, we simply can’t step outside to meet it.

I don’t know about you, but I’ve known prisons. I’ve lived in them happily and content, so much so that I never wanted to leave. A prison of a mind that wanted to control every emotion, feeling, or word said or not said.

A safe space that commanded my attention so much that a laugh couldn’t burst without permission. Walled behind a diamond seal that thought it was in control because the map was charted with many constraints and very few inputs. I succumbed to the lie and embraced its truths.

One of my drawings from back in 2013

I was happy until I wasn’t. Until reality met me in a cruel space that decided it had enough of my shenanigans and wanted an out. The mind could not understand what was happening, and it collapsed on itself as the map started to be dismantled piece by piece.

In an instant, happy went to anxious and depressed. Without even noticing, the plan went to shit, and the mind couldn’t catch up to the rollercoaster of unexpected steps playing out, and it stood idle — not a great place to be, I can tell you that much.

Track your progress every step of the way. Do not miss any issues. Check the last issue.

— The bigger picture plan! #accept

Don’t be sad. While, in retrospect, I hated that period, it was the best thing that ever happened to me. I still find it difficult to talk about, but that person has changed so much that I do not know them anymore, and that’s ok.

So, what’s the point of this story — I know the mind is getting impatient, so let me put it at ease. How can I not be mad about what happened in a period where I was intentionally and fully aware, positioning myself to fail, and went into a period of anguish that I did not even know how to handle?

The interesting observation is this: The bigger plan played out exactly as it should. I might have felt sometimes in control of it and sometimes not. And I’m not being philosophical about it. I mapped it out. I am an engineer at heart, and architecting systems at several layers of abstraction is my forte. (You can read my book Reality Check, where I take you through the map in detail)

Now 10 years later, the logic in it seems trivial, and it all makes sense. But at the time, no sense could ever be made out of it.

And that is because the mind is a reactive machine, not a proactive one, even if it sometimes pretends it is. It can create the connections only after the fact. It is a lagging indicator. It can only tell you what happened after it has occurred. So plan or no plan, tease the mind or satisfy it however it makes more sense.

Lift your foot and let it land. The best foolproof plan to sate the mind is to distract it with one. Accept it, and gain the freedom of the whole space itself, not the map.

Until next time,
Carlo