Alternative Futures

Compare possibilities fairly before fear makes the decision for you.

Your future is your property. You can do whatever you want with it.

When Dan Sullivan taught me that idea, I loved it. The future only exists in my mind. Why wouldn't I imagine something extraordinary?

I can be having the best year of my life and still believe next year will be better. Not because something outside me has promised that, but because I get to create the future in my imagination. I can keep evolving, learning, and deciding what I want.

Yet so many people use that same imagination to create a future they dread. They think they're simply being realistic. What they're actually doing is rehearsing a story about something that hasn't happened.

Notice the futures behind your decisions

When you're making a decision, you're imagining alternative futures.

Should you take a job? Become a life coach? Stay where you are? You picture what life might be like on either side of the decision, and then you choose.

You may think you're deciding entirely from facts. You can consider what you know right now and weigh the pros and cons. But you can't know the future. You're imagining it.

Someone considering life coach training might imagine overcoming insecurity and becoming a successful coach. That's what makes the idea exciting. Then they might imagine never learning enough, never finding clients, and never overcoming doubt.

Those are two stories created by the same mind. One is a possibility they want. The other is a possibility built from self-doubt. Neither has happened yet.

The ingredients of your imagined future include your current circumstances, your interpretation of your past, your beliefs, and your creativity. If you don't notice that, you can mistake a familiar fear for a fact about what will happen.

Stop making your past the limit

Most people haven't really considered their future. They tell me they're not sure what will happen to them. They're waiting for life to arrive instead of imagining what they want to create.

I once asked a friend's boyfriend what he wanted to do with his business. He gave me an answer. Then I asked him to imagine that anything was possible. Suddenly, he described a completely different future.

What changed? Not his circumstances. His permission to imagine.

No one can tell you that you're imagining your future wrong. You can daydream. You can be creative. You don't have to restrict yourself to the trajectory of your past.

When people tell me they don't want to imagine something bigger because they might be disappointed, I ask them to notice how they feel now. They're already disappointing themselves ahead of time.

Why not at least give yourself the chance to imagine what you want?

Be willing to bet on yourself

Watching my sons play poker gave me a way to think about this. They bet on a hand because of what it might become. Sometimes they win. Sometimes they lose.

But if they fold every time, they can't win. They're giving up the possibility ahead of time.

So many of us do that in our lives. We don't want to lose, so we never give ourselves a chance. We don't bet on an alternative future.

One night, my son told me he'd bought back into the game twice before winning. I thought about how many of us wouldn't buy back in. We'd decide one loss meant it was time to leave.

What if getting something wrong meant there was something to learn? What if you could keep choosing possibility instead of treating disappointment as the end?

Imagine the best version of both choices

Here is how I want you to approach a decision: make both alternative futures amazing first.

Let's say you're considering staying in your job or leaving to become a life coach. Imagine staying, getting the promotions you want, and earning the pay you want. Then imagine becoming the most successful life coach you could be.

Once both futures are wonderful, which one do you want?

This is different from making one option miserable and the other one the answer to all your problems. When you do that, you're choosing between stories shaped by your fear and your hope. You're expecting a circumstance to make you happy.

You're the one who creates your happiness. Knowing that, you can imagine a great future either way and choose from desire.

You can ask the same question about a relationship. Imagine the best possible future with your partner and the best possible future on your own. When both are amazing in your mind, what do you want?

Have your own back after you decide

I like to make decisions from the belief that there is no wrong decision. Either way, I win. Now which way do I want to go?

If you stop beating yourself up over decisions, you stop creating the experience of having made the wrong one. You can decide this is your journey because you chose it, and then make it the best journey you can.

Think about your life ten years from now. Imagine two alternative futures. Don't settle for a default continuation of your past. Make them better. Let yourself enjoy them before you choose.

Then decide. Know the other future could have been great, and decide this one will be the best because you've chosen it and you're going to create it on purpose.

Today can be wonderful. Tomorrow can be even better. You get to imagine it that way.