Yesterday, I spoke about an actual, real-life finish line.
So today, let’s talk about imaginary finish lines, shall we?
🏁
Years and years ago, when I left Medicine, I spotted that the imaginary finish line I’d been aiming for—becoming a consultant surgeon; having a private practice; making lots of money—wasn’t really a finish line at all.
You see, studying and practicing surgery was bloody hard work, and one of the things that kept me going, with all the book-bashing, the exams, the tedious academic journal submissions and the various jumping-through-hoops I had to do, was this notion that:
The Mr-Croft-Ego-Construct 📦 (for I was far enough into surgery to have dropped the ‘Dr’ and re-become a ‘Mr’ by then) honestly believed that when the Consultant-hood finish line was crossed, I’d be happy.
It seemed like a no-brainer. I mean, why the hell else was I putting myself through these horrors (no social life, very few weekends off, evenings of study) if not to reach some sort of goal, where it would all be worth it?
🏁 😎
Evidence to the contrary
But then I noticed something odd. I was surrounded by people who had already crossed that imaginary finish line… and some of them were very obviously not happy. And they made it clear that they didn’t think it was worth it.
Oh.
I began to question the Finish Line Hypothesis that had kept me going for so long.
Had I been sold a lie?
🤨
Now I look back, I think this was the first real-life experience I had of the Inside-Out Understanding (the recognition that 100% of our felt experience of life comes from thought in the moment, not from our circumstances).
It was my first inkling, because I saw so clearly that money and status and houses and holidays and fancy cars didn’t guarantee happiness.
(Dammit.)
I drifted away from Medicine not long after that, and started looking for happiness elsewhere, eventually realising it was there all along.
🤦🏻♂️
Sneaky mind strikes again
But here’s the thing…
If we do realise it was there all along—that happiness is an inside job—the mind, being the mind, imagines this to be some sort of finish line, too!
(Honestly, it sees sodding finishing lines everywhere!)
Which is why I seem to have so many conversations with clients that go something like this:
- “I know it just my thinking, and yet…”
- “Why do I feel so bad? I shouldn’t feel like this any more!”
- “There’s obviously something I’m missing here, because things shouldn’t be like this.”
- “How come I react in that way? Surely I’m past all that now?”
- “Why do I still get emotional in these situations? It’s silly!”
The mind convinces itself that having-an-insight is synonymous with crossing-a-finish-line and once we’ve seen the rock-solid connection between thought and feeling, or we’ve had an experience of our Innate Health, that suddenly everything should be ok now.
It’s like the mind thinks there's some sort of finish line, beyond which point, we stop being human!
🤖
So no.
It's much deeper than that.
Our Thought Systems are going to respond to life’s happenstance in whatever way they respond to it.
You don’t get to choose.
And being ok with whatever it throws at you—with not being ok—is the key.
Just let that one rattle around in there for the rest of the day.
😘
Giles
p.s. I mean, it’s not like there’s a quote, saying this very same thing, at the bottom of every. single. email. I send out or anything!!
Your next reads
Giles P Croft
Why ‘looking forward’ isn't bad, per se.
Giles P Croft
Seeing the TRUE NATURE of things is not a finish line. It's an experience, just like any other.