I kind of dropped the ball on these because I don’t know if I feel like challenging my core wounds, but I think I need to keep going for the 21 days at least. It is interesting because you are supposed to focus on one core wound. I don’t know which one I would focus on, but maybe if I just keep going there is one that I will want to focus on.
I was talking to a friend about how it is hard to work on yourself sometimes. What I told her is that it is sometimes scary to think about who you might change into, but I think there is another reason. Sometimes it is hard to work on yourself because in order to work on yourself you first need to look at yourself in the mirror and face who you are, and that isn’t easy to do.
I think a big core wound or belief is that there is something wrong with me, that no one will actually like me if they know who I really am, that I’m weak and creepy and unattractive.
So today, my girlfriend and I were discussing how to make better decisions in Valorant and it made me think that we are playing low level blunder chess. Blunder chess at 200-800 elo is simply playing chess with these main ideas:
Check for blunders (hanging queen, bishop, knight or rook)
Check for checks on king
Look only one move ahead
If no clear threats, work on positioning
The idea behind blunder chess is simply that people at low elo will make a lot of mistakes and you can simple wait for them to make a mistake.
I strongly believe my elo (below diamond) that “blunder chess” is highly effective since a lot of simple mistakes are made.
I wonder if I can do the same simple ideas in Valorant where I don’t strategize too much, but check for very simple positioning and big mistakes:
Today is my first break from work in what seems like forever. I have a couple of things planned for the break, hanging out with family, spending some time gaming, and hopefully sneaking in a few calls with my girlfriend.
I also want to spend some significant time on my Instagram and business.
I’ve been thinking a lot about boundaries and how to let go of taking responsibility for other emotions, and I’ve been thinking again on this idea of believing in everyone’s power over themselves.
I feel that when you feel that people don’t have the resiliency to handle situations, or the ability to overcome situations, or at the very least, learn from them, that is when you start to take responsibility for their emotions. How could you not, if you have the ability to handle your emotions, but they are not able to handle theirs? Sometimes, you need to just trust in the process. If they need to complain, get hurt, work through their feelings, something you need to trust in their process.
There was a big journey I went down in terms of working on myself, becoming more mature and being able to live a free and meaningful life.
I started by thinking that you needed to meet your own needs
Then I thought you needed to be good at asking for your needs
And finally, I thought you needed to process traumas and emotions
But I realized that they are all part of the same things and have different parts to play.
In a way, everything is about not abandoning yourself and taking care of yourself. You surround yourself with people who you can talk about what is on your mind truthfully and emotionally. They help you understand what you need. You are able to then give yourself what you need and walk down further along the path of understanding different parts of yourself that are in pain.
From processing emotions, we can truly love ourselves, and the people around us, and be present in the moment.
There is a sense that being with people who don’t accept us, don’t allow us to feel safe speaking our truth is self abandoment. In a way, even if someone meets some of our needs (for example is attractive enough to make us feel special), if we settle for someone who doesn’t love us or allow us to be ourselves, we are putting ourselves down.
Not allowing ourselves to meet our own needs (for example, asking for validation from others because we refuse to give it to ourselves) is self abandonment.
Refusing to look deeper, and shielding parts of ourselves from the world (for example, keeping a confident outward appearance when we feel anxious) is abandoning parts of ourselves and placing the outside world’s comfort above our own.
Today I feel a bit like there is a lot of uncertainty. There is uncertainty with my coaching business and with my career as an AI consultant, but there are also lots of opportunities moving forward.
I want to strive to move forwards and not start to distract myself from the emotions via games and videos.
The first thing I want to tackle is sleep. That is my main priority today. I want to understand why I feel unfulfilled at night, like something wasn’t quite done.
My intuition tells me that I desire to create art. I don’t know why.
Perhaps my first step is to start working on art at 9:30 PM.
Before that I want to achieve something in Valorant, so I will need to do some gaming earlier in the day.
I also desire to work on myself more, I think it really helps to think about emotional development as work. When I think about it as vulnerability, it feels not productive. But when I think of it as emotional work, it takes on new meaning and purpose.
Ok so lets take a look at my two projects right now:
So for my AI Consulting plan, I want to stick to the plan, but the timeline has changed a bit.
I wanted this current goal (Be known, give preview of consulting) to finish by Feb 27th. That leaves 7 days to film, shoot, edit and get feedback.
UNIT ONE (ends 23rd): Shoot 3 videos
Spend total of 3 hours per video (9 hours total)
UNIT TWO (ends 24th): Write 2 LinkedIn posts
Spend total of 1.5 hrs per post (3 hrs total)
UNIT THREE (ends 26th): Get feedback, harden process
Looking at my goal for art coaching, I feel dissatisfied with my current structure on process for that. I feel I need to work on finding more ambitious and exciting goals at every step of the way (even if I have a lot of time to get there). I realized in order for the syllabus method to work, you need to have very ambitious exciting goal…then think about how to make it difficult to expect anything other than success.
So let’s revisit the master plan here.
Goal: Ramp up to an income of 8333 per month (100k per year) within one year
I want to choose a new goal…make 1500 per week in coaching.
I want to achieve this within the next 3 months.
