Recently I’ve been feeling immense pressure with the sensation that I’m somehow running out of time.
I feel a lot of frustration and anger in my chest.
I feel like I have no time anymore to work on the projects, and making progress in my own WordPress. I feel burning rage and frustration in my chest and stomach.
It might be the I am out of control wound.
I’m really angry at myself for procrastinating and not being able to get anything done.
Today I did come up with a really cool idea for an AI benchmark for:
Creative writing
Problem solving
Research
Contracts
I also feel overwhelmed. I feel like there is so much work to do, I don’t know where to start. I am overwhelmed. I am not able to deal with it.
I have a lot of projects I’m working on and it is scary to feel that I don’t know how to handle that.
I feel pressure because there are all difficult challenges that are important to me.
I failed big at succeeding in them…I’m so proud of myself!
This is a good thing. To fail big is to learn big.
The lessons are slowly being revealed.
The first question is…what did I need when I was in the overwhelmed state?
Well, I needed to feel the feelings, to be ok with just processing first.
After feeling the feelings to the fullest, what I need next is to find the courage in myself to face the challenge. To remember that I’m capable of anything.
And after feeling embracing the challenge, thinking tactically how I want to face it, and specifically, what small steps I want to take.
I want to take everything that I know as a small task and add it to my todolist. We will start there.
I feel exhausted. My head feels numb. I feel hot and tired. My back aches.
My heart feels heavy. I feel angry at myself. So helpless. My mind in a fog.
My apartment is a mess. I just want to cry.
I can’t work. I just play games all day long. my eyes feel tired.
It’s 2 o’clock in the morning. All I want to do is eat and play video games. The pull is so strong in my heart like there is a strand of honey getting pulled.
I feel a numb panic deep in my chest. I’m afraid of failure. I’m scared I will disappoint myself and everyone around me. Pushing myself to make my business cards is only making me curl up even harder.
It was a long week. I’m exhausted. But the work just keeps coming.
I guess I can cancel tai chi tomorrow. Sleep in.
Tonight I can clean my apartment until I feel more peaceful.
I know I can use the gym as a way to process emotions, but I don’t use it.
I feel this pull, this overwhelm, like the honey being pulled, from my heart.
I’m capable of anything. Even rising from this challenge. This is important because as I get more successful, there will be days I feel exhausted, and in those moments, I need to find a way to find balance, to find peace.
I also want to learn to embrace failure. Failure is so scary to me. There is an image in my mind of my business cards being a complete disappointment and I feel a pit in my heart. A horrible amaturish website I’m not proud of and I can’t fix it.
Everyone starts somewhere. Everyone starts at the beginning. The people who are exceptional, who are savants are not people who started at the middle. They are people who enjoyed the beginning.
But how can I enjoy this? I feel so scared it won’t be good.
Makes me think of this video:
In this video, Jesse talks about how play allows us to feel pressure while still being able to learn.
That fun is the key to this.
But what is the key to fun? What would make this fun for me, regardless of the outcome, what would make designing and drawing fun for me?
What would make it an infinite game, not just a finite game focused on an end goal?
It’s true, the thought of designing business cards does not sound fun to me at all. It sounds like a slog. But maybe that’s because I’m worried about failing.
Ok, what if I tried to merge my painterly style with “woodcut” style prints. What if I created a new drawing technique that I could use to create cool stuff for friends and to sell as products?
That definitely sounds more like play to me.
So what about going to the gym, because I like it so much when I actually go, but I find it hard to go to begin with.
What if I saw it as supercharging myself – which it really is doing. Whether I go to lift weights or just to hang from the bar and stretch it really is building my body up to full potential. It might even solve my sleep problems.
And what about sleep, why do I not want to go to bed? Because if I go to bed, tomorrow, I wake up with tons of problems. Well maybe, that’s not a bad thing. Maybe before I go to bed, I fill my to do list with questions that I want to search out the answers to.
Here are the questions I have today, that if I knew the answers to I would rest easy:
What am I going to do about my art coaching and AI gaming companies?
Am I behind schedule and if so what do I do about it?
Should I extend the schedule?
Am I losing money?
How do I get out of my procrastination phase and get working?
What do I do about my art coaching website?
How do I get everything done in such a short period of time?
Should I start registering for fairs?
Should I pay someone to design the website for me?
How am I going to get the motivation to start drawing? How do I start drawing consistently?
How do I start going to the gym and working outsite the apartment consistently?
