Impress the past. Frustrate the future. Ignore the present.
The most abstract thing I've ever written. Clearly not the last.
I was working on a project today for KnowCap and thought about the biggest problems I could ever think to solve…and whether I was doing it or not.
In my mind, I wondered if I would do something that would make me, from four years ago, flustered. “There’s no possible way we could do that,” he would say. Yet, here we are…doing that.
A concept that has been permeating throughout my brain while thinking about what to write today. It was centered around my young and older selves. How I view them and how I think of them.
I couldn’t think of a specific phrase that I had read before, so I thought about “Impress the past. Frustrate the future. Ignore the present.”
Ignore the present
I intentionally placed the present last. When it comes to professional accomplishments, the present me is virtually an entitled a-hole. Wants everything right now. Believes he’s earned it. Deserves to be successful because of the insane amount of work he’s put in.
But deep down, I know.
No one cares how much I work. It doesn’t matter. What matters is that I stay present in my personal life, focused on cherishing every short-term milestone there is.
When it comes to my professional life, however, I need to focus on loving “the process.”
Nothing more.
Impress the past
I placed this first because younger me was just as impatient as I am now.
But you know what? He’s proud. He knows that the work paid off. He knows he could not have imagined that we would be here.
And that’s truly something when you take the time to think about it.
Even incremental progress compounds over time. I’ve always believed that to be the fabric of life (compounding rules everything). When you think about your younger self, are they impressed with who you are now?
Would they recognize you? Congratulate you? Or, simply say, “this is what happens when you learn to love the process and keep pushing. Keep doing that.”
Frustrate the future
This is the hardest one of all. In my mind, I want to be in a place five years from now that my future self will wish we went even harder.
"Had we made that one cold call, we would have survived." That’s one version.
At the other end of the spectrum, “By making that cold call you now are busier than you ever imagined, I wish you had made more of those calls.”
In my mind, I see future me always looking at what’s around and thinking, “why didn’t he just do X…?”
Hindsight is a monster if not handled properly. If handled properly, it can help you address long-term decisions more effectively. If I know that I made a mistake in 2018 looking forward to now, it means I can learn from it when the same decisions need to be made now looking forward to 2024.
It’s abstract. Maybe the most abstract mental exercise you will ever do. But it will illuminate a few things for you:
That you truly do accomplish more in a long-term goal than you think you will
You are happier when you focus on the work and the process vs. the results
Long-term thinking and short-term thinking are just the past experiences reflected through your current and future selves
Reflecting on how each decision affects your past, present, and future can help clarify thinking