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An Unexpected Remedy for Loneliness, Anxiety, and Other Personal Problems
Sometimes, it's not about figuring out the perfect solution to what's making you unhappy.
Have you ever had a problem you couldn't seem to solve?
You probably pondered solutions over and over, maybe losing sleep.
I bet you were trying to solve the wrong problem.
When you can't find the answer, it is often because you are not asking the correct question.
To illustrate this, let's take the question, "How might I find a spouse?"
Just because it ends with a question mark doesn't mean it's a question.
Drop "how might I," and you get a declarative statement: "Find a spouse."
This could be regarded as an answer.
So finding a spouse can be regarded as either an answer or a question.
But what question is "Find a spouse" the answer to?
There could be many. Some possibilities are:
How might I get companionship?
How might I get taken care of?
How might I stop working?
How might I have (more) sex?
How might I get my parents to stop nagging me?
How might I move to a better economic situation?
How might I improve my social life?
How might I keep up with my friends?
Each of these questions, regarded as a problem, has many possible solutions.
Finding a spouse is just one possible solution to each of these.
In actuality, it may not be a very good solution to any of these problems.
Experience has shown me that one of the main causes of losing sleep over a problem is that we think we are dealing with a question when in fact we are dealing with an answer (a solution) that turns
out not to be a good fit for our actual problem.
A way around this dilemma is to ask, "What would it do for me if I solved this problem?" The answer to this can then be converted into a new, more generative question.
If I believe that I want a spouse to satisfy my need for companionship, the real problem (question) is, "How might I find companionship?"
Finding a spouse now becomes simply one of many possible ways to find companionship.
By changing the question, I have altered my point of view and dramatically expanded the number of possible solutions.
The situation can be illustrated diagrammatically as such:
Because I haven't been able to find a spouse thus far, I can take a different tack: I can ask what finding a spouse would do for me.
I believe it would give me companionship.
So, the new question is, "How might I get companionship?"
The diagram below shows possible answers.
I am no longer stuck with trying to find a spouse. It's that simple.
Identifying what you expect from the solution to the problem you're stuck on brings you to a higher level and, ultimately, a better question.
Changing the question is often enough to lead to a satisfactory resolution and to make the original difficulty disappear.
In this example, if I figure out how to get companionship without getting married, the issue of finding a spouse becomes moot.
This procedure can be repeated starting at ta higher level. If the question of how I might find companionship becomes difficult to solve, I would ask, "What would it do for me if I found
companionship?"
Possible answers might be:
I would feel less bored.
I would get social stimulation.
I would get intellectual stimulation.
I would feel less lonely.
I would feel more secure.
By choosing the one that seems most resonant (I would feel less lonely) and converting it into a question, I get a new question.
"How might I feel less lonely?" is a long way from the original question, "How do I find a spouse?"
Many married people feel lonely within their marriages, so clearly even solving the original problem (finding a spouse) might not solve my actual problem of being lonely.
Now, the situation looks like this:
Use this procedure whenever you find yourself stuck and losing sleep over an issue.
Often, it can open up a wide range of new solutions.
The original problem disappears, and the way to proceed is immediately obvious.
For this to work, though, you need to be honest enough not to hang on to the original question, no matter how comfortable you have become with it.
There is a tendency to rationalize our dysfunctional behavior with excuses.
Remember, we shy away from labeling them as excuses; instead, we call them reasons.
Of course, they are goooood reasons, right?
There isn't always a single answer to the question, "How would I benefit if I had a solution to my problem?"
It is simply a matter of using a different how-might-I question and repeating this procedure until you feel the Aha! that comes from recognizing your actual issue.
I’ve never enjoyed parties, but I’ve always forced myself to.
However cheerful or awkward the evening goes, I always wake up the next day mapping up my words, retrieving memories from blurriness that only succeed in conceiving a rueful self-disgust that
lasts throughout the day.
Since summer started, along with the sense of ‘normality’ that mass vaccination injected back into our daily lives, so did the sense of feeling left out.
As a bunch of invitations piles up in my DMS, I’m feeling alien, cast out in this reborn social world that, not long ago, I craved desperately.
Here are three things to remind yourself of when you’re feeling left out.
#1. Here is better than ‘there,’ wherever that is
Whenever I go for a long time without socializing, a sense of guilt takes hold of my mind’s crevices.
Essayist Susan Sontag described it best in her diaries:
“I don’t feel guilt at being unsociable, though I may sometimes regret it because my loneliness is painful.
But when I move into the world, it feels like a moral fall — like seeking love in a whorehouse.”
Why is guilt spread underneath the decisions we make in our social life?
Perhaps the guilt stems from the feeling that life is elsewhere, and if we were there, and not here, all our absences would be filled, our desires satiated.
If somebody just uploaded a picture on Instagram of today’s party that you missed or weren’t even invited to begin with, think that your cozy nook, that is here, is better than
there.
Prioritize spaces where you feel at ease, for that’s when life can truly be lived.
#2. No, parties won’t give you ‘contacts’
For a long time, I had this ongoing capitalistic voice in my mind that kept urging me to go to parties because, according to it, “that’s how contacts are made, and contacts are important for the
future;” whatever that means.
As much as I wanted to take off this capitalistic pair of sunglasses — a shade where we see people as card keys for a thing called future — I realize I’m constantly reinforcing it by barricading
behind these social interaction badges, i.e., clubs, squads, memberships, fraternities, sororities, workshops, residencies, fellowships, you name it.
What makes them ‘exclusive,’ as the word blatantly boasts, is their ostracizing nature.
The same happens with parties; they are coveted for a reason: we think that by being invited to a party thrown by a selective group, we’ll be able to meet the ‘right’ people, and get the [insert
the thing you want] deal that we aspire to get.
But truth is, parties are full of people with altered consciousness, people too high and too drunk to bond beyond a simple night’s blurry memory.
Parties won’t get you contacts.
Hard work and time will.
Reunions and get-togethers won’t spontaneously generate ‘contacts’.
#3. Life doesn’t happen on a phone screen
Whenever I see an Instagram story of my master’s program classmates hanging out, I think of Taylor Swift’s all supermodels squad a couple of years ago and realize sometimes selective pods aren’t born to bring together, but to tear apart, to secrete
segregation.
What I mean is, we all knew Taylor Swift hung out with six-foot supermodels, but then it became a publicity tactic, which spread a crooked message online: only pretty girls are rewarded with the
privilege of socializing and having a great time.
In other words, her squad excluded way more than it included.
And the only reason thousands of girls might have felt like they didn’t belong to any sort of communal gathering is that they saw it online.
It’s so easy to open any social media app, look at a picture or video for two seconds, and mentally create a whole narrative out of it.
Life doesn’t happen on a phone screen.
And if you see a photo dump of the party you missed or weren’t invited to, it doesn’t matter now, for it’s already past tense.
Final thoughts
The communal sense of having lived through a pandemic together is about to crumble and give way to new forms of exclusion.
This other type of loneliness, different from the quarantine loneliness, will cast its spell on some of us, taking hold of our malleable minds and creating the sense that we’re feel left out of
life.
But if quarantined left any piece of wisdom on us, we must strive for a type of communion that disregards the statistics each one of us represents, without caring about our prestige, or our lack
of it.
But first and foremost, we must remember life is happening here, right now, and you are part of it.
Turn Negative Thoughts Into Positive Ones
How to avoid negative thoughts?
With all the negative events and the hardship of our daily activities, you might be thinking that it is normal to have negative thoughts.