How will I start cooking again and cleaning up my apartment? Where will I find the time?
How will I prepare for the next week of work? How do I balance my other businesses?
When will I continue to work on my Javascript projects? What is the breakdown between AI work time and coaching work time.
I’ve been thinking more about rejection and working through some of my thoughts with it.
I want people to validate me to feel confident being myself. But validation and confidence are completely different.
Confidence is all about being ok with not getting other’s approval and validation, being ok with not being the strongest, the smartest, the most attractive. I want to find a way to let go of seeking approval from everyone. That is seriously holding me back.
The first thing I realized is that I need to be clear about what I value outside of approval.
I love solving difficult problems. I love learning, growing, and improving myself. I love creating. I love meeting new people and connecting with those people on a deep level. I love consuming art and music, writing and dance.
Being rejected doesn’t stop me from pursuing those things. In fact, people who reject me might realize my path is one they admire and want to follow.
The second thing I realized is that I can use rejection as motivation. It’s just a challenge to my ego. It makes me stronger.
I don’t want anything handed to me. The hero has the slay the dragon. I want to be the underdog, and I strive for greatness.
I am slowly getting back into things. After completely messing up my bedtime, getting it back, getting sick, losing my bedtime again, I am finally getting back into the swing of things.
I want to refocus on the things that I set out to focus on: Health, AI Consulting, Art Coaching.
I want to have an 11-12 PM bedtime, journaling at night, morning walking meditation, and morning todo list and blog post.
Today on my morning walk I contemplated rejection.
You know I always felt that working on yourself made you more prepared for life in general and I always felt my fear of rejection was holding me back from a lot of things in life, initially from getting a girlfriend, but later from being a life coach.
Recently I had the experience of meeting with a client for a free session for which they were super impressed by but when I sent them my rates, they did not respond. This immediately triggered the rejection wounds within me. I also just had an artist interview who was late to our conversation, did not agree to the full hour, and did not want to schedule another time to complete our conversation which triggered rejection wounds within me.
I feel scared that if I ask for things, people will reject me. I’m afraid it will be awkward to talk to them afterwards, I’m afraid how others will view me after getting rejected.
This morning I came up with a couple of nuggets to handle and process rejection:
Take up space: there is a part of me that wants to hide when people reject me. I want to take up as little space as possible. This concept is doing the opposite. I deserve to be here like everyone else. Take up space! Make the ask!
Enthusiastic yes: I don’t want people to feel pressured. I am going to follow the philosophy on the Prosperous Coach. It’s either an enthusiastic yes, or its a no. Maybe is a no. And tell them that. If they are not sure, they know where to find you.
Slow down: I realized this new revelation in Valorant has implications in life too. When I feel stressed about rejection and awkwardness, shame, and judgement, slow down. I usually try to speed up, to move past it. Slow way down, focus on what is going on before charging ahead.
Stay busy, focus on the process not the outcome: one thing that I noticed, when I’m busy doing what matters, I won’t care as much about anything else. I want to focus on health, coaching and consulting. Don’t let anyone’s rejection take away from that. It’s like what they say about cold calling. Focus on the process, not the outcomes (focus on improving your process for cold calling, not for the outcome of every call).
Today I feel mentally and physically drained. I went to bed at 3 AM last night. I feel defeated, anxious, and sad about my relationship. I keep asking myself what it means to own a startup, what it means to be in charge. I think what it means is to be able to take a day off if you need to.
Let’s take a look at some of the different areas of my life right now:
STARTUP
I’m disappointed in both the effectiveness and efficiency with customer projects as well as the level of sales outreach.
I feel disconnected from my partner with quite a bit of friction, feeling that there is always a barrier to do what I want to do.
What might be the next steps?
Identify areas my partner is strong in to involve him more on things I need help with
Identify areas I feel strongly I should lead and take more leadership in that area
LIFE
I’m a bit stagnated on my todo list
My life systems for food and exersise are seeing big wins
Huge desire to get more sleep
What might be my next steps?
Fallout during the day only for leveling up people
Netflix and long fallout sessions at night in bed
To do list cleaning/grooming on fridays
COACHING
I’ve stopped completely
Undecided on whether to work on my own art projects or continue coaching
I want to work on my youtube channel and an art group
What might be my next steps?
Finish artist interview challenge
Outreach for potential clients
RELATIONSHIP
I feel misunderstood a lot, mismatching values, too much physical distance