One of the many errors I’ve made in life is putting too much stock in potential. I’ve stayed in places and formed relationships with people in the hope that something would change. I believed that where I am can be better, and it could be pride that tells me that I’m the one to fix it. We like to call this hope, but what if hope is a veil that blinds us to what is occurring in the present moment? What if we are so caught up in the future that we don’t take care of what is in front of us?

Looking Towards the Future

To say that a thing or a person has potential is to point to the future, suggesting that the item or person is insufficient right now. Consequently, this means we take for granted what is right in front of us for some further goal. This is probably more impactful if we talk about ourselves. Instead of loving who we are right now, we look towards our potential. It could be getting a promotion or losing weight. This hope for the future might actually be a distraction. It’s constant goal setting because we will never reach the goal. We are the donkey being moved by the carrot, but never eating it.

My firsthand account of this is my fitness goals. Regardless of what I wanted my body to look like, I was never satisfied. As someone who was overweight, I knew I had the potential to lose weight and worked toward this goal. Once I had lost weight, I thought I was too skinny, and it was time to bulk up. I was never satisfied. I never really realized until now how much I put myself down, wanting to be a fantasy version of myself.

Many people are caught up in this fantasy when it comes to relationships. A person shows you who they are, but the response is, “I can fix them.” You see the loving person they can potentially be, so you stay just so you can be the one to save them. As the relationship continues, we seem to be the only ones hurting.

The Fantasy of Improvement

All these examples point to the idea that improvement is a way of life. It seems like the only reason we are alive is to realize or attain some potential. As a result, we have savings account targets, unread books on a shelf, and a 5-year plan. All these things look towards the future, while dismissing the present moment. The idea of improvement comes from the internal error of one day arriving. Once I have this amount of money in the bank, once I’ve mastered this skill, once I have this job, I can rest. Only then will I be safe. What does this mean for life without these things? Are we essentially using the present moment as a waiting room until “real life” happens?

The truth that we, as future-oriented individuals, must come to is that the future version of us only lives in our heads. It isn’t real. The competent, rich, good-looking person we want to be will never come if you don’t believe it now. The truth is, believing we will be safe in the future means we feel unsafe right now. Instead of feeling the uncertainty and unpredictability of life, we build a fortress of goals to pretend that we are in control. This means we replace the vibrant possibilities of life with the dead certainty of a plan.

The truth is, we don’t want to improve our lives. It’s what we want to solve. Yet life is not a mystery to be solved, only experienced. Instead of flowing with the river, we’d rather freeze it because something static is manageable. This is the issue we have with change. The river doesn’t freeze. Layoffs occur, markets crash, and our bodies decay. We want to prevent this negativity by constantly believing in a future that meets our expectations of positivity, even though it consistently does otherwise. The future you isn’t coming to save you.

Burn Your Potential

What if instead of always trying to become, we just be? Our minds will tell us that if we don’t seek to be better, we won’t do anything. We believe that if we are not constantly improving, we are dead. One can look at nature and see that this isn’t true. The tree that reaches the heavens has no concept of a future self. It lives with zero ambition and zero hesitation because it aligns with what it is, not what it could be. If we are too caught up in what could be, we spend less time appreciating what is right now.

That doesn’t mean we stop working. Our actions will remain. The job still needs to be done, and the bills will still be paid. The only difference is understanding that you are perfect the way you are right now, without the need to get “better.” You’ve already won the race. This is much better than staying in the race, where the finish line keeps moving.

The state we are trying to achieve is total hoplessness. Yes, I know this made you cringe, but anything that causes anxiety is probably a good thing if it is making you think. To be without hope is to be without fear. We don’t have to wait until things get better to live for today. It might be better to say that you’ve lost. Maybe it’s actually a virtue to give up. No, this isn’t an excuse for nihilism. Depression is no different than hope in the sense that depression says the future will be worse. Hope and depression disregard the present moment. I don’t need my body to look a certain way, nor do I need a relationship to complete me. Because of this loss, I’m finally free to just be.

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