But negative thoughts are not the by-product of bad situations.
They are the direct results of our personal assessment of our experiences.
However, our thinking pattern affects our brain in many ways.
Our brain is plastic.
It means that it is capable of change and environmental adaptation.
Also, our brain is a rich and nutritious soil that whatever you put in it will grow.
Both negative and positive thoughts have a direct impact on the brain.
If you negatively interpret your experiences, then you are cultivating negative thoughts.
Unfortunately, negative thoughts can negatively affect your overall being. It does not only impair you psychologically but also physically.
Both he and his colleagues found in their study that with ample training, positivity can be achieved.
In his report in the National Institute of Health in 2015, Dr. Davidson said:
"The results suggest that taking time to learn skills to self-generate positive emotions can help us become healthier, more social, more resilient versions of
ourselves."
Thus learning how to be positive is a skill. It can be learned by anybody. But how can we train our minds and fill it with positive thoughts?
Most the experts suggest seven common things to do to be happy.
Here are the quick tips:
1. Do good things to others.
Doing good things for others has two benefits.
First, you help others to overcome something.
Second, it makes you happier.
Doing good things can be as simple as helping an old man crossing the street.
Or, offering your seat to a pregnant woman on the bus.
The thing is, a simple act of help makes you feel better.
2. Appreciate simple things.
Most people find it hard to stay happy because they focus on the negative side of their experiences. They forget that their world does not only revolve around a few negative things.
If you want to be happy, spend time appreciating simple things around you.
It could be a beautiful sunrise, a bird, or a pet.
These things have a significant impact on your well-being.
3. Develop a strong social relationship.
Your social interaction can do so much for your happiness.
Widen your world by making new acquaintances.
The better your social connection, the happier you will become.
And happiness, not negative thoughts, makes you healthier and allows you to
enjoy a longer life.
4. Have an attainable goal.
Be realistic in your goals.
People who have impossible goals often end up frustrated and stressed.
Furthermore, forget about perfection.
The more you strive to be perfect, the more you drag yourself from reality.
Because there are no easy ways of perfection.
It only exists in the mind, not in reality.
5. Develop a new skill.
Don't be stagnant.
Learn something new.
Even simple things.
It could be a sport, a hobby, or something that can boost your self-confidence.
Anything that improves yourself, will be helpful to make you feel better.
6. Self-acceptance.
You are not perfect.
And there is nothing to feel ashamed about it.
In fact, it is healthy. Imperfection is the very essence of being human.
Instead of hating your own mistakes, strive to accept them.
Accept the reality that you have flaws.
People who donate accept who they are, and accumulate negative thoughts and hatred inside.
Ultimately, they lose the opportunity to appreciate the real meaning of their life.
7. Develop resilience.
Negative thoughts cannot do any good to you.
Resilience does.
Do not complain about life.
Instead, find ways to turn negative events into positive ones.
Champions have this habit.
They always make their failures a motivation to pursue their dreams.
Rejection teaches you how to reject what’s not right for you.
As you look back on your life, you will realize that many of the times you thought you were being rejected by someone or from something you wanted, you were in fact being redirected to someone or
something you needed.
Seeing this when you’re in the midst of feeling rejected, however, is quite tough. I know because I’ve been there.
As soon as someone critiques and pushes you away – as soon as you are rejected—you find yourself thinking, “Well, that proves once again that I’m not worthy.”
What you need to realize is, that the other person or situation is not worthy of you and your particular journey.
Rejection is necessary medicine; it teaches you how to reject relationships and opportunities that aren’t going to work so that you can find the right ones that will.
It doesn’t mean you aren’t good enough; it just means someone else failed to notice what you have to offer.
This means you now have more time to improve yourself and explore your options.
Will you be bitter for a moment?
Absolutely.
Hurt?
Of course—you’re human.
There isn’t a soul on this planet that doesn’t feel a small fraction of their heart break at the realization of rejection.
For a short time afterward, you will ask yourself every question you can think of:
What did I do wrong?
Why didn’t they care about me?
How come?
But then you have to let your emotions fuel you in a positive way!
This is the important part.
Let your feelings of rejection drive you, feed you and inspire one heck of a powerful opening to the next chapter of your story.
Honestly, if you constantly feel like someone is not treating you with respect, check your price tag.
Because it’s you who tells others what you’re worth by showing them what you’re willing to accept for your time and attention.
So get off the clearance rack.
And I mean right NOW!
If you don’t value and respect yourself, wholeheartedly, no one else will either.
I know it’s hard to accept, but think about it…
All too often we let the rejections of our past dictate every move we make thereafter.
We literally do not know ourselves to be any better than what some intolerant person or shallow circumstance once told us was true.
It’s time to realize this and squash the subconscious idea that you don’t deserve any better. It’s time to remind yourself that…
The person you liked, loved, or respected in the past, who treated you like dirt, again and again, has nothing intellectually or spiritually to offer you in the present moment, but headaches and
heartache.
One of the most rewarding and important moments in life is when you finally find the courage to let go of what you can’t change, like someone else’s behavior or decisions.
Life and God both have greater plans for you that don’t involve crying at night or believing that you’re broken.
The harsh truth is, sometimes you have to get knocked down lower than you have ever been to stand up taller and emotionally stronger than you ever were before.
It’s not the end of the world—it’s never the end of the world – and yet rejection can make the loss of someone or something you weren’t even that crazy about feel gut-wrenching and
world-ending.
Sometimes people don’t notice the things we do for them until we stop doing them. And sometimes the more chances you give, the more respect you lose. Enough is enough. Never let a person get
comfortable with disrespecting you. You deserve better. You deserve to be with someone who makes you smile, someone who doesn’t take you for granted, someone who won’t leave you hanging.
Some chapters in our lives have to close without closure. There’s no point in losing yourself by trying to fix what’s meant to stay broken.
Take a deep breath. Inner peace begins the moment you decide not to let another person or event control your emotions.
You really can’t take things other people say about you too personally. What they think and say is a reflection of them, not of you.
Those with the strength to succeed in the long run are the ones who build themselves up with the bricks others have thrown at them.
Let your scars remind you that the damage someone has inflicted on you has left you stronger, smarter, and more resilient.
When you lose someone or something, don’t think of it as a loss, but as a gift that lightens your load so that you can better travel the path meant for you.
You will never miss out on what is meant for you, even if it has to come to you in a roundabout way. Stay focused. Be positive.
Rejections and naysayers aren’t that important in the grand scheme of things; so don’t let them conquer your mind. Step forward! Seriously, most of us do not understand how much potential we have
– we limit our aspirations to the level someone else told us was possible.
Too many people overvalue what they are not and undervalue what they are. Don’t be one of them. Ultimately, you are who you are when nobody’s watching. Know this! And dare to be yourself, however
awkward, different or odd that self may prove to be to someone else.
Comparing yourself with others, or other people’s perceptions, only undermines your worth, your education, and your own inner wisdom. No one can handle your present situation better than
you.
The more we fill our lives with genuine passion and purpose, the less time and energy we waste looking for approval from everyone else.
You can use your struggles, frustrations, and rejections to motivate you rather than annoy you. You are in control of the way you look at life.
Sometimes transitions in life mean something even better is coming your way, so embrace them and don’t be afraid to let go.
Right now is a new beginning. The possibilities ahead are endless. Be strong enough to let go, wise enough to move forward, diligent enough to work hard, and patient enough to wait for what you
deserve.
Afterthoughts
All details aside, you don’t need anyone’s constant affection or approval in order to be good enough in this world.
