We Live In Two Worlds; The Inner And The Outer
We live, each of us, in two worlds.
One is visible, the other is invisible.
One is determined only by others, the other is determined only by us.
One is the focus of the West, the other is the focus of the East.
Both are important. Both are different.
And they are completely unrelated from one another.
Success in one rarely relates to success in the other.
Some people thrive in one but struggle in the other.
Heath Ledger. Robin Williams. Michael Jackson. Amy Winehouse. The list of celebrities who were known to be troubled or took their own lives is countless.
“But they had it all” we say, scratching our heads. But what is “it all”? Any reasonable definition of “all” must include the second world, the one each of these individuals struggled to live in. And in that case, with this definition, they did not have it “all”.
The Myth of Success.
Imagine our culture without the idea of “success” – what a free and liberating place that would be.
It is difficult to point to one thing and call it success, just as it is difficult to point to one thing and call it the universe. Is one rabbit the universe? Is it connected to the whole? Or is it just an independent part of the whole? If it is just a part of the whole, then does that imply it is separate to the whole?
To point at one thing in our culture and call it “success” suggests that other people must be pointing too. By this logic, the number of fingers pointing determines the size of the success. Things like gold medals, Nobel Prizes, being CEO of a Fortune 500 Company, and having a large bank balance or social media following… these are all crude approximations of ‘success’.
For an individual to be successful in any socially measured way, they must go where the fingers point – even if their heart points in a different direction. So, if the fingers move, they must move too. And if the fingers from the crowd signal for them to jump, then they must ask, “how high?”.
So Success Cannot Be Truly Defined By The Crowd?
If it cannot be defined by the crowd, then it must be the opposite. It must be that success is defined by the individual. Success is achieving the thing you set out to achieve – and when individuals don’t know what they want to achieve, they look outside for ideas. That’s when they become attached to whatever the fingers happen to be pointing at.
Big mistake. It still hasn’t come from YOU.
What you are looking for is in the External World – the Outer World. The goal in the Outer World should be to do whatever is necessary to build and maintain one’s Minimum Viable Lifestyle. That is all – everything else on top of the MVL is just a bonus.
Heath Ledger. Robin Williams. Michael Jackson. Amy Winehouse.
What point is Outer World success if the internal experience is bad? What point is Outer World success if all it achieves is slightly impressing others for a moment, and doing nothing to add value to your own life?
The Inner World
If life is a game, you are born looking at the Outer World through your two eyes – your two windows out into the world. You keep looking through these two windows as you grow up. You look on agonisingly at a magnificent, vibrant and rich world, full of wonder and spoils. You are so dazzled by looking out the window, you pay almost no attention to the other side of the window – the house you inhabit.
Though the Outer World is fun and exciting, you only spend a bit of time there. The house on the other hand is where you live. No matter how long you distract yourself in the Outer World, with its riches and fame, you will always come back to the Inner World – your home – to sleep.
In fact as you grow your artificial audience out in the world – comprising people who do not like their homes and their Internal Worlds, all they do is follow you around and mill around you. You are the distraction keeping them out of their reality, just as they are the distraction keeping you out of yours.
However this leaves you less places to hide, forcing you into the one remaining refuge – your house. Your home. Your Inner World.
You Cannot Escape Your Inner World
Though no one sees the inside of your home from the street or passing by unless you let them in, you can never escape it. If it is run down, weary and inhospitable, it is you who will suffer, not your friends in the Outer World.
That being said, Outer World wins are best achieved when you have the platform of a stable home and Inner World.
The Inner World is the obsession of Eastern Philosophies – the Outer World is the obsession of Western culture and consumerism.
What is most true is that these two worlds need not have anything to do with one another. No matter how nice the street or external facade of your house, this does not stop the inside being run down. The examples are countless.
So Remember
We live, each of us, in two worlds.
One is visible, the other is invisible.
One is determined only by others, the other is determined only by us.
One is the focus of the West, the other is the focus of the East.
Both are important. Both are different.
And they are completely unrelated from one another.
Success in one rarely relates to success in the other.
