One day in 2013, I stepped outside my then-girlfriends house. As I was standing in the narrow alley, I looked up at the roof of the building across the street:
I don’t know why of all moments, it was this one when I realized:
“I am small.”
I had been on top of huge towers before, stood in front of skyscrapers, but for whatever reason, this time I went into aerial view in my mind.
And then I zoomed out. All the way.
Look, I made an animation to show you (with the exact spot):
That was the moment it finally clicked for me.
“I am just one, microscopically small piece in this huge, huge world.”
Some might say this is depressing. I thought it was the most liberating feeling ever.
When we mess up, we worry about the few people we think will care. Invariably, there are even fewer who really do. In the grand scheme of things, the number of people we’re scared to fail in front of becomes negligible.
- When you fail an exam in college and have to repeat it – nobody cares.
- When you waste 6 months trying to start a tea cosy drop-shipping business and it tanks – nobody cares.
- When your relationship falls apart because the partner you chose was just a terrible fit – nobody cares.
What this showed me is that I’m playing the show of my life on a very small stage – and in front of mostly empty seats.
Think about it like this: If you do something that reaches 1,000,000 people, you will have interacted with 0.01% of the world.
That’s a lot of freedom to fail.
Maybe I had this reaction precisely because the place was so insignificant. Bill Gates could stand in that alley and get the same feeling.
No cars driving past you. No people passing by. Just chirping birds and the almost palpable indifference of those old, majestic buildings.
Zoom out and you’ll see: nobody cares.
You’re the center of your own, tiny universe. But not everyone else’s.
There is wonderful freedom in that.
