Today is not the first day working on the Profit in Peace challenge, but it does FEEL like the first day I am living it.

Today is the first day when I dedicated my morning to finding my magical life. For some context of what that means:

Something that I still don’t really understand or feel comfortable with applying is the values that I believe in every day.

I think that writing honestly and focusing on myself in this blog every morning might actually hit all of these points:

1. Honesty – well, this blog isn’t called unfiltered for no reason! I do remind myself all the time of the “if they don’t like me please leave” mentality.
2. Imagination – for me, this blog is dedicated to all my imaginative parts: art, YouTube, philosophy, poetry etc.
3. Intuition – this is the place where doing things “my” way is celebrated and I tap into what is the best way to do something (according to my intuition) rather than how everyone else does it.
4. Empathy – this blog is a lot for my feelings where I process feelings through words, video, and images. It is a part of honesty too, honest emotion where this is my place to express everything imperfect.

I also like using the blog as my way of living out all my values and being the person I want to be because it really feels like I am sacrificing something to do this…in a good way.

JT Franco talks about if you aren’t willing to sacrifice for what you want, what you want becomes the sacrifice. In the end, I had no idea whether I would sacrifice time talking to my girlfriend, going on YouTube, working, playing games, or making YouTube videos. Those are the things I spend most of my day doing anyway. But none of those things seemed right. It was too blunt on an idea, how could you sacrifice all of YouTube? How could I sacrifice all of work?

But by sacrificing my mornings, in a way, I am also sacrificing all of those things. I resist the urge to listen to audiobooks, watch YouTube videos, check messages, or work in the morning. I dedicate all my time to working on my blog and all my challenges, thoughts, ideas, and philosophies.

I also feel a deep unease and anxiety keeping pace with me this morning:

I’m Afraid I My Boss Will Check

I’m afraid my boss will check

See I’m not working

It won’t matter that I have bigger dreams

it won’t matter if I did a bunch of planning

On the weekend

Feverishly, desperately trying to

Make my workday

Productive, efficient enough

To make up

To make it easy

For me to balance

I remember the look on his face

When I told him

I like to meditate

Skeptical

And

I also wonder

If finding my magic

Will make me feel sad and lonely

Like I did yesterday

I feel tired as I

Let go of trying to change the feeling

And accept it instead

Another anxiety that I have about this challenge or this “morning commitment” is just the sense of lack of clarity. I don’t know what I should be working on, or what I can work on. I think is the pressure of time. Or maybe its because I completed all the prework for the challenge and I don’t exactly have something to work on right now. I’m afraid every action is not “right”.

Is it the right thing to:

1. Work on challenge videos?
2. Work on editing videos?
3. Work on reaching out?
4. To focus on my body?

Wow there is so much here and I feel that I may be stalling. Scared to make a decision so I’m just rambling on a super long blog post that doesn’t really say anything in particular.

Well all I know right now is I feel like doing a bit of freewriting, fantasy writing or something of that nature. So I’ll go do that.

So here is the long and short of it.

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:

1. What am I willing to give up and how will I go about giving it up?
2. 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.