When someone rejects or abandons or judges you, it isn’t actually about you.
It’s about them and their own insecurities, limitations, and needs.
So you don’t have to internalize any of it!
Your worth isn’t contingent on other people’s acceptance of you.
You’re allowed to be yourself.
You’re allowed to voice your thoughts and feelings.
You’re allowed to assert your needs.
You’re allowed to hold on to the truth that who you are is more than enough.
And you’re allowed to let go of anyone in your life who endlessly makes you feel otherwise.
Sometimes we need to be reminded to actually practice the little habits that allow us to better understand and nurture the right bonds, or let go of the wrong ones.
We need to be reminded to be selective in our battles, too.
Oftentimes peace and love in our lives and relationships are both better than being right.
We simply don’t need to attend every argument we’re invited to, especially when our sense of self-worth is on the line.
5 Agreements You Must Make With Yourself when you feel alone.Ayodeji Awosika
Wanna know the worst part about failing to achieve your goals, live the life you want, and overcome your challenges?
It’s not the lack of the outcome itself, but the fact you broke your agreement with yourself.
Each time you tell yourself you’re going to do something and fall short, you chip away at your soul one little piece at a time.
In isolation, none of these broken agreements are so bad, but cumulatively, they destroy you.
And they destroy you in a way that’s almost worse than total abject destruction.
See, when your life is just genuinely messed up and horrible, you can almost tolerate that more because you can’t do much about it or the odds are so stacked against you that it’s much easier to
justify your situation because it’s justifiable.
People in poverty and destitution aren’t leading “lives of quiet desperation” they’re just royally screwed.
Consequently, many people in these situations, take third world countries, for example, find a level of happiness because they are so circumstantially challenged they almost have no choice.
But “normal people” maybe you, who let their souls rot away in the suburbs. I can think of few worse hells. I use the same analogy over and over again — Chinese water torture. Breaking your
agreements day after day until you die.
Not good.
You will get no pep talk from me about how easy it is to keep your agreements to yourself. It’s the hardest thing you’ll ever do.
But it’s worth it.
Keep these top ones in mind.
You Won’t Compromise Your Happiness for the Sake of Others
This doesn’t mean “never take anyone’s opinion into account.
I’ve seen it happen over and over again to so many people. And it often comes from one particular source.
Can you guess?
I can’t tell you how many messages people have sent me about the fact that they want to do something different with their life but won’t do it because they don’t want to let their parents
down. Even middle-aged people suffer from this.
Are people like your parents trying to make you unhappy?
No.
But one important truth you must understand about people — often, they can’t help themselves.
You’d think the people that created you would want the best for you.
Actually, they do, but they just have a different definition of the word ‘best’ then you do.
They project dreams and insecurities on you at the same time.
Don’t blame them.
Accept that they’re coming from the only paradigm they know and move forward.
Parents are the overarching example, but there are many others:
Spouse — If your spouse doesn’t agree with your dreams, maybe they shouldn’t be your spouse. Not saying this in a callous way, but if your values aren’t aligned, then you will
run into problems.
Kids — You should sacrifice for your kids, right? Yes, but there are many types of sacrifice. You can sacrifice your happiness to procure resources or you can sacrifice your
extra time to build your dream on the side and get the best of both worlds. You know my
answer here.
The Joneses — You can totally ignore these people. Friends, colleagues, acquaintances, whatever. Again, not that you never take anyone’s opinion into account, but ask yourself,
are these people living your life? Do they pay your bills? No? And no again? Well, then you choose what to do with your life, ok?
Here’s the thing about compromising your dreams and failing to put boundaries around your non-negotiable values — nobody will respect or appreciate you for it. You’ll end up with a martyr complex
and wonder why everyone isn’t super thankful for your sacrifice.
Counterintuitively, if you put yourself first and set those boundaries, you’ll get respect because few people have the confidence to do it.
You Will Do The Things You’re Afraid Of
There are few better feelings than courage — being scared yet doing the thing anyway. You experience a type of euphoria you can’t replicate any other way.
I don’t know about you, but fear annoys me.
The fact that I’d ever hold myself back for any reason, over some petty psychological BS, seems so insane to me, but of course, it happens. It happens to me just like it happens to you.
Do you have to achieve world domination to be happy?
Absolutely not.
But your soul will atrophy if you don’t exercise it.
And you exercise your soul by being courageous.
Courage takes many forms In general, standing up against your inner critic, the resistance, the beguiling monkey mind, takes courage.
The odds are stacked against you.
Psychological resistance weighs heavy, no way around it. So how do you stand up to it?
My go-to answer is always the same — realize you are going to die. There’s no fear to feel when you’re in the abyss, gone forever.
I always try to think to myself, “If this moment embarrasses me if I get rejected, if this doesn’t work out, will I ever care 6 months from now? 6 weeks? Hell, even 6 hours?
Probably not.
If it works, however, I’ll always remember it.”
You Will Focus on Gratitude
As much as I talk about ambition, goal setting, productivity, and world domination so to speak, I understand how important it is to have gratitude and develop detachment from your desires.
On the one hand, you want to push for your goals and dreams like they mean everything.
And the other hand, you need to understand they mean nothing and that, ultimately, all you have is the now, your existence, your oneness with the universe.
Since I’m so ambitious, I have to put a focus on this philosophy:
I meditate daily
I write down three things I’m grateful for every day
I’ve read and studied dozens of Eastern Philosophy texts
People often comment on my work and tell me to “be content.”
Their ‘gratitude’ is actually a coping mechanism they use to justify their inability to act — to face that inner critic and really do something.
Most people can say “I feel grateful to have a roof over my head, food on my stomach, and clothes on my back.”
Go above and beyond that.
Can you be grateful for the obstacles, pain, and tragedy that can make you stronger?
Can you be grateful for the outcomes you’ve earned through hard work and overcoming the inner critic?
Are you grateful for the abundant opportunities available to you? If so, why aren’t you doing anything with them?
Ah, see, there’s the kicker.
Being ‘fake content’ is a lot like having a toolset but building nothing with it.
Think of people who are really grateful like immigrants who come to America.
They work their ass off because they truly appreciate the opportunity, while all the “content” people watch Netflix.
Focus on the proper form of gratitude, the whole form.
You, Will, Take Care of Your Mind, Body, and Spirit
So much happiness boils down to:
What you put in your body
How you move your body
The work you do on your mind
If you eat shit food, never exercise, watch tons of T.V., booze it up every weekend, how in the hell are you going to be happy?
You are a biological entity. Your mood is heavily affected by the way you treat your biological entity.
I’d love to see a case study if society adopted the following:
Eating healthy
Exercising
Going outside to see nature
Spending time consciously reaching out connecting with people they love
Limited smartphone use
Journaling
Meditation
If society as a whole managed to do this for, say, six months, I’d suspect we’d see a sharp drop in anxiety — razor sharp.
Do I want you to become a self-improvement robot?
No.
But you have to understand how much of an impact your environment has on your mental state as well as the way you treat the vessel that houses your mind.
All this stuff seems basic and elementary, doesn’t it?
Everything I write is basic and elementary.
The keys to happiness, success, contentment, etc, are sitting right in front of you? But you, we all, want to look for magic answers elsewhere.
Self-improvement books prey on people making people believe their life isn’t good enough.
That by hustling harder, organizing your life more, and changing your mindset around money, you can radically change your life.
But many of them miss the bigger picture.
Every person out there wants one similar thing: happiness.
While financial stability and a good night’s sleep can liven your mood, there are more effective ways to achieve this ultimate, larger goal.
