People Dream About the Future Because They Hate Their Lives

The other day friend and I took a trip to ancient sites.
He said, “Can you believe people used to walk here 3,000 years ago?”

And I went, “Yeah, it’s funny how people fantasize about the future. But WE are the future people used to fantasize about.”

Imagine a world with kings and queens, knights and other stuff.

Now take a look at what we have. It’s nothing less than a miracle. People talk about AI, robots and all that. But thousands of years ago, people probably asked the same questions we ask now.

“How will the future look like?”
“What does the future hold for us?”
“Will my dreams come true? And if so, when?”

I mean, that’s why people go to fortune tellers, right. We can’t help but think about what’s coming. Or what’s not coming.

We’ve become obsessed with the future. We forgot we’re already blessed. We forgot WE are the future.

So we wait and barely enjoy what we already have.

We’re stuck in “waiting mode”

That’s the fundamentals of our minds. “When I get this or that, I’ll finally be happy”. We look for stimulus in the future, not enjoying the present. Easy to fall into that trap.

I know people who always wait for their next vacation. “Oh, I can’t wait to get on a plane to London! Oh, Amsterdam! I’m coming.”

People hate their lives. So they look for an escape. I have clients who tell me “Happy Thursday” because it’s the end of the week.

Does that mean you suffered all week? You had to way wait to be happy? To put a smile on your face?

That’s kinda sad. With ChatGPT, people go, “Oh wow, AI will do this and that. It’s amazing.”

And it is amazing. It’s a badass technology. But again, they’re fantasizing about the future. And doing that is useless, no matter the concept.

If you’re dreaming 24/7, you’re a prisoner of the mind. I’d instead learn to enjoy the now.

Chasing goals can get you ill

In high school, my friend constantly talked about how his cousin made tons of money.

He’s in tech, he’s an entrepreneur, all that.
The day we met, he said, “Forget it, I stopped chasing money. I’m out of this game.”

He still got ambitions, but he’d rather spend time with his kids. You can spend your whole life chasing goals and money, fantasizing about the future.

And you could achieve them. But I think even if you’ve manifested your wildest dream and didn’t enjoy the road, you won’t be able to enjoy what you have because you can’t enjoy the “now”.

You just don’t know how to do that.

I spent three years working on my side hustle to realize I didn’t want it. It wasn’t a waste of time in terms of knowledge and experience.

However, it was a waste of time in terms of consciousness. My day passed by, and I didn’t enjoy them.

I don’t want to be on my deathbed, thinking, “I got all this stuff, but I didn’t enjoy this life to the fullest.”

“That’s why we seize the moment, try to freeze it and own it
Squeeze it and hold it, ’cause we consider these minutes golden.”
– Eminem

Enjoy the now or regret it later

The book “The Power Of Now” by Eckhart Tolle shifted my thinking twelve years ago.

It’s a groundbreaking idea for most of us- enjoying the “now” because that’s all we have.

Every birthday, I think, “Damn, I wasn’t that conscious this year.” Another year flew by. Time passes, and there’s nothing you can do about it.

Measure your days by the level of consciousness, not by productivity. Business-wise, productivity should be measured and improved.

“Life-wise”, productivity is a vanity metric. It’s an illusive measure that became somewhat of a “trend” in the 21st century.

If all you do is try to be productive and complete tasks, you get into a mindset of “getting there.” A goal-oriented mindset that focuses on the next thing. And the next one. And the next goal after that.

You enjoy nothing. Your precious goals and “productivity” are all you’re left with.

Get my free ebook, “Life Lessons From Getting Rejected by Hundreds Of Women”

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This post was previously published on medium.com.

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