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I want to share my situation here as it's the only place that it feels worthwhile to share it to. And I only have a couple of friends that I feel comfortable sharing things like this with. I discovered nofap at 14, that marked the start of my self-improvement journey. I'm almost 19 now and I feel like I've hit the knee of the exponential growth curve. What can happen in a short amount of time now is absolutely baffling. During the ~5 years of my self-improvement, and about 3yr of more hardcore self-improvement I'm finally starting to reap visible rewards. I completely broke off my porn addiction about 8 months ago. Really defeated it, fully. I don't have urges. Porn simply feels pointless. Since then the growth in my life has been increasingly accelerating. I am proud of my body, I look great. I feel absolutely grounded most of the time. Detached from the approval of people. I feel increasingly authentic. I feel like I've built the infrastructure to allow anything to be possible. It's only a matter of committing to something. I meditate, I go to the gym, I train martial arts, I eat well, I feel grounded and confident, I work with people 20+ years older than me, I read, I learn. I feel so good sometimes it's ridiculous. The possibilities feel so big and real it's absurd. Leo's videos were a main source for my lifestyle. I got an 1-year "internship" to what's almost like my dream job. Recently I got applied to non-military service for 1 year at an organization that's focusing on national security. Think of it like an internship for a year. Now, I come from a lower-middle class family with nothing too special going on. This place is fucking crazy. The kinds of people I see here are the kinds I've never seen before. Ambassadors, generals, ministers, all kinds of politicians and high-ranking military personnel. I signed an NDA the first week I was there. The intelligence service at my country did an security investigation on me. I JUST GRADUATED FUCKING HIGH-SCHOOL. Where people were only focused on drinking and stupid-ass drama. Then all of a sudden I'm working alongside people with careers in politics, national security, intelligence, journalism. I've been warned multiple times about being an interesting prospect for foreign intelligence cervices as I'm a young and new employee. The security protocols at this place are crazy, and what's more crazy is that these people fully trust me with them. I feel like I'm being treated like an adult for the first time in my life. I wouldn't have been able to get this job without working on myself hardcore for multiple years. From high school to living a fucking spy movie in about 5 months. I feel like after years of hard work, everything is clicking in to place right now. I feel good. I have so much time left. I feel as though I have a mission. I have a plan for the future. I'm discovering my life purpose. I know where to look. Fuck I'm hyped. Holistic self-improvement works. Don't stop learning guys. Thank you for listening to my TED-talk.

Tooting my own horn here but had to vent lmao.

Where'd you get that from?? According to https://worldpopulationreview.com/country-rankings/suicide-rate-by-country Finland has a suicide rate of 15.3, while the US has 16.1 As a Finnish person I hear this very often even in Finland. I'm not sure why it has stuck as a meme for so long that Finland has a very high suicide rate, even though it's actually not true. I think it just stuck from the 90's and early 00's since back then Finland actually had a really high suicide rate due to Nokia going bust and other stuff.

I used to paint graffitis a few years ago. During that time I got a few paid gigs to paint inside someone's house. The fumes are potent to say the least when you paint inside, so that's when I wore a respirator with 2 activated carbon filters. The first time I painted, I noticed that the other filter was leaking a bit. I got these small pieces of carbon in my mouth and nose. Didn't give it much thought back then. After a few months I got another gig where I also wore the respirator. This time after taking the respirator off I noticed that it had leaked significantly more. I most likely inhaled a fair bit of the activated carbon leaking from the respirator. I have no idea how unhealthy this is, definitely doesn't sound like it would increase my lifespan lol. I was around 15 years old when this happened, so I hope that my young body is capable of getting rid of any chemicals/toxins that I've exposed myself to. That being said, I've had some minor health problems mainly related to autoimmune issues. Symptoms such as exhaustion/tiredness, minor migraine, and digestive issues. Nothing serious though and I'm slowly healing through various techniques. It's just an interesting thought how these symptoms could be related to the exposure. What do you think?