Because you see, happiness (and all the building blocks that lead up to it) are life-long choices.
You can’t “work hard, play hard” to a life that will still make you happy well into old age.
That kind of change is merely temporary.
And how would I know this?
I’ve been in your exact shoes.
I thought that by focusing on everything external, I could fix something internal in me.
But I only made myself more stressed and unhappy.
I was shocked to realize most of the choices that drive my fulfillment with life today quotes from the best-selling books out there.
They were vastly underrated paths to happiness that not enough people talk about.
So if a happier life is what you want, I’d consider making one, two, or all of these changes to your life.
Your present self, along with your future self, will thank you for them.
Accept what’s controllable and uncontrollable.
You have more control than you think, that is, except when you don’t.
Hear me out.
We tend to focus a lot of energy on worrying about the things in life we can’t control and let what we can control fall to the wayside.
I used to believe I was unlucky in my love life.
I dated one emotionally abusive guy after the next.
Every time they hurt me, I didn’t leave them, I blamed the pain on being dealt unlucky cards.
But all this did was keep me in victim mode.
And you know what happens to victims? They continue to be hurt.
While I couldn’t control how my partners treated me, I could control the choices I made up until that point.
I could stop chasing qualities in partners that weren’t healthy. I could stop ignoring red flags when they came up.
The same goes for your life.
Believing you have control over the uncontrollable will suck the happiness right out of your life. Instead, shift your energy to what you can control.
Give the power back to yourself.
Learn how to be a good friend/family member/partner.
People aren’t born effectively communicating and showing each other appreciation.
You know what your parents teach you.
If that’s not from a place of love and healed trauma, you’re like most people in this world.
Which is to say, you have a lot to learn.
Putting your thoughts and feelings into words is hard enough, but also learning that’s OK and what will improve your relationships is a whole other obstacle to overcome.
Being a good person to the people in your life is a skill you have to learn.
It’s comprised of learning to communicate, keeping promises, respecting people’s time, and having hard conversations when you’d rather avoid them.
In the long run, this will strengthen the bonds in your life.
Which means you’ll be happier, too.
Find what makes you uniquely happy.
I once had a therapist friend who helped me through one of my darkest bouts of depression.
She told me to make a list, as long as my age (25 at the time), of activities that make me happy when I do them.
“But don’t just write ‘hiking’ because that’s what everyone else writes,” she said, “Sit down and really figure out what brings you joy.”
And so I did.
It took me several days to come up with those 25 activities, but I still kept that list to this day.
Because when something hard comes up in my life or my depression starts to creep up, I have my go-to happiness list.
You’d be surprised how many people couldn’t make a list with five things that make them happy, let alone as long as their age.
But figuring out what uniquely makes you feel better is a toolbox you can carry the rest of your life.
Differentiate between reality and social media.
You can hate on social media all you want, but the fact is, it’s a prominent presence in our life.
Chances are, you’re on at least one platform once a day.
You need to protect your mental health during that time.
It’s easy to see the carefully curated photos or videos of someone’s life and think that’s how your life should be.
If you see someone else obtain something, why shouldn’t you be able to, right?
But the truth is, that person’s life doesn’t even look like the one they post.
Aside from the most obvious example, I could make here (photoshop), people rent expensive cars, lie about their financials, and act much happier than they are.
So while I could’ve said, “comparison is the thief of joy,” you’re better off learning to question everything you see.
By knowing what’s real and what’s a filtered social media post, you can protect your happiness.
Stick with something you enjoy doing.
Once you find something you even moderately enjoy doing, stick with it.
I’m not saying that it has to be something you do for the rest of your life, but give it at least six months to see what can come from it.
For the first year of my writing career, I made anywhere from $0 to $500.
That’s not even enough money to pay my rent with.
But I stuck with it because I enjoyed writing; I didn’t do it for the money.
Eventually, I found success through my consistency.
You’ll find the same kind of success when you show up regularly when it comes to the things you love, too, regardless if it makes you money.
So even if what brings you joy is watercolors or fishing, stick with it.
Give yourself a fighting chance to see how good you can become and potentially find something that can bring you life-long happiness.
Consume content that’s outside of your bubble.
When the time comes that my (nonexistent, at the moment) kids graduate high school, I’ll encourage them to take a gap year.
Sure, the college has its value, but traveling the world gives you something I believe to be invaluable.
And that’s perspective.
Now, I’m not saying everyone must travel the world to have an open mind.
That would be elitist to assume, and I know everyone can’t afford to. But at the very least, consume content that’s outside of what you know.
Read books by authors from different races than you.
Learn a new skill from a different culture. Interact with people who think differently than you do.
Because when you believe your world can only ever exist how it is, you’re stuck.
There’s so much knowledge and understanding to be had out there in the world; obtaining it is key to a happier life.
Learn how to be happy with the present.
Would you believe me that you can experience happiness, even in the smallest amount, today?
That happiness isn’t something you can only have in the future if you start doing everything I wrote above?
Well, start believing because it’s true.
There’s no such thing as the pursuit of happiness; all of us have reasons to feel joy every day.
Sure, you can start heading in certain paths that lead to more sustainable happiness, but it's a feeling that’s within your grasp right now.
Here’s a simple exercise to get you started: write down everything you appreciate in your life.
Start with obvious ones like your family and friends and trickle down to small things you take for granted, like the internet you’re using to read this article.
Use that gratitude to warm you up inside.
Happiness comes from within you, no matter what best-selling books and “gurus” out there tell you.
And the great news is that you can make small changes to head to a life-sustaining happiness today.
Just remember that with enough steps, one day, you’ll look back and see you’ve gone miles. Your future self won’t ever regret that.
“Compassion is not a relationship between the healer and the wounded. It’s a relationship between equals.” ~Pema Chodron
After college, I was hustling hard to get a work visa so that I could stay in the US.
But then my mom got caught up in a political scandal, and without much reflection on how much this would alter my life’s plans, I dropped my dream of staying in America, drove 1,000 miles, and
flew another 500 to be by her side.
Would she have crumbled without me there? My mama is a tough chick, so I highly doubt it.
But at the time, I (subconsciously) believed that when the ones we love are hurting, their pain trumps everything. Their pain gets top priority, and whatever goals and dreams we’ve been working
toward now pale in comparison.
At the time, I thought that love meant tending to the other person’s needs first, always.
And this form of self-sacrifice came naturally to me (I’d behaved this way even as a young child), so I was lucky, right? Having inherent
caregiver qualities is a beautiful gift, right?
Yes. And maybe not.
Are You a Natural Caregiver?
You’ll know if you have this trait too, because people will often tell you their secrets mere minutes after meeting you.
When someone has just been in a car accident or broken up with their boyfriend, you wrap your arms around them and for the first time that day, their body fully relaxes.
People tell you they feel at home in your presence. Safe. Heard. Cared for.
There’s so much beauty in having a trait like this. Without much effort, you nurture and care for those around you. It is a gift you give us all.
But there’s another side to the caregiver coin.
Helping other people can become addictive.It can begin to feel like the only way to show your love is to prostrate yourself at the needs of others.
Oh, you’re hurting? Lemme swoop in and save the day.
Oh, you’re broke? Lemme dump my savings into your bank account and all will be well.
Oh, you’re single again? Lemme set you up with my neighbor’s son.
Whatever your ailment, I’ve got a fix for you!
And the gratitude from the people we’re supposedly ‘fixing’ tends to flow so steadily that we become convinced of the healthiness of our stance.
