I was in a men’s support group tonight and I was mulling over some of the recent discoveries I had:
I realized that the right person in your life will be someone who will accept everything about you. Someone who isn’t like that may just not be right for you.
I usually walk away at the first sign I feel someone doesn’t understand me. I learned not to give up so quickly if it’s someone I love. If they care about you, they will try to understand. It may take some time, but they will.
I realized I have a very deep-seated hatred of women that is shoved down so deep I didn’t know it existed. I feel this has affected my life in profound ways and I want to explore this deeper and understand why.
I realized that the way I work myself to death isn’t healthy and I need to find a better way.
I chose to explore the last realization – how I approach work. Through the discussion and coaching, I realized the following:
I feel deep shame for asking for help because I feel like this means I’m not good enough and disorganized.
I think of everything in terms of lone wolfing everything – when in fact I work on a team. The work I do benefits the company I work for, my colleagues and my customers (as I believe in the product).
There is no shame in asking for help.
In the past, when I used to troubleshoot customer issues, I would work until 4 am in the morning and not feel like it is work because I know who it is for, and how I am helping them (I felt good about it).
I resolve going forward, that every time I get overwhelmed and feel the urge to procrastinate I’ll do the following:
Ask myself who I am helping
Myself for the money and experience I will gain
My family, and friends because of the money and time, and experience I can share with them if I succeed at my work
My colleagues for how my work will benefit their lives and careers
My customers for whom my work will transform their businesses and their personal careers.
Focus on doing the work to help them (not just to get it done).
I will never forget the story of the teacher who said the moment that teaching transformed for them was the moment that they stopped trying to teach, and focused on helping their students learn. This feels like that moment to me.
I need to be kinder to myself. To enjoy my life when I’m tired and my body is hurting. I should eat out, take breaks, watch tv. There is no shame in asking for help. I’m on a team. Most of all, I should focus on how my work will help others not just myself.
Make up something for the answers to each of my questions:
What are my target audiences and how can I reach them in a way that is consistent with my vision?
What is a way that my funnel will achieve my mission and vision in some way?
How do I make the funnel effortless and almost self-perpetuating somehow?
AI Consulting
Target audience is startup or small businesses
My vision is to help them reach their full potential
I think the best way to reach them is probably through a facebook funnel
That means walking them through some free content, free newsletter, and possibly free community
Maybe 3 offerings: strategic consulting, innovation project, business overhaul
Strong brand on brighter future
Once funnel is created, should be able to just talk to consultations, maybe live streams
Art Coaching
Target market are people who are looking to or about to retire
My vision is to foster the creation of more masterpieces
Best way to reach them is to hand out business cards at conferences
I think the best way to achieve my mission is by having some content on a website that is inspirational for artists, magical, fun, simple way to book a free consultation
Create a business card that is magical and artsy
Strong brand around dreams
Once funnel is created, just go to conferences and hand out business cards
Ok, now that I worked through all of that, time to go through the same stuff as yesterday:
UNIT ONE: Logistics
Log the new DBA documents
Switch Epiphany AI over to a new account
Switch expenses that are related to business over to new business bank account
Apply for a second business credit card
UNIT TWO: Longterm planning
Answer the question, how much time and money do I want to put into each experiment?
UNIT THREE: Business planning
Finish business plans
Finish financial plans
Finish self growth plans
Finish marketing plans
Final Updates:
Brand for funnel of Art Coaching is children’s books, fairy tale, fantasy. The website is an invitation to start an adventure.
Plan for AI consulting is to explore CRM pipelines such as Zoho, Zapier, and Hubspot
I felt very lonely today, so I watched two videos. I figured that whenever my knee feels bad I do research, but I don’t do a lot of research when I feel lonely.
Major ideas that might help me from this post:
Think about how to help others to feel less lonely. It’s weird that I always think about who can make me feel less lonely, but I actually don’t need other people for that. Helping others will help me feel less lonely.
Emotional perfectionism definately sounds like me. Thinking about how it might be possible for me to connect with people even if they aren’t perfect friends and fill all my needs makes it a lot easier to connect with people.
This one really really really helped me because it answered one of my questions, why am I distracting myself all the time and going on YouTube videos and playing games. The simple thing is, I’m not a good friend to myself.
Main takeaways:
A good friend is honest in a loving gentle way. Be honest with yourself in a compassionate way.
A good friend is encouraging and pushes you to be a better version of yourself. Remind yourself what you are capable of, believe in yourself. Encourage yourself to be a good man, a strong man, despite what others want you to do.
For some reason, the idea of being a good man makes me feel really really calm for some reason. I know I have been fighting myself and that’s why I’m on my phone all the time.
I wanted to spend some time thinking more about my ideal friend:
Someone who is accepting of me, a good listener, empathetic
Someone who wants to go on adventures with me
Someone who encourages me to dream big, believe in myself
I had a slower start to the day. I started the day on my phone, waking up a bit early because my new retainer is bothering me when I sleep.
I watched some Valorant, talked to my girlfriend, and now I have a flight in about 3 hours. I want to leave in about 2 hours. I still have to take out the trash, eat up some more food and load the dishwasher.
I did a bit of a workout and I found out a couple of things that help with regaining energy, and gathering chi:
Butt-clenched breathing: sounds a bit weird but it works. Lie down, clench the sphincter muscle (what you use to hold in poop) breath in. Then relax and breathe out. Repeat.
Tummy circles: put the left hand over your stomach, then your right hand over that. Make circles over your stomach in the clockwise direction. Do it lightly. Then put your hands in the same area in your back and repeat.
Extremity exercises: this can be any exercise that works your extremities. For example, doing a dead hang and focusing on clenching really hard with your hands but leaving everything else relaxed, or doing heel raises with the tips of your toes super engaged with everything else relaxed.
Meditation: lie down close your eyes and walk down a staircase while counting to 10. Imagine the smell of wet stone, always puts me in a meditative state really quick for some reason.
Anyway goals for today. Just relax! I want to get all the chores sorted out and just spend the rest of my time relaxing.
I want to be able to face my pain. And there are a couple of questions I want to ask myself.
How am I feeling?
I feel really sad and heartbroken and lonely. I feel so much pain in my chest. I am angry and frustrated and depressed.
How can I be kinder to myself?
I need to give myself permission to ask for help from people. I need to ask people to distract me, to comfort me, and listen and understand why I loved her so much. I can try to forgive myself for hurting her.
Can I forgive her?
I don’t want to. I’m scared when I do, I will completely let her go. I will give up hope and move on. I want to think about how she can fix it. I want to blame her. I know she’s so loving and she didn’t want to be the person she was. She has a kind heart deep inside and really emotional and passionate.
Can I forgive myself?
It makes me really sad. I know I hurt her a lot, and keep hurting her over and over because of my ego. I feel ashamed that I need so much from her and keep asking her to give me more. I suppose I’ve been through a lot too. I had so much painful things happen in my life and it’s closed me off. I was more open to her than anyone else. I deserve to be happy too. I deserve to put my needs first too.
What do I need from her?
I need for her to tell me everything is ok. I need for her to tell me she loves me. I need for her to give me hope again that we will have a beautiful loving bond where I will have everything I need.
Can I give myself that?
It’s hard for sure. I don’t think everything will be ok. I don’t love myself either. And I don’t feel hope.
I’ll write a poem to try to do all those things for myself: