This weekend - we watched two movies - both picked by my 21 year old daughter who's staying over in between apartments, and house sitting jobs. I say this because she's at a prime age of figuring out 'who she is, and who she could become', and temporarily couch-surfing with her parents is a part of that journey.
Saturday, she picked '13 Going on 30' - a 22 year old comedy starring Jennifer Garner. It's a lightweight film about an awkward 13 year old girl who, in the midst of a bad birthday party, makes a wish that she was 'Thirty and Flirty', as described in her favorite magazine. Little does she know, magic glitter happens to fall on her from a gift given by her best friend Matty, who she's just yelled at for, well, being himself, an awkward 13 year old boy.
Of course, as you might suspect, she wakes up in the body of her 30 year old self, spends the movie discovering that being who she thought she wanted to be wasn't so great, that Matty, who grows up to be a young Mark Ruffalo, is actually pretty awesome, and takes these life lessons back with her following another emotional scene involving magic glitter that returns her to her 13 year old self. A fun movie that my daughter said was 'transformational' when she watched it at 13. Last night, the pick was
'Everything, Everywhere, All At Once', starring Michelle Yeoh, Jamie Lee Curtis, and Ke Huy Quan (from Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom and Goonies!). This is out in theatres, but also available for 5.99 on Amazon Prime, which is how we consumed it.
It's about as different from '13 Going on 30' as you can get, in terms of complexity. Yeoh winds up manically discovering who she is in 100s of multiverses as she chases a villain who appears intent on killing her. She has no idea what's going on, of course, and spends the movie figuring out how to leverage who she is in these universes in order to return to her 'alpha' self, and save her reality as she knows it, by, of course setting it on a new course.
The movie is a bit of an acid trip, not that I know that feeling first hand, but I feel safe in my assumption. But essentially, it's the same plot: protagonist is unhappy with current life, something happens to allow them to see their life in a different perspective, and they return to the present with a new outlook on life. Heck, it's George Bailey in 'It's a Wonderful Life' all over again.
Honestly, you could probably identify this formula in half or more of the movies being made - it's a basic transformational plot. This genre, of something magically (or psuedo-scientifically) moving into a different self simply moves it along faster, and comes with the added bonus of lessons learned being able to apply to the younger self, instead of only being learned as an older self. If only we knew then, what we know now.
So why am I telling you about these movies? Because we have the magic to do what these characters did right between our ears. The imagination to picture ourselves in the future if we stay on our current path. We don't think that way though, do we. Usually we spend our energy looking backward, often regretting what we've done to get here, and our imagination focusing on what we could have done differently. This can be helpful - and Winning Anyway involves reviewing the past to a degree - so I'm not suggesting it's a negative action, unless you stay in the past too long, or too often.
What if...you looked at the many people you could become, instead? Who you might be in a different universe, or who you might be in 17 years, or heck, in 17 days? What choices would you have to make to be the version of yourself you want to be? This may sound like an easy ask - after all, we all have goals we want to achieve. But I'm suggesting we go deeper. Who will you be if those goals ARE achieved - or are NOT? Do you have the right goals? Will you truly be happy? Will you be who you want to be, not just once you've achieved them, but after taking all the actions required TO achieve them? What sacrifices will you have to make - and do you want to make them?
By imagining FORWARD - you might save yourself time, pain, and even a few obstacles along the way. You can imagine one path - the straight line to the goals you currently have, as young Jenna did in '13 Going on 30', or you can get really intense and picture multiple versions of yourself - good, bad, and all places in between - and come out of it with some ideas that are completely new ways of thinking.
Looking back has it's place, and while it can inform your future, you still can't change the past. Looking horizontally and/or forward into who you can become? That's a WinAnyway strategy that might just change the game for you in ways you've never imagined.
Want some help imagining your best message? Then developing and delivering it to the world? Set up a free consult with me on my Calendly (https://calendly.com/rich-hopkins) - we'll take a look at the speech, and the speaker you can be the next time you deliver from stage.
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