We’re confident that healing every sore spot we see is not only natural and enjoyable, but it’s the main reason we were put on this planet.
When you carry the Nurturer Gene, fixing other people can easily become a destructive self-identity.
You will martyr yourself over and over again in order to meet the invisible quota of Lives Helped that floats above your head.
You will obsessively analyze how every choice you make might impact those around you.
You will assess every meal, every dollar spent, every vacation taken (or not taken) based on how it will impact the people you feel a responsibility to care for.
Because, in this unhealthy version of caregiving, our understanding of love has become warped. Love now looks like a relentless string of sacrifice.
Your thoughts might go something like this:
If I don’t love her with my constant presence, she will feel sad and lonely.
If I don’t love him with my attentive eye observing everything, he’ll get sick again, or maybe even die.
If I don’t love them with my efficiencies managing everything, someone will get hurt. Things will go very wrong if I’m not here to take care of them all.
Sometimes, love calls on us to invest our energy and time in tending to someone else’s pain.
But not 100 percent of the time. And not with the nurturing going down a one-way street, pouring out of the same person, over and over again.
If you see this pattern in any of your relationships, consider what it would take to expand your definition of what it means to nurture, to love, to care for.
A healthy caregiver not only nourishes the needs of others, but also nourishes her own.
Holistic nourishment. Nourishment of the whole of us, for all of us—which includes you.
Self-nourishment might look like hiring a babysitter so you can have a romantic getaway with your hubby.
Self-care might mean taking the job on the other side of the country, even though it means you’ll only see your parents twice a year.
Self-love might be quietly soaking in a bubble bath instead of probing everyone for a detailed account of their day.
Share your talents and resources. Generously give your time and attention. But you cannot pour a magical tonic on the wounds of every person walking the planet. It’s not your job. And if
it were, it’d be a sucky job because you’d fail at it every single day.
Especially when we identify as being “spiritual,” we can lift up words like “compassion,” “generosity,” and “kindness” to such a degree that we forget that even “compassion” sometimes must say
no.
Even “generosity” has to allocate some of her resources for herself.
And even “kindness” must muster the nerve to walk away sometimes.
If you are the person in your relationship or family or company that defaults to caregiver and wound-tender, give thanks for the ease with which you dish out your love.
But be careful about inhaling that caregiver role to such a degree that your identity becomes dependent on having someone nearby to nurture.
Give your love. Freely and deeply.
And trust that even if you’re not there to ‘fix’ them, everyone will be just fine.
Superman is the sole survivor of the planet Krypton. His father, Jor-El, discovered that a nuclear
chain reaction was building inside Krypton that would soon shatter the entire world. Jor-El, therefore, had his unborn son Kal-El removed from the Kryptonian Gestation Chambers and affixed the
life matrix containing Kal-El to an experimental vessel for travel through hyperspace.
Jor-El launched the starcraft toward Earth just before Krypton exploded.
Superman was, in effect, born on Earth when the starcraft landed there. Jonathan and Martha Kent
found the infant inside the vessel and brought him to their farm in Smallville, Kansas. Since he
appeared entirely human, the Kents assumed that the baby was a victim of a cruel experiment.
At this time the baby had no super powers. The Kents named the infant Clark and raised him as
their own son.
As Clark grew older his Kryptonian body began developing superhuman abilities. When Clark was
eighteen, took him to the field where his starcraft still lay hidden and explained how he and Martha
had found him. Clark resolved to use his powers from then on only for the good of mankind. After
revealing his secret to his childhood friend, Lana Lang, Clark left Smallville to study at
Metropolis University.
THERE IS NO SUPERMAN, no one is coming to save the day.
It’s hard to watch a friend or family member struggling with a problem or making “bad” decisions. You naturally want to help.
ou want to make your friends and family members’ lives easier and more joyful. You want to fix their problems and relieve their suffering.
Trying to keep a loved one out of harm’s way seems like a good idea, except that it doesn’t work when they don’t want your help.
Not everyone wants to change (or not in the way you think they should) and that’s their prerogative. Despite your desire to help, you can’t make people change and you can’t fix their problems
(even when you have great ideas and their best interest at heart!).
You simply can’t fix or solve other people’s problems and trying to do so often just makes things worse.
Whose problem is it?
Most people accept the notion that they can’t control other people or solve their problems.
But we get sucked into trying to change and fix it because we’re confused about whose problem it is.
Sometimes our desire to help, protect, and be the hero clouds our judgment.
And sometimes we think we know what’s best and foist our ideas upon others regardless of what they want.
We tend to think that problems that affect us are ours to solve. This false belief leads us down a futile path of trying to control things that aren’t in our control.
For example, just because you’re affected by your spouse’s unemployment or your teenager’s smoking, doesn’t mean these are problems you can solve.
You can’t get a job for your spouse nor can you make your child quit smoking.
However, if your spouse’s unemployment has left you in debt and feeling anxious, stressed out, or angry, those are problems you can do something about.
And yet, some of us persist in trying to fix or change other people and their problems.
It reminds us of bad things that have happened in the past. And we get anxious and afraid of the catastrophic things we anticipate happening if we don’t step in and try to change things.
Accepting what’s out of our control and that we can’t solve other people’s problems doesn’t mean we’re powerless.
Quite the contrary; it allows us to put our energy into solving our own problems and to change the things we can.
Trying to solve other people’s problems often makes things worse, not better
Not only is it impossible for us to solve other people’s problems, but we can also inadvertently cause a host of other problems in the process.
To be honest, I often wish that I could solve other people’s problems.
But it always ends badly when I try.
I get bossy, give unwanted advice, and act like I have all the answers.
It’s definitely not something I’m proud of and I imagine at least some of you can relate.
Sometimes, it’s downright presumptuous for us to assume that we know what someone else needs or wants.
Our efforts to help may actually be conveying this harmful message: “I know how to solve your problems better than you do. I don’t trust your judgment or abilities.
You’re incompetent or unmotivated.”
It’s not helpful to try to solve other people’s problems because:
Nagging and giving unwanted advice leads to more stress, conflict, and negatively impacts relationships.
When we try to fix, change, or rescue, we assume that we know what’s best. We take on an air of superiority and can act condescending.
Making decisions for others takes away their autonomy and their opportunity to learn and grow.
We become frustrated and resentful that our efforts to solve other people’s problems don’t work and that they aren’t appreciated.
We get distracted from solving our own problems. For some reason, fixing other people always seems easier than fixing ourselves!
Instead of doing things for other people, we need to allow them to live their own lives, make their own decisions and mistakes, and deal with the consequences of their choices.
Not only does this free us up to focus on what we can control, it respects other people’s autonomy.
Sometimes you can help
Of course, sometimes we can and should help others.
But it’s important to distinguish help from enabling or doing things for people that they can
reasonably do for themselves.
The most important question to ask before trying to help someone with their problems is: “Does this person want my help?”
If you’re not sure, ask them.
In addition, be sure that the kind of help you’re giving is the kind that’s wanted.
For example, your wife might like some help with her efforts to lose weight.
However, she’s not going to appreciate your help if she’d like you to cook healthy meals several times per week, but your version of help is to remind her of the calorie count of everything she
eats.
When someone doesn’t want your help or advice, it’s best to keep your mouth shut
Otherwise, the unsolicited advice is probably to quiet your own anxiety or a bad habit, not really to be helpful.
If you’re available and approachable, your friends and family know they can ask for your help if they want it.
Control vs. influence
Another common pitfall is that we confuse control with influence.
Often we can influence our loved ones, but we can rarely control them.