UNIT ONE (1 month): Focus on my craft – become a coach I would hire for 1000 per month
Create plans (10 days, ends March 2nd)
Deeply understanding clients
Creating extreme focus and presence in life and sessions
Developing connections clients need
Materials and exercises to create and track strategy
Execute on plans (10 days, ends March 12th)
Research and refinement (10 days, ends March 22nd)
Interview other coaches
Read books
Further brainstorming
UNIT TWO (1 month): Build 100 hot leads – depends on having free stuff
Random try posting (10 days, ends April 1st)
Get feedback and do networking and outreach (10 days, ends April 11th)
Turn warm leads into hot leads with offer (10 days, ends April 21st)
UNIT THREE (1 month): Meld and combine top level coaching with leads machine
Talk about my clients achievements, use it to push their art (10 days, ends May 1st)
Clients have voice on my platform to talk about concepts in my coaching (10 days, ends May 11th)
Refine call for action to get warm leads to ask for my offer, then turn into hot leads (10 days, ends May 21st)
Okok, I finally have a good framework, but working on this framework makes me realize I really do need to work on free products in the meantime.
Goal: Create free products in 1 month
UNIT ONE (10 days, ends March 2nd): Complete research
Transcribe and think, what is the million dollar problem or breakthrough?
Collate results, come up with solutions
Research competition
UNIT TWO (10 days, ends March 12th): Develop products
Planning and gathering materials doing research
Create products
UNIT THREE (10 days, ends March 22nd): Continue development
I saw an ad on Facebook. It was talking about making money as an introvert and making money without giving up your inner peace.
I immediately signed up. It was about 20 dollars.
Now I have done a bunch of the exercises for the prework of the challenge and here are my reflections.
Some major questions that I have right now:
What am I willing to give up and how will I go about giving it up?
How do I live my values every day in a way that is in flow and not forced or mechanical?
I have some initial ideas.
First, I was thinking originally about what I wanted to give up in terms of things like YouTube, or socializing. But recently it made a lot more sense for me to think about time. Specifically, I wanted to dedicate my entire morning to succeeding at these goals.
From the time I wake up, I usually am doing what JT Franco calls “buffalo brain” (the idea of being one of the herd that moves without thinking). I listen to audiobooks, and watch YouTube videos. I don’t eat breakfast or drink water. I keep the blinds closed. I feel awful and I don’t feel the feelings.
Someone once said (might be Melinda Gates) that the first few hours of the day are the most important because they set the stage for the entire day to come. If I want to give up anything, I want to give up my mornings to getting up, drinking water, feeling my body, and going downstairs into the lounge to write on my blog and work on achieving my dreams.
Middle of the day has to be reserved for work and for talking to my girlfriend. End of the day has to be reserved for me time. Being alone, taking time, creating art, and letting the magic of nighttime take over.
This is what I’m thinking roughly:
7/8 AM – 9/10 AM: Dedicated to living the magical life
9/10 AM – 12 PM: Dedicated to doing the impossible at work
12 PM – 1/2 PM: Lunch, meditation
1/2 PM – 5 PM: Work, performing at the highest levels
5 PM – 7 PM: Misc time
7 PM – 11 PM: Alone time, creativity, play
During the weekend, work will be removed, leaving more time for dedication to my magical life. I think it will look something like this:
7/8 AM – 12 PM: Dedicated to living the magical life
12pm – 7 PM: Misc time
7 PM – 11 PM: Alone time, creativity, play
With this balance, it seems that my breakdown is this:
Weekday
1-3 hours per day on living magical life
5-7 hours of work
4 hours of alone-time/play
2 hours of miscellaneous time
Weekend
4-5 hours per day on living magical life
4 hours of alone-time/play
7 hours of miscellaneous time
I suspect, I will have to do careful planning during the weekend, in order to perform at the absolute highest levels of work and potentially spend less time there.
In terms of living out my beliefs of empathy, intuition/following feelings, creativity/imagination, and honesty. I’m not entirely sure what actions I need to take to feel that I am in congruence with my values.
My main thought right now is about taking risks, breathing through difficult emotions and sensations, and following connection theory.
It is extremely hard to be yourself all the time. There will always be things that you want to avoid, that you are afraid of. Specifically, things that you don’t like about yourself.
Control gives the illusion of happiness. The fear of loss of control is like all fear and uncomfortable feelings. It is not something that needs a solution or be avoided. You don’t solve the lack of control by being more controlling. You don’t solve fear by avoiding your fear.
Emotions are meant to be reacted to, and the solution is meant to come to you, not something to be forced into existence. The most healthy way to process painful emotions is through physicality, expression and meditation:
Physicality – punching, running, yelling, screaming, crying and sort of physical release
Expression – writing, talking, recording a video diary
Meditation – letting the emotions come and go
I used to write that you should follow what you feel. Sometimes, you don’t KNOW how you feel. That’s ok. Clarity is about patience. The patience to wait for the answers to come, to be able to sit in the pain for long enough to see the truth.
And at the end of the day, clarity will bring an understanding of not just how we feel, why we feel it, but what we truly want. That is truly being ourselves, following what we want in the moment. Embracing that is the key to true happiness, confidence, and feeling truly alive.