@Spence94 Hey! I'm just starting to study Mandarin on my free time. How are you going about it? Any good Mandarin resources to share? Personally I've just been using Duolingo for now and listening to a couple of podcasts on spotify: Coffee break Chinese and SBS Mandarin. It's a tricky language. I might buy some books on it and find some Mandarin kid's cartoons to watch. Chinese media content is hard to find on the western side of the internet though

Which problem areas facing the world -either now or in the future- do you consider being the most serious and neglected? Some ideas: -Dangers of superintelligent artificial intelligence -A conflict between leading superpowers -A pandemic even more serious than right now You could also answer from the perspective of what would you create or increase in the world to create the most good. What are your two cents? The problems can be as general or as specific as you like. I'm interested in what the forum thinks are the most important issues to focus on from the perspective of human well-being and consciousness.

A more physiological approach that might help you, a short watch: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=vJ8b-DoKYAU Helped me when I had some depression and loss of emotions. Sending good vibes for you all the best.

@bejapuskas Hey man I really want to thank you. I've been pondering and contemplating about my life purpose or a good while. Did the course two times, got some direction but I'm still searching. From your response I started reading about effective altruism and 80000 hours. What a goldmine. Finally something that resonates with me. You don't even know how much value you've generated through that short answer to this thread. All the best.

@Village I think you're being too vague, what do you mean by going outside and living life? And you're right in a sense, I don't particularly enjoy studying the things I do right now, and it definitely is exhausting, but in a good sense. I feel like I used my energy for a good cause. I'm only doing it to get to uni, 1 year left.

Context: I have about 4 months to prepare for my final exams from upper secondary school (matriculation examination). The exam for each subject lasts for 6 hours, and that's when I want to have every braincell working on full capacity. Currently on a normal day I have some trouble focusing for more than 90 minutes at a time, and I feel like that might negatively effect my performance. Question: Do you have any tips or techniques on how to maintain a full focus during the exam? For example what to eat the day prior, or during the exam? Do I stock up on coffee during the exam? How should I aim to reach a flow state? Adderal? A water fast beforehand? Keto diet? Take short meditation breaks? Smoke a bowl during the exam and just ask DMT entities for the correct answers? Any insights are appreciated.

@Village You wouldn't what exactly? And for the record I threw the adderal in there as a half-joke nothing wrong with cold showers though? And what else would I do than study? Honestly. That is a crucial step in pursuing my life purpose, I want to get to a really specific uni that's challenging to get to. It makes me feel happy and satisfied at the end of the day, knowing that I did everything I could to get closer to my vision. Also, I go to the gym so I'm not completely throwing away my physical health, even though I definitely could benefit from exercising more. I'd rather be satisfied, happy and moderately healthy, than feeling like I'm not using my full potential in terms of my LP while being super healthy.

@Michael569 Man, I followed your routine and I'm on fucking fire. Usually on saturdays I just sit back and pick my nose but yesterday I studied for something like 9 hours! I've never felt this good, this is my new default routine from now on. Thanks man, you really changed my outlook.

@Average Investor @Leo Nordin @SirVladimir Thanks for sharing your thoughts! This was very helpful

Hey everyone! I've been wondering about this for a couple of weeks now, I can't remember if LP course had any segment on it; how do hobbies and your life purpose go together? I'm going to use my situation as an example. I'm 17yo at the moment. Finished the LP course about 6 months ago and I am clear about my life purpose as an architect, a perfect fit for me. I do my best to practice it every day, even though most of my time is spent on schoolwork. I also started playing guitar couple of weeks ago, and I'm really liking it. I've found it to be a great way to relax for a bit, and the mastery process feels exciting. Now.. I'm seriously considering replacing going to the gym with jiu-jitsu, thinking it is a better way to stay fit, gain confidence, and meet new people. That would probably take up more time than gym because the schedule is not flexible and it is more competitive. After all of that most of my time would be divided in to school, jiu-jitsu, architecture (broad skillset; practicing visual arts, marketing, building structure etc.), and guitar. My worry is that I'm dividing my attention in to too many things, and that I will start losing focus on my life purpose. Should one hone down on hobbies and laser focus on LP, giving the career a really strong start, or toy around a bit and explore new hobbies even though the life purpose is clear? I'm obviously lacking life experience, so would spreading my time in to multiple things benefit me more? Both ways have their pros and cons, and there probably is a lot more to this than I am seeing. Feeling quite conflicted about this. I would love to hear your thoughts.