Meaning we may be able to shape or guide their decisions.
We can counsel them or provide them with information if they are receptive, but we can’t force our own agenda.
How to stop trying to change, fix, or solve other people’s problems
Before launching into “fix-it” mode, try asking yourself these questions:
Is this my problem or is it someone else’s problem that’s affecting me?
Is this a problem I can fix or change?
Is changing this person or situation in my control?
How can I redefine the problem so that I’m focusing on what’s in my control?
Do I have any influence?
Did they ask for my help or ideas?
Am I forcing my solutions and ideas onto someone?
Am I helping or enabling? What’s the difference?
Why am I trying to solve this problem?
Is this actually an attempt to manage my own fears and anxiety about what may happen? And if so, how else can I deal with uncertainty and feeling out of control?
If you’ve been trying to fix or change people for years, it will take time and effort to change these patterns.
In addition to being patient and compassionate with yourself along the way, try to focus on what’s in your control and the problems that you can solve.
And remember that if you’re feeling particularly frustrated with your inability to change or solve a problem, you may be trying to solve someone else’s problem.
If you live locally, I’d be happy to support you with counseling and therapy in my Campbell office (easily accessible from San Jose, Santa Clara, and Los Gatos).
“Compassion is not a relationship between the healer and the wounded. It’s a relationship between equals.” ~Pema Chodron
After college, I was hustling hard to get a work visa so that I could stay in the US.
But then my mom got caught up in a political scandal, and without much reflection on how much this would alter my life’s plans, I dropped my dream of staying in America, drove 1,000 miles, and
flew another 500 to be by her side.
Would she have crumbled without me there?
My mama is a tough chick, so I highly doubt it.
But at the time, I (subconsciously) believed that when the ones we love are hurting, their pain trumps everything.
Their pain gets top priority, and whatever goals and dreams we’ve been working toward now pale in comparison.
At the time, I thought that love meant tending to the other person’s needs first, always.
And this form of self-sacrifice came naturally to me (I’d behaved this way even as a young child), so I was lucky, right? Having inherent
caregiver qualities is a beautiful gift, right?
Yes.
And maybe not.
Are You a Natural Caregiver?
You’ll know if you have this trait too because people will often tell you their secrets mere minutes after meeting you.
When someone has just been in a car accident or broken up with their boyfriend, you wrap your arms around them, and for the first time that day, their body fully relaxes.
People tell you they feel at home in your presence.
Safe.
Heard.
Cared for.
There’s so much beauty in having a trait like this.
Without much effort, you nurture and care for those around you.
It is a gift you give us all.
But there’s another side to the caregiver coin.
Helping other people can become addictive.It can begin to feel like the only way to show your love is to prostrate yourself at the needs of others.
Oh, you’re hurting? Lemme swoop in and save the day.
Oh, you’re broke? Lemme dump my savings into your bank account and all will be well.
Oh, you’re single again? Lemme set you up with my neighbor’s son.
Whatever your ailment, I’ve got a fix for you!
And the gratitude from the people we’re supposedly ‘fixing’ tends to flow so steadily that we become convinced of the healthiness of our stance.
We’re confident that healing every sore spot we see is not only natural and enjoyable, but it’s the main reason we were put on this planet.
When you carry the Nurturer Gene, fixing other people can easily become a destructive self-identity.
You will martyr yourself over and over again in order to meet the invisible quota of Lives Helped that floats above your head.
You will obsessively analyze how every choice you make might impact those around you.
You will assess every meal, every dollar spent, every vacation taken (or not taken) based on how it will impact the people you feel a responsibility to care for.
Because, in this unhealthy version of caregiving, our understanding of love has become warped. Love now looks like a relentless string of sacrifice.
Your thoughts might go something like this:
If I don’t love her with my constant presence, she will feel sad and lonely.
If I don’t love him with my attentive eye observing everything, he’ll get sick again, or maybe even die.
If I don’t love them with my efficiencies managing everything, someone will get hurt. Things will go very wrong if I’m not here to take care of them all.
Sometimes, love calls on us to invest our energy and time intending to someone else’s pain.
But not 100 percent of the time.
And not with the nurturing going down a one-way street, pouring out of the same person, over and over again.
If you see this pattern in any of your relationships, consider what it would take to expand your definition of what it means to nurture, love, to care for.
A healthy caregiver not only nourishes the needs of others but also nourishes her own.
Holistic nourishment.
Nourishment of the whole of us, for all of us—which includes you.
Self-nourishment might look like hiring a babysitter so you can have a romantic getaway with your hubby.
Self-care might mean taking the job on the other side of the country, even though it means you’ll only see your parents twice a year.
Self-love might be quietly soaking in a bubble bath instead of probing everyone for a detailed account of their day.
Share your talents and resources. Generously give your time and attention.
But you cannot pour a magical tonic on the wounds of every person walking the planet.
It’s not your job.
And if it were, it’d be a sucky job because you’d fail at it every single day.
Especially when we identify as being “spiritual,” we can lift up words like “compassion,” “generosity,” and “kindness” to such a degree that we forget that even “compassion” sometimes must say
no.
Even “generosity” has to allocate some of her resources for herself.
And even “kindness” must muster the nerve to walk away sometimes.
If you are the person in your relationship or family or company that defaults to caregiver and wound-tender, give thanks for the ease with which you dish out your love.
But be careful about inhaling that caregiver role to such a degree that your identity becomes dependent on having someone nearby to nurture.
Give your love.
Freely and deeply.
And trust that even if you’re not there to ‘fix’ them, everyone will be just fine.
A new view of a situation is just what we need to answer a difficult question, or see something we've been missing.
There is no greater way to escape the troubles of daily life than to ascend into the welcoming embrace of a tree house. Like a bird in its nest, we feel held and safe in the branches, cloaked
within a curtain of green leaves. Here we can breathe more freely and think more clearly, our hearts and brains fed by the oxygen released by the leaves. We float above the everyday world of the
ground, enjoying a bird's-eye view of all that remains below.
We may choose to be alone or we may invite a special friend to join us. Either way, this is our private world in which we get to decide who comes and goes. It is our haven where we can fully be who
we are, shed the masks required by the world below, and reveal our most hidden secrets, dreams, and desires. It is also an ideal vantage point on the life that continues below the branches. Often, a
new view of a situation is just what we need to answer a difficult question, solve a challenging problem, or see something we've been missing. It is as if we have ascended into the heavens and are
able to tap into a higher awareness. We can draw on this airy energy to revitalize us, relax us, and feed us new ideas. When we descend, we are ready to enter the world again, cleaner, clearer, and
often more inspired.
If you haven't been in a tree house for a while, now may be the time to make one for yourself or find one you can borrow. If you can't find or create an actual tree house, think of other venues that
could provide the same experience--a rooftop perch, a quiet spot in a grove of trees on a hilltop, a light-filled attic. Or just close your eyes and visualize yourself ensconced in your perfect home
in the branches of your favorite tree.
Sometimes we need to be alone, to simply do nothing but enjoy the
sound of silence.
We all need time alone. Even those of us who are social butterflies need some time to ourselves. Solitude is necessary for meditation and quiet reflection. We also may
choose to isolate ourselves when we are busy and need to meet a deadline. We may cherish time alone when we want to give ourselves over to art or music, lose ourselves in a good book, or delve into a
personal project. Having time to ourselves allows us to focus completely on our yoga practice or get into the zone while running or strength training. Sometimes we need to be alone to simply do
nothing but enjoy the sound of silence. Our alone time revitalizes and replenishes us, grounding us in our own company.
