So you want to get started right away, making changes and rumbling the earth. That’s great. We all do! But then reality sets in: you have to sell some of your precious time for money––time that could be spent organizing, researching, and working towards your radical goals. This is an especially difficult task for someone who, like me, abhors the very economy they are forced to contribute to.

Audre Lorde’s essay “The Uses of the Erotic: The Erotic as Power” describes, in beautiful language, this desire to continue experiencing the joy that we derive from pursuing our passions:

“For once we begin to feel deeply all the aspects of our lives, we begin to demand from ourselves and from our life-pursuits that they feel in accordance with that joy which we know ourselves to be capable of. … And this is a grave responsibility, projected from within each of us, not to settle for the convenient, the shoddy, the conventionally expected, nor the merely safe.”

At the end of this passage, Lorde charges us with the responsibility of refusing to settle for anything that’s merely conventional or safe. This is a great goal to aspire to, but some of our pursuits will inevitably suck the joy and passion out of us (namely, those pursuits which are required to pay the bills.)

Audre Lorde, in her own words: "black, lesbian, mother, warrior, poet."

Unless you have a job that allows you to be an activist for a living, you have two options: you can choose to live a double life of sorts, keeping your personal life, your work life, and your life as an activist separate; or you can merge all of these spheres and allow them to influence one another.

The latter path is much more fulfilling, and it’s capable of keeping you on track when the going gets tough. If you choose this path, you’ll have a support group everywhere you go. By bringing the joy and fulfillment that you experience from engaging with your passions into every other aspect of your life, you’ll transform your conventional experiences into extraordinary ones.

Let your passion influence all areas of your life, even in the simplest of ways. Becoming the person you wish to become, despite all of the obstacles that exist in our society––recall chapter two––is radical in itself. You set an example for others, and  you change the world in the process.

If you feel overwhelmed by your fast-paced life with its unending list of commitments, remind yourself of your passions, and let this push you through. When you’re in transit, read a book or listen to a podcast relating to your interests in order to ground yourself.

Talk to your coworkers and peers about your interests. Let your passion shine through, and your enthusiasm will become contagious for those whose receptivity to your message is there, but latent.

I got my first job as a teenager working at a local ice cream shop. At the time, I was just beginning to get into the issue of income inequality. I talked to my coworkers about the ideas I was reading about and listened to what they had to say. Most of them found that they thought along the same lines as me, and we had a number of  interesting conversations while dishing out exorbitantly-priced sundaes and contributing our precious labor time to an economy that we had no faith in.

Having my friends and coworkers tell me that they began investigating the issues we discussed convinced me that I was on the right path, and I’ve continued to allow my radical interests to intersect with other aspects of my life.

As a student, I allow my radical thought to influence my schoolwork. I’m able to twist most any essay prompt into something I can answer with ideas grounded in critical theory. As a writing tutor, I create conversations with my students aimed at helping them engage with their readings more deeply, tease out the connections between the ideas and their own lives, and become truly interested in what they’re writing.

Scribble ideas into your notebook while you’re waiting in line at the store. Read things relating to your interests during downtime at work. Talk to the people around you about your interests, and invite them to look at the work that you do. Become active in the union at your job, or try to create a union if your workplace doesn’t have one already (as long as organizing wouldn’t get you fired.) Bringing your radical ideas and tendencies into every aspect of your life will help propel you forward and keep you feeling fulfilled during your more monotonous experiences.

Of course, the most powerful thing you can do is to devote a chunk of your free time to pursuits that advance your goals and resonate with your values. This is bound to infuse you with energy and passion that will spill over into the less sexy aspects of your life. We’ll discuss this next.

Amanda Fox-Rouch (Hunter College)

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Consider the following quote, which is commonly attributed to M.K. Gandhi:

“Your beliefs become your thoughts,

Your thoughts become your words,

Your words become your actions,

Your actions become your habits,

Your habits become your values,

Your values become your destiny.”

If there’s anyone who had insight about the importance of thoughts and actions in turning our dreams into reality, it would be Gandhi. The man made non-violent action a habit of his, and his legacy became his radical use of non-violent action to achieve political change.

The above quote acknowledges that thoughts are fundamental in leading us to whatever end goals we have. Without believing that we could achieve anything, we’d be paralyzed. Even rolling out of bed in the morning takes a certain amount of belief––some days require more belief than others, to be sure.

