The Heaviest Loads – ElPropósito4 min de lectura

Which loads are worth carrying on the journey?

Photo by Adli Wahid on Unsplash

There’s a kind of letting go that brings well-being, sets us free and gives us all the focus we need to perform at our best. One of the formulas I admire most (after Einstein’s E=mc²) is Performance = Potential minus Interference. Tim Gallwey proposed it to describe, with great simplicity and depth, how everything that gets in our way through life drags down our performance and our ability to be the best version of ourselves. We carry a number of loads on our shoulders, loads that consume and drain our energy. What are they?

It’s odd to write, but one of the heaviest loads may be our own knowledge. In a world changing faster and faster, at the speed of thought, the idea that a little knowledge could be enough to solve a given problem seems almost impossible to me. I say this because of the sheer vastness of what there is to learn. Look at a library and you’ll see how small one life is next to all the books we could read. We simply don’t have enough life to read even a decent share of them. What can we do? What’s within our control?

Of all the subjects out there, only a few could ever be "mastered." That’s why it matters to be aware of all the loads we carry inside. The biggest also include our beliefs and everything we keep telling ourselves or making up to give things meaning. Many of them are unreal and wouldn’t survive a second of real life. We live surrounded by countless baseless fears, and they’re nothing but loads, noise and interference for the potential we carry within.

The ways to free ourselves from those loads are as varied as the people in the world, yet they all follow one pattern: they’re inside us, and the answers come from a particular kind of reflection. A fear, for example, comes in two kinds: real or invented. It’s real when it can truly harm us (a snake, say). It’s invented when it’s a dragon. Most of our fears are unfounded. They’re dragons, beliefs or thoughts we keep believing can or will hurt us, and all they do is waste time and energy.

The heaviest loads are mostly the ones we’ve carried for a long stretch of life. Feedback we ignored at the time, an honest word we didn’t believe, a value we refused to learn, a reflection that showed us the best path while we kept going down the wrong one, advice we wouldn’t take, a question we never dared to answer. The heaviest loads are everything that undermines our potential, keeping us, every time we carry them, from moving in the direction and at the speed we want. How do we set them down? By daring to live a life guided by our Purpose, a purpose we know holds our values and our essence.

Warm regards,

Rodrigo Baccaro

P.S. This week’s VELA (what I was Watching, Listening to, Reading and Learning):

• Watching: The Grand Tour. I’m a fan of these three and have followed their shows since Top Gear, and I’ve especially enjoyed this one. The new version on Amazon has a much more distinctive touch, especially the historical details and the storylines.
• Listening to: Maps of Meaning. A very unusual book by Jordan Peterson, which I’ve been able to hear and understand through his podcast. I’m looking for a copy, and it will join this year’s reading list very soon.
• Reading: Letters from a Stoic (Letters to Lucilius). A gem in my hands, one of the most wonderful books I thank God and life for letting me read. One of those books we should all read at least once.
• Learning: Buffettology. I’m continuing with this wonderful book, which I expect to finish before January is out, though it’s one I’ll keep coming back to for the rest of my life.

Author: Rodrigo Baccaro

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