Yet, too much isolation, especially when our intention is to hide, withdraw, or not deal with the realities of our lives is not physically, mentally, or spiritually healthy. It is during moments like
these when being in isolation takes us away from our lives, rather than enhancing it. If anything, too much isolation can create a buffer whereby we don't have to deal with our problems. Sometimes,
pushing ourselves to deal with our issues and be in our lives, rather than isolate, is one of the best gifts we can give to ourselves.
Also, just as it is important for us to have our "alone" time, we need to remember that as human beings, we are by nature social creatures that thrive on human contact. Our lives cannot occur in a
vacuum, and we cannot fully live in this world without interacting with others. Consider using isolation as time spent for rest, reinvigoration, and personal growth. Isolation can then not only
empower you, but it can allow you to return to your work and your relationships restored and ready for life.
How to be Happy With Yourself
Change your perception, change yourself, and change your life
When’s the last time you sat down and deeply thought about that question.
There are so many variables that make up one’s happiness.
Our happiness level changes from day to day.
We define the world differently because we’re all different.
So how do you ever really know?
You don’t.
But you don’t need to.
Working on yourself and learning how to be happy with yourself is a never-ending process.
You’re never going to feel totally content, so stop making it a goal. Make the process itself your goal.
These strategies might help.
Fight to Cure a Major Cause of Anxiety
Have you ever noticed that sometimes you move through life with a sense of unease?
Something’s bugging you about life but you can’t quite figure out what it is.
A mentor of mine calls this the ‘refrigerator hum’ of anxiety.
Your refrigerator makes noise, but you rarely hear it because there are other sounds in your home that drown it out.
But when your home is completely silent, you can hear it.
This is what that this type of anxiety is like.
It’s barely noticeable because you’re so caught up in your day-to-day activities, but every once in a while your mind finds a moment of stillness where it becomes very loud.
That anxiety comes from knowing what you’re supposed to do, but failing to do
it.
You know you should probably work out more.
You know that you should try to execute that business idea.
There’s an open-ended list of tasks you’ve been putting off for a long time but you keep procrastinating.
The gap between the way you should live and the way you actually live subtly haunts you.
You’ll be happier with yourself when you finally start to do those things you know you’re supposed to do.
Imagine how you’d feel if you finally started knocking items off of that list.
Confidence is nothing more than being at ease with your life.
It’s a feeling of certainty.
Not certainty that things will work out the way you want them to, but the certainty that you did everything you could to get things to work out.
Practical recommendations:
Close your ‘open loops’ — Open loops are the things you keep putting off that bug the hell out of you. Write them all down and start to systematically get them done. Simple short
checklists work wonders. Use the ‘eat the frog’ technique where you start the day by doing the hard tasks you tend to avoid first.
Form a keystone habit — Don’t try to overhaul your life all at once. It doesn’t work. Choose one central positive habit you want to develop and focus only on that for a while.
Once one habit kicks in, others will inevitably follow. I chose reading.
Choose a project to aim for — I had such a hard time being happy with myself until I found something compelling to work on. I started writing. Did it for about 90 days without
quitting. That was all it took to shift the trajectory of my life forever. Dedicate 90 days to feeling out a new goal or project and don’t make a decision on whether or not to quit for the entire
time period.
But Ayo, how do I get the motivation to start?
I think about doing these things all the time, but I can’t bring myself to do them.
Bringing yourself to do something is something I can’t do for you.
Getting the ball rolling is the hardest part.
My best piece of advice? Understand that all the challenges come upfront.
You only have to get through the initial resistance period to free yourself.
The Obvious But Underused Strategy to Be Happy With Yourself
If you want to be happy with yourself, you have to play offense and defense at the same time.
You play offense by doing the things you’re supposed to do.
This can take a bit of guesswork.
But the defensive strategy requires zero guesswork.
You play defense by avoiding the things you clearly understand are bad for you and will make your life worse.
Once I started working on my writing and got serious about it, I realized I wouldn’t be able to make my dreams come true if I kept engaging in bad habits.
I stopped drinking entirely.
Not for moral reasons, but because it took my energy away and made me feel like garbage.
I stopped smoking tobacco because it will, you know, kill you.
I stopped hanging out with people who I knew were bad for me.
In general, I stopped being lazy.
How’d I quit all of the vices so suddenly?
To get rid of vices, you have to replace them with something else.
I replaced my chemical addictions with an addiction to my creative work.
And I used to be one of the laziest most destructive people on planet earth — booze, all sorts of drugs, illegal activities.
Again, there’s no magic recipe.
You have to visualize the future you’ll have if you continue to engage in destructive activities.
You have to understand the severity of these activities.
Many of them will literally kill you.
Either that or they’ll create a life where you have to go through a ton of avoidable stress.
If you’ve dug a deep hole, you just have to accept what you’ve already done and stop digging.
It’s hard to stop digging because you have this perverse need to continue punishing yourself to confirm a negative identity.
You sabotage yourself because it’s strangely easier to deal with than changing your life. Understand
that you get a payoff from self-sabotage.
Replace it with something better.
Learn How to be Happy With Yourself Without Doing Anything
So you have the two-pronged approach for the tangible things you have to do to be happy with yourself, but there’s still a deeper element to the process that’s tricky to contend with.
See, even though it does help to make tangible changes in your life, you shouldn’t have to do anything to be happy with yourself.
It would occur naturally if you realized how capable you were in the first place.
You should know that you’re valuable as a human being by default, but you’re wracked with insecurities.
You should be okay with yourself as you are because, on the whole, there’s nothing really wrong with you.
I’ve yet to meet someone with no blessings in their life. You have some weaknesses — not even weaknesses really, just things you aren’t naturally as good at as other people.
There are certain things you define as flaws, but that definition is flawed because other people with the same traits don’t view them as flaws at all.
Your view of yourself is highly subjective.
Again, no exact science, but it can help to understand the subjectivity of your own self-perception. You don’t have to feel the way you feel about yourself.
You’re choosing to, even if that choice feels so forced that it comes across as objective reality.
It’s paradoxical.
You have to fix your life and simultaneously understand that you’re not broken.
You make improvements in your life for the sake of making those improvements.
Inner work and outer work both matter.
You feel better about yourself because you’ve made positive changes, but your self-perception changed, not because of the changes themselves, but because those changes gave you the permission to
feel better about yourself that you could’ve given yourself all along.
Are You Humble Enough to do What it Takes to be Happy?
The last piece of the puzzle is having the humility to start where you are instead of where you wish you could start from.
When I was 14 years old, I weighed as much as I do now, but I was chubby and weak whereas now I’m fit and strong.
I transformed my body in the course of a single summer when I started training at my new high school for football.
The first time I ever did a bench press, I could only press the 45 pound bar itself.
When I did drills and workouts, I’d get crazy tired and be dripping with sweat while the other kids breezed through them.
It was a little bit embarrassing to be so out of shape, but I kept showing up to training five days per week.
I went from pressing the bar to adding 5 pounds to each side of it.
Then 10.
By the end of the summer, I had 45-pound plates on each side.
Losing weight made the running drills easier over time. I got faster and breezed through those drills by the end of the summer.
The workouts were so hard on me I’d literally go home and lay around all day after them.
But, I kept going back every morning.
The first day was embarrassing, but over time, I started to look forward to training.
As my body changed, my confidence grew.
More confidence meant even harder training, which meant more confidence, which meant harder training.
When the actual season got underway, I’d stay after practices and do extra drills and weight training on my own.