But right now, I’d like to suggest that a way to kick-start the process of shaping your destiny is to take actions that convince yourself that you are already whatever you want to become.

In essence, I’m endorsing the “fake it til you make it” method of achieving change.

By donning a dinosaur suit and acting like a terrifying and ever-powerful T-Rex, you will become exactly that. Image credit: hyperboleandahalf.blogspot.com

According to this interesting article on Brain Pickings, “reverse-engineering psychology” is a fancy way of describing the “fake it til you make it” mantra. It’s a process we can use to change our habits and, eventually, the very essence of who we are.

The article summarizes psychology research and personal anecdotes from the likes of Ben Franklin that suggest something remarkable: our actions inform our beliefs. Of course, believing that you can become a certain way is the first step towards doing it. But the actual process of coming to believe that we are whatever we think we are results from the rationalization that we go through when observing the actions that we take.

Let’s make this idea more concrete by way of an example.

You go to a party where you know there will be tons of interesting people you haven’t met. You’re notorious for being the “quiet one” basically everywhere you go, but you’re dying to change this. So this time, following the “fake it til you make” it mantra, you decide to do something a bit different.

The first step is to hold firmly in your mind whatever you’d like to be: for tonight, you want to be an amicable person who has no problem interacting with others. The second step––which is arguably more crucial because it will make you realize that you already hold the potential to be the aforementioned person––is to act accordingly.

So, perhaps primed by a glass of liquid courage or two (but no more than that––you don’t want your technique to be sloppy), you discard all self-doubt and simply begin colliding with other people. If you act like you are thirsty for good conversation, good conversation is what you’ll get. You move about the room, hopping from one individual or group to another, and by the end of the night you realize that there’s not one person in that room you haven’t introduced yourself to.

After leaving the party, your brain begins to rationalize what just happened. As you ride the train home, your mind replays scenes from the party over and over again. Your brain has to find an explanation for what just happened––that’s what brains do––and it eventually concludes that you’re not so shy after all. In fact, you can be the life of the party. You were the life of the party.

But perhaps you’re convinced that this was just a fluke. The only way to fully convince yourself, then, that you are actually as confident as you acted at the party is to repeat the experience over and over again––in essence, make it a habit of yours. Now that you have this party experience under your belt, it will be much easier to repeat it next time and perform even better.

By continuing to be the life of the party wherever you go, even if you’re just faking confidence at first, it will get easier with time to perform accordingly, and your brain will eventually become convinced that you are the life of the party.

Let’s take a look at a more sober example.

You have a presentation coming up. You’re nervous about it even though you’ve rehearsed it a ton and you clearly know the material inside and out. Before you get up there, stop, breathe, and empty your mind.

When it’s your time to present, turn on your charisma switch. But, wait, how do you do this if you’re convinced that you don’t have a switch? It’s quite simple. You emit confidence through one of the most powerful tools of persuasion that everyone has at their disposal: body language.

You want to basically emulate everything that charismatic people do. Stand up straight. Let your hands rest at your sides rather than clutching them in front of your crotch or your stomach. Gesture freely. Speak loudly and clearly. Make eye contact with your  audience.

If you do this successfully, the audience won’t know the difference, and neither will your own brain after a few minutes. You’ll eventually begin to genuinely feel the confidence that you were only faking at first. You’ll become, in essence, a self-fulfilling prophecy simply by imitating the qualities you’d like to possess.

If you wear this button and act like a doctor, people will likely treat you like one. Warning: This is not a good idea. Becoming a doctor requires a series of actions that do not involve wearing this button.

If you want to be a writer, write. If you want to be an artist, make art. If you want to be a crappy customer service representative, dole out crappy customer service like your life depends on it. If you want to keep getting the same things you’ve always gotten, keep doing the same things you’ve always done.

You already contain the person that you want to be (and all of the people that you don’t want to be) inside of you. It’s just a matter of acting accordingly in order to bring out the qualities, and therefore the people, that you’d like to bring out.

If you change your actions, you will change your habits. If you change your habits, you will change the way you think about yourself. In turn, you will change your life.

Trust me. I’m a doctor.

Amanda Fox-Rouch (Hunter College)

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