[읽기: Elle Luna] The Crossroads of Should and Must

출처 1: Elle Luna. "The Crossroads of Should and Must". Medium. Apr 8, 2014.

※ 발췌 (excerpt):

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Over the past year I’ve chosen Must again and again. And it was petrifying. And at times it was dark. But I would never, ever, trade this past year for anything. This essay is my three biggest takeaways from the experience. It’s for anyone who is thinking of making the jump from Should to Must. Anyone looking to follow the energy deep within their chest but aren’t quite sure how.

Should is how others want us to show up in the world--how we’re supposed to think, what we ought to say, what we should or shouldn’t do. It’s the vast array of expectations that others layer upon us. When we choose Should the journey is smooth, the risk is small.

Must is different—there aren’t options and we don’t have a choice.

Must is who we are, what we believe, and what we do when we are alone with our truest, most authentic self. It’s our instincts, our cravings and longings, the things and places and ideas we burn for, the intuition that swells up from somewhere deep inside of us. Must is what happens when we stop conforming to other people’s ideals and start connecting to our own. Because when we choose Must, we are no longer looking for inspiration out there. Instead, we are listening to our calling from within, from some luminous, mysterious place.

Must is why Van Gogh painted his entire life without ever receiving public recognition. Must is why Mozart performed Don Giovani and Coltrane played his new sound, even as the critics called it ugly. Must is why that lawyer in his thirties spent three years writing his first novel only to be rejected by three dozen publishers. ( ... ... )

Picasso's life blended seamlessly with his work. It was all one huge swirling mix of bullfights and beaches and booze. And we could tell. Because to look at one of Picasso's canvases is quite literally to look into his soul. And this is exactly what happens when our life, our essence, in one and the same with our work. It's when job descriptions and titles no longer make sense because we don't go to work─we are the work.

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What if who we are and what we do become one and the same? What if our work is so thoroughly autobiographical that we can't parse the product from the person. What if our jobs are our careers and our callings?

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Sectin 1: Choosing Must creates the kind of work that puts ripples through the universe. But it start as a whisper, a call from somewhere far away.

The path to my Must started with a recurring dream about a white room.

Concrete floors, white walls, and a matress on the floor. That was it. And I would visit this room practically every night. One day, a friend asked the question that would forever change the course of my life; “Have you ever thought about finding your dream in real life?” I hadn't, but later, I began to wonder ...

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Section 2: Choosing Must often requires a leap of faith. If you've ever peered out over the edge of a cliff, you've felt the fear.

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The harder road, trickier, and more sustainable, is to make shifts ever day within our existing reality. To integrate, not obliterate. For Sheryl Sandberg, ^Lean In^ was a tiny yet growing piece of her heart for years until it exploded into the world--all the while she was still running one of the world's biggest companies and raising two children. Weaving our Must into our existing realing is about co-designng small opportunities within our teams. It's about setting aside quite time to be alone with our thoughts, and then actually following through. It's about doing one small thing, anything, to honor our personal truth--today.

But while money and schedules are the reasons cited most often for not making the leap, I believe the real reason is something deeper and far scarier.

While Must comes from somewhere deep inside of us, a beautiful truth that calls to us from within, Should comes from somewhere external, a place that's equally important and powerful. Should comes from the place we call home, the people we love, the world we've created--the people, places, and things that define us.

It's here, standing at the cliff's edge, peering down below, hearing the siren's call, that we feeling the terrifying prospect of abandonment, failure, and humiliation. And this is the exact moment when people decide against taking the leap--to avoid that great unknown, that transformative place where nothing is written, nothing is guaranteed, and everything is possible.

Grab a piece of paper and write the numbers one through then on the left side of the page. At the top, title it “What am I so afraid of?” This is your Worst Case Scenario list. This is your list of things that make you think “They're all going to laugh at me.” These are your largest fears, and you've got ten minutes to write them down.

Go. Line by line, walk yourself through each line. Would they really laugh at you? They would? How do you feel about that? Line by line, have a conversation about all of your fears. Would you really be homeless? Would you really be alone? Do you really need that much money? This is a list of your tradeoffs. And they are the biggest things standing in your way.

TRADEOFF: A SITUATION IN WHICH YOU MUST CHOSSE BETWEEN TWO THINGS THAT ARE OPPOSITE AND CANNOT BE HAD AT THE SAME TIME.


Secion 3: Choosing Must is a daily practice, a recurring choice. Just because we chose Should yesterday doesn't mean we'll choose Must today. And just because we chose Must today doesn't mean we won't slip back into Should tomorrow.

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As time passed, I found myself choosing Must more often than Should. And over time, continuing to choose Must opened doors into worlds I never could have imagined. Here are three qualities I've integrated into my daily practice that have helped me achieve a sustaimable Must.

Solitude

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Focus

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Bring others in


Section 4: Those who choose must.

When who we are and what we do are one and the same, we are walking the roadof Must. When we choose Must, what we create ^is^ ourselves. It is a ^body^ of work. When we make something because we Must, not just because we can, it is the difference between disposable products that last a few years and life-affirming movements that sustain generations.

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