Leo Babauta on the Self-Improvement Urge

We must improve. We must read every self-improvement book. When we read a blog, we must try that method, because it will make us better. When we read someone else’s account of his achievements, his goal system, his entrepreneurial lifestyle, her yoga routine, her journaling method, her reading list, we must try it. We will always read what others are doing, in case it will help us get better. We will always try what others are doing, try every diet and every system, because it helped them get better, so maybe it will help us too. Soon, we will find the ultimate solutions, soon we will get there. No, that hasn’t happened yet, but maybe this year will be the year.

Maybe 2012 will be the year we reach perfection.

Quashing the Self-Improvement Urge

Tyler Durden said it best when he declared that self-improvement is masturbation. Yet, can anyone say that someone like Charlie Sheen or Lindsay Lohan couldn't do with some self-improvement? So, which is it? Is self-improvement worthwhile or just a fruitless pursuit that makes us hate ourselves?

It was the psychoanalyst Jacques Lacan who gave us his theory of the mirror image. Basically, we see ourselves in the mirror as something better than what we really are. So, we pursue to become what we see in this mirror of ourselves, but we fail. This resulting alienation leads to immense dissatisfaction and disappointment. The reason for this is because the mirror image is always better than we actually are no matter how far we move towards realizing it. The result is a sort of mental trap. We can't realize the dream, but we can't quite let go of it either.

Minimalism is a letting go of these dreams. The ancient Skeptics told a story about happiness. A painter was attempting to paint a horse and was trying to paint the foam coming from the horse's mouth. He tried and tried, but he could not pull it off. In anger and disgust, the painter gave up and threw the sponge he used to clean his brushes at the painting. The sponge splattered paint on the picture, and this created the effect he was seeking.

This parable was the Skeptic's way of describing where happiness comes from. It comes from letting go. It is when we stop seeking happiness that we find it. Similarly, the minimalist lifestyle movement is a letting go of dreams and what have you. This provides tremendous relief. The contentment that Babauta discusses in his essay is also about letting go. By rejecting this perfected mirror image of ourselves and accepting ourselves as we really are, we are set free from the alienation and disappointment that comes from pursuing a goal that can never be realized.

Do I agree with this prescription for what ails us? No, I do not. The Skeptics made the mistake of equating relief with happiness, and they are not the same thing. The answer they gave was only partially correct. We should reject this idealized future self as the basis for happiness. This is because happiness can only exist in the present. Happiness is something that must be experienced now. If you are someone who is always in pursuit of a theoretical future happiness, you are wasting your time.

True happiness is what Aristotle called eudaimonia or the god within. Happiness comes when we lose ourselves in the pursuit of our projects. This is quite different from what the Skeptics considered to be happiness. For them, happiness comes when we abandon our projects. But projects do not go away simply because we wish them away. The life of a bum is far less stressful than the life of a career oriented workaholic. But this does not recommend unemployment as the best option for living.

The correct answer is to steer yourself in pursuit of your goals but to focus on the process instead of the outcome. In other words, you set your navigational tools, and you learn to enjoy the ride. This is what we call "flow." This is when a superstar athlete stops looking at the scoreboard and simply immerses himself in the game. The score has a strange way of taking care of itself.

We definitely need to stop visualizing our idealized future selves or seeking happiness in the future. We need to find happiness in the present. This means keeping your goals as opposed to what Leo recommends but to also be forgetful of them. Once you've decided on which goals or projects to pursue, you should seek them but realize that happiness does not come from the attainment so much as the pursuit. For many people, this is a difficult thing to do. This is why happiness can be so elusive for so many.

Self-improvement is a worthy pursuit. We just shouldn't conflate it with the error that the achievement is what brings happiness. As someone who cultivates flow on a daily basis, the achievement of a goal brings a certain sadness because that bit of fun has ended for me. The antidote? I find another project and start working again. My goal is really to always be in a state of doing. What matters to me is not what I've done or what I will do. What matters is what I am doing at this moment. This moment is all that exists. All those other things such as health, wealth, fitness, and the rest are simply byproducts of a life of flow. I simply enjoy the now.

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