This is a follow-up to How you see yourself. This short piece can be read on its own or after it. It’s part of a collection on self-improvement.

BMO (bˈiːmo͡ʊ)

BMO is a character from Adventure Time, they are a small robot with sentience and my favorite character.

In S05E28 it’s revealed BMO stands for BE MORE.

That’s all there is to it. Imagine yourself as a multifunctional robot and ask yourself:

• What is less than optimal in me?
• What can I realistically improve?
• What will be the consequences of each change?

You have to be able to look at yourself and at least see some stuff to improve.

I believe you should always have a note, a file, or a notebook page where you try to put into words the kind of person you can reasonably become.

What is less than optimal? Why?

Finding what is less than optimal is relatively easy.

Just write down anything that comes to your mind that is not at the best.

This helps you see yourself from the outside.

What can I realistically improve?

In this list there will be things that are impossible or close to impossible to achieve.

“I wish I was taller” is not realistic unless you are a teenager or willing to go through experimental surgeries.

What will be the consequences of each change?

This is something I added recently to the protocol.

By the time you read this The demon you eat might already be out of the drafts.

One of the little ideas in there is that the person you are changes all future possible states you can achieve.

So it is important to think about how these improvement might lead you to be worse off overall. Think about the direction of your character rather than just the collection of the next states.

Being more transparent and lying less might put you in a position where you are seen as brash and rude some years down the road. This ends up being suboptimal in the long run.