The person with whom you’re going to spend the most time in your life is yourself.

Read out loud this sounds a bit depressing, doesn’t it?

You might argue that you’re just you—not multiple people. You can’t step outside yourself and look at “you” as someone else. And that’s fair, but that’s exactly what this blog is about. It’s about you and the different versions of you that exist simultaneously.

So how many versions of you do exist?

Well that’s acutally the wrong question to ask. There are so many ways in which you can dissect yourself. One is by age. There’s the one-year-old version of you, the two-year-old version of you, and so on and so forth. Another way you can see yourself is through the different emotions you experience. There’s the sad you, the angry you, the anxious you, and maybe the happy version of you also exists. You can also see yourself through the different responsibilities you have in life: as a student, as a friend, as a sibling, as a child. There are numerous other ways in which you can think about yourself.

I highly encourage you to think about some of the different ways you’d like to view yourself. If you come up with something interesting please feel free to post that in the comments (yes, the blog now has comments!).

This idea isn’t just something that I made up. Part of this idea comes from something called IFS (Internal Family System). This is going to sound very cringy to some of you, but hold tight for a while.

There will always be a part of you that is unsatisfied and unhappy with life, and there is no way to completely get around that. So what you do is try to contact the part of you that is unhappy. How exactly you “contact” that version of yourself varies from person to person. You may imagine him or her as a separate figure or as a voice or feeling inside you.

Either way, you ask it this simple question: What is it that you need from me?

Things get a bit blurry here, because the “me” asking the question is also just another part of you. But essentially, you’re talking to yourself—intentionally. Think of it as a form of self-therapy.

That might sound like bullshit. And yes, I agree—it isn’t that interesting. However, it gets more exciting if you start to think of yourself across time.

What did your 12-year-old self do? Did he or she achieve something that you are proud of? Did he or she make mistakes that you regret? Did you fulfill the promises you made to your 12-year-old self? Take your 12-year-old self out for lunch. Have a chat with him or her. You might be surprised by what comes up.

I’ll leave all the other possibilities to you. Have fun playing around with this idea and see where it takes you. Once again, please do comment if you come up with something interesting. Just be careful and don’t become schizophrenic…

One last thing: you don’t have to limit yourself to the versions of you that already exist. You can create new ones.

Imagine that the confident version of you doesn’t exist (I’m totally not choosing this as an example because it’s personal). From this point onwards, you can create that version of yourself. At first, it may be hard to remain in that version for a long time because it is forced. However, you don’t need to be in that state all the time. Just tap into it when you need to give a presentation or when you have an important meeting.

Believe it or not, this is what actors do. If you see actors receiving awards, you’ll notice that they often seem nervous. But in the TV shows or films they acted in, they seemed so confident. They’re basically using this technique. I was listening to a TED talk on how to be confident and the speaker said, the easiest way to be confident is to imagine yourself as a superhero.

Try becoming Thomas from Peaky Blinders or Patrick Bateman from the movie American Psycho.

Well folks that’s all I’ve got to say right now. I know the topic is a bit abstract but there are actual applications of using this technique.

Have interesting conversations with yourself. Until next time