If you have the humility to start from a humble beginning, you can one day look up to see that your entire life has changed.
But you have to start by lifting just the bar.
I got my writing career started by writing one article. I had to crack open a book for the first time and read a couple of pages.
The entire process started with a single day where I first attempted to live a better life and got slightly less unhappy with myself.
You’ll be happy with yourself not when you’ve achieved perfection, but when you finally get the ball rolling.
You can start over as many times as you want to until you die.
You can fail 99 times and finally get that ball rolling on try number 100.
Your chances increase when you have enough humility to set the bar where it needs to be in the beginning, no matter how low it is.
But we tend to react to emotions unnaturally. We tend to try hard to not feel them. When we do this, emotions tend to grow big and dark and
hairy.
Fear and loneliness let us know we’re moving in the wrong direction. We’re getting farther from home… farther from ourselves. It’s time to come
home.
So let’s take a look at how to overcome it.
See, the goal is not to never feel lonely. The goal is to feel it as deeply as possible, then let it pass right through you. It’s like eating food.
You eat it, your body extracts the goodness from it, and then the rest finds its way back to the earth.
The key involves engaging the feeling process. When you engage your feeling process, you want to seek out and find the unresolved emotion inside you.
Unfelt emotion becomes like a delicious meal. You look forward to it. You can’t wait to sit down and dig in.
And the mere thought of avoiding your loneliness, by distracting yourself from it, or putting yourself in situations where it won’t come up, seems odd. It
makes no sense.
“Why in the world would you avoid your loneliness?”
Live your life as if your glass is half-full rather than half-empty, all you need is a change of thought.
We are all familiar with the metaphorical story of two people looking at the same glass and one perceiving it as half-full while the other sees it as half-empty. As much as we've heard this, it's
still a valuable exercise to really observe our minds and notice whether we are engaged in half-full or half-empty thinking. People will refer to themselves as being of one type or the other as if it
was a permanent characteristic, but we are all capable of shifting into a half-full consciousness if we simply make the effort.
When we look at our lives with half-empty consciousness, we perceive a lack and think that the other half of what we want is missing. We are coming from a position of expectation and entitlement. On
the other hand, when we look at our lives as half-full we perceive fullness. It is as if we recognize that our cup could be fully empty and so we are grateful for what we see as bounty--not something
we expect or believe we are owed, but a gift. In half-full consciousness, we count our blessings. When we look at our lives we see all the elements that are in place and all the things we do have.
This doesn't necessarily mean we don't seek more, but we seek from a place of fullness instead of from a place of lack. This fullness draws positive energy into our lives and often attracts more
abundance.
If you would like to begin to make the shift into half-full consciousness, try imagining your life as an empty glass. This is your life without all the people you know, the work you do, your home, or
your current state of physical wellbeing. This is just an empty, open space waiting to be filled. Once you have that feeling of openness in your mind, begin filling it with all the people, things,
and places that make up your life. You may be surprised to find your glass overflowing.
In order to achieve anything in life, it is important that you know your self worth. Knowing your self worth means that you know that you deserve to be treated a certain way; that you deserve
certain things in life simply because you are a human being. Your self worth does not disappear because you made a mistake or failed at something, it is something is inherent in all people and
will never fade in quantity or value.
How do you realize your self worth?
Many people go through their entire lives never fully realizing their full potential because they do not believe in themselves or their
self worth. These people often look to others to enjoy even the smallest tidbit of validation. This is no way to live.
In order to realize your self worth there are several avenues you can take. One avenue is to make a list of all your attributes,
good and bad, and as honest and as accurately as possible, assess them from one to ten with ten being the best. This can give you an idea of how you think of yourself and how you see
yourself. While we can be our worst enemies, it can also be helpful to get feedback from friends who we know are honest and will only give you helpful feedback.
You can also realize your self worth by beginning projects and endeavors that will bring about positive remarks and comments about your
performance and your personality traits. Join a sports league, volunteer for charity work, help a neighbor. These are all things that can help boost your self worth and feelings of self
value. Think about what you do and what you might say to a best friend who was achieving and going through similar experiences.
What would you say to him or her? Their place in your life is infinitely valuable. Rest assured that yours in their life is
too.
Watch this motivational video...............
Self-Acceptance with Emotional Freedom Technique (EFT)
What is the Emotional Freedom Technique?
The Emotional Freedom Technique, or EFT, is the psychological acupressure technique I routinely use in my practice and most highly recommend to optimize your emotional health. Although it
is still often overlooked, emotional health is absolutely essential to your physical health and healing - no matter how devoted you are to the proper diet and lifestyle, you will not achieve your
body's ideal healing and preventative powers if emotional barriers stand in your way.
Studies show that more than 85% of the world’s population suffers from some degree of diminished self-worth. For most people who lack a positive self-image, the future looks like a mere
extension of their troubled past – their expectation of what is to be is consistent with what has been, with a slight and predictable level of improvement. Because of their lacking self-esteem, most
are resigned to a life that lacks the excitement and passion characterizing the lives of those who feel worthy of tapping into the best things life has to offer. People who possess a positive
self-image typically have an optimistic expectation of what is ahead of them, and as a result they realize this expectation as a self-fulfilling prophesy.
In contrast to the state of resignation that typifies those with diminished self-esteem, consider the possibility that the future lives as the realization of a promise – a promise you make
to yourself and to the world. The future will result from your expectations, and the quality of your future will be impacted by the commitment you have for it. It lives as a possibility. In other
words, you get to invent it. In fact, you are the sole designer and architect of what is to be, and the result will be entirely consistent with your expectation and your self-image.
Our future will be directly related to what we expect for it to be. If we doubt our self-worth, and expect our future lives to be worse than our current situation, we will sabotage
ourselves into making it turn out into a self-fulfilling prophesy. If we limit our expectations, and plan on more of the same results we have experienced to date, our apathy will generate a future
consistent with this expectation. To the contrary, if we believe in ourselves, and our expectation is that our future will be better than our present situation, self-motivation will lead to actions
that will bring about the positive outcome we envision.
If we feel good about ourselves, and expect to live happy, fulfilled, and successful lives, we will take the actions consistent with realizing that expectation. We will therefore generate
the opportunities that will result in rich relationships, abundance, and joy being attracted to our lives – because we believe we deserve it, and act on this belief.
We get what we expect, and attract prosperity or lack joy or sorrow. We have rewarding relationships or angry, frustrating ones – all as a result of whether or not we feel worthy. Just as
we can doubt our abilities to succeed, and our worthiness for attracting rewarding friends and intimate relationships, we can instead choose to take full responsibility for expecting all aspects of
our lives to be the way we want them to turn out. When we come from this positive mindset, and commit to manifesting our dream lives, we put forth an energy that attracts all the things we desire to
us.
A Conversation With Bob Burg – Lessons on Bringing Value!
Bob Burg, the author of the Go-Giver, shares powerful insights on how to take your life and business to the next level by being and becoming more valuable!
Bob is also the author of the upcoming Lessons From Giving Value book and he is inviting you to share your best Giving Value tips, strategies or story for the book.
Today, I hope you will have another inspired day, that you will dream boldly and dangerously, that you will make some progress that didn’t exist before you took
action, that you will love and be loved in return, and that you will find the strength to accept and grow from the troubles you can’t change. And, most importantly (because I think there should be
more kindness and wisdom in this crazy world), that you will, when you must, be wise with your decisions, and that you will always be extra kind to yourself and others.
This adapted excerpt comes
from the book, 
Print 