#NOW by Max McKeown

Author:Max McKeown
Language: eng
Format: epub, pdf
Publisher: Aurum
Published: 2016-01-15T00:00:00+00:00

In all these the Nowist mindset is helpful since you are more likely to be open to new experiences, seeking to learn, and hopeful about your future.

Nowists seek change alongside movement and, as a result, will often find themselves in better places when they are hit by unanticipated events. They do not merely cope, they re-scope what is possible. Like comic book superheroes, bitten by spiders or bathed in radioactivity, they transform.

For Joseph, a key message is that growth is a journey, and it is here, again, that a Nowist mindset helps. He argues that stress brings about certain kinds of growth because it is this destructive level of power that unexpectedly transforms the person, their philosophy and their patterns of living. The Nowist expects, and seeks out, the unexpected. They want to be remade, and actively push towards transformative can’t-go-back experiences.

In this way, you instinctively value changes that occur in your life, often as they are happening. And you express changes in your perspective through taking action to change your life. All of these are steps recommended by Joseph. Some people must learn to take them, and must sometimes painfully become ‘active agents in their own lives’ but Nowists are already active and leap, often with humour and joy, towards the growth to be found in challenges.

This humour and joy was seen in the attitude of an aid worker when he was unexpectedly imprisoned in Iran. When asked how he survived twenty-eight days of solitary confinement he explained:

By the end, I was doing 1,500 sit-ups and 400 push-ups a day. I told myself, I’m going to do a really long workout from breakfast until dinner, and my being here is the second part.

He went on to say that he found messages scratched into the walls in Farsi saying ‘You can get through this,’ ‘Don’t ever give up,’ and ‘Nobody stays here for ever.’

All of these were messages of hope and movement – many from previous political prisoners, alone in a cell, extending their #Now beyond the present moment to a future where they would be free. They were able to imagine another person who would need encouragement. Former inmates reached mentally beyond imprisonment towards hope for eventual freedom, and beyond fear to action in the present.

By the time the aid worker was released he was over thirty thousand sit-ups and twelve thousand push-ups ahead of most of us. And he was still laughing. People like him look for growth and adventure. They have often been adventuring their whole lives, so are not easily overwhelmed when unexpected shocks arrive. Even when those are as dramatic and awful as imprisonment in a foreign country.

This is in part because the adventuring tendencies of a Nowist are joined by an enjoyment of their own nature. People in a Nowist mindset tend to challenge themselves to see what impressive feats they can manage, and love the whole experience, even if they fail. Sometimes the whole thing is funnier and more memorable if they don’t succeed.

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