Let go, achieve more

Stillness is the Key by Ryan Holiday is a book which talks about the importance of being still in the mind amidst all the disturbances, chaos and noises around us. In this book Ryan distils the ancient wisdom of stoic philosophers where they spoke about developing peace within oneself so that they could think, work and be well even if the whole world around them is at war. Of the many strategies and principles covered in this book, one in particular resonated with me at a deeper level; which is “Letting Go”. In this context letting go is about giving up on the “willful will”.?

Willful will is the desire to be in control of the outcomes all the time and try to dictate a schedule, a timeline and a process for everything we are a part of. In this book Ryan refers to Awa Kenzo, a great archery master, who spent more time teaching his students the mental skills of detachment rather than technical skills of archery. By detachment Kenzo meant letting go of the expectation of getting a perfect bullseye by a particular timeline and instead embracing the process of learning and mastering the art itself. This way the pressure of achieving a goal is taken away and therefore the student is free to immerse themselves in the process of learning.?

How does this apply to us on a regular basis? Why did I resonate with this??

I believe most of us are always obsessing over achieving something or the other - the next pay raise, the next promotion, lose weight in time for the wedding, win the championship, be married to the perfect partner by 30 and so much more! I am no different. Of course we need to have goals in life. A life without any goals and aspirations? will be nothing but an excuse to wake up, eat and go back to sleep with a few Netflix breaks in between.?

What? if we change the approach? What if we focused more on the process or the path towards achieving a goal as opposed to the final goal itself? This is what Kenzo was telling his students. Instead of thinking “I am somehow going to get promoted in a year's time”, what if we focused on “what more value can I add to the organisation in my present role and position and how can I improve myself as a person in the process?” By changing the narrative we are taking back power because adding value to the organisation and to oneself is something we have a lot more control over than the outcome of getting a promotion in a year's time. When you start working on the elements you have control over, inevitably you are giving yourself a much higher chance of successfully achieving the goal.?

Quite simple isn’t it? Simple but not easy. Easy thing would be to keep complaining and whining about how unfair the system is, fighting and stressing yourself out over an outcome you have little to no control over. Instead, what if you start enjoying the process of learning some new skills? Making new connections, solving more complicated issues and taking on new and challenging projects? You may not get the promotion, but at least you will discover your strengths and weaknesses and will certainly ready you to move on to a better place where you are appreciated.?

Let's take another example.?

Say you want to learn to play the guitar. Instead of chasing a goal such as “I will learn to play a song in 3 months” focus on the process of learning the art of playing. For starters, by choosing to embrace the process over chasing a target outcome you for one are adopting a growth mindset? (Read up on the growth mindset work By Dr. Carol S Dweck). During this process you start discovering various things about yourself as well; how do you persevere through the initial boring phase of learning the utter basics to how you overcome the nagging urge to give up when it gets so frustrating because you don’t seem to be progressing beyond a certain point and even the urge to bash the wretched thing on the floor once in every few days. Then you will also notice that you will be making friends with likeminded people who are also struggling in the process and realise that you are not alone in this journey.?

Work done for a reward is much lower than the work done in the Yoga of wisdom. Set thy heart upon thy work, but never on its reward. Work not for the reward; but never cease to do the work - The Bhagavad Gita

As nice and peachy as it may sound, in my experience there is a downside to only embracing the process. If there’s no end goal in mind, we can get bogged down in the learning process (I am the poster child for this!) and forever go on learning with no end and not achieve anything in life.? You are not going to get a promotion for being the most knowledgeable person in the team. You will get the promotion if you can show the value you have created for the company using the knowledge you have gained through the process. The principle of non attachment or “letting go” in this context applies when you still remain calm and collected in the event you do not get the promotion despite you having mastered your craft and applied that knowledge for the betterment of the company. You remain still in your mind, (because we are human, try) not let the set back get to you and think what to do next.?

It is ok to totally and absolutely embrace the process and not have a goal for certain things in life; for example meditation. I do not think one should set a target in mind when getting into meditation because the whole point of the practice is to be present and focussed at the present moment and it shouldn’t be some ego trip to say something like “I can meditate for 2 hours in one sitting”.?

But when pursuing other interests I think it helps to have a goal in mind, but do not get attached to it - again coming back to the theme of this article; letting go. The main objective should be to enjoy the process, learn and master the craft, discover facets about yourself and those around you whilst staying on the correct path towards achieving the goal. When you get into the process of learning and mastering something, you might even realise that the original goal doesn’t make sense anymore. You do not want that anymore. So change it! Nothing is chiselled? in stone. When you are more focused on the journey than the destination, you have no attachment to the destination, so any detours or destination changes will not bring you down. It’ll only motivate you to keep true to the path of discovery.?

Let me know what you think in the comments!