Phill

You guys ever seem this one? I am always open to listen, but, it looks very oversimplified for me. Really wanted to hear you guys thoughts on this video!

Weird I can access it no problem, but the more i think about its content the more i see bullshit, still would like to hear different perspectives

I am 30 years old. I use the computer 12 hours a day every, single, day. I make a living through coaching people online (2 hours per day) and also as a Motion Designer (6 hours per day), I work from my home, and my computer is in my bed room. I am a perfectionist, and yes I am very aware of how much it cripples me. When I work, I try to do the best job possible, always going beyond my limit, I care a lot about quality, I never deliver a shitty job, it must be at least decent. I tried to meditate in the past, I couldn't, I get too agitated, I read almost everyday for 20 minutes at least. I make much more money than the average person, my family is middle class but I do not feel the need to buy anything else in life, I feel I exhausted that long time ago. I love changing things in my mind, but I hate changing other things in life like re position the furniture of my room around would make stressed or changing the light of the room would also stress me. I repeat my cloths often and also my beard style and hair, if I go buy a new t shirt, it must be the exact same size and style, otherwise I am not buying, same shit goes for my jeans. T shirts must be neutral colors grey, dark grey, black, dark blue, fuck all the other colors, I feel like a clown if I were them, I feel ridiculous even though I am very aware that it has nothing to do with ridiculous, it's just a color and a t shirt. I cut my own hair, or ask gf to help me cut it, I do not go to the hair dresser because every time I go they cut my hair too short, feels extremely ugly right after and go into a identity crisis for days, this used to be much worse when I was younger, I can deal with it better now, still it stress me out. Mom said that when I was young, I would puke crying in stress when people would be cutting my hair in the hairdresser. I hate changing things in me externally, but I like changing internally. When I was young my room would be dirty and a mess, now I notice that it makes me stressed out, so I try to maintain a more clean and organized room. I love routine, when girlfriend wants me to drive to her city and stay there a few days shit is really tough, I resist a LOT, but once I get there I get relaxed, I can notice that, and she says I become another person stress-wise. I jog 30 minutes at least 5 days per week. I eat healthy, meat, lots of vegetables and some carbs. I am fit. I consume little sugar specially the refined, no drugs, not even caffeine (this shit made me very depressed last time I was consuming it often) I love to learn and to become more aware of what things are and how they function, I love to test new ideas. I don't like studying, but I love applying what I learn. My sleep schedule is fucked up, I go sleep at 4 am waking up at 12 pm. For the past 12 years it has been pretty much the same, in the past it was worse because one week I would be sleeping in the day, then the other week I would be sleeping at night. I tried many types of supplements, Omega 3, Magnesium Chelate, L-Theanine, none seems to do a thing to how stressed out I feel. I rarely socialize, I never feel the need, and I have a girlfriend too so... I love video games, I play to relax usually 2-3 hours a day no more) Mom and Dad take anti depressants and anxiolytics, my family has a history of depression, insomnia and anxiety, my father is an alcoholic, but the one who has a job. I decided to try anti depressants when I was 17 years old, shit made me a zombie, I couldn't identify if I was feeling happy or sad, I would feel numb, and that numbness made me hollow/empty, had frequent suicidal thoughts at the time, so I decided to not take that route again. My dad lives alone, very very little contact with people, he can only socialize when he drinks, I had very bad social anxiety, I do not have it anymore. I look very similar to my dad in the mind in some aspects I can see that, when I was young, if me and my brother would start fighting, he would immediately bring us back to my mom, mom said that sometimes he would take us then 30 minutes later come back home with us, she would ask why? He would say 'they are fighting/discussing', looks like my dad couldn't handle those situations emotionally, little emotional intelligence? I take 100% responsibility for everything in my life. Now that you know some information about me, let me introduce my issue. I am a person that lives stressed out pretty much all the time, most of my days, is suffering with big dose of anxiety and constant, obsessively questioning everything in life, I feel pain in the back, back of the neck and shoulders almost everyday for 3-4 hours a day. Lately, I felt so stressed once I laid in the bed, I told myself, life just isn't worth if I keep living this way, I was feeling very very miserable. I start observing more closely what types of things stress me out, and to my surprise it seems like everything stresses the shit out of me, I feel so stress out at times that, even trying to do the things that I enjoy I can't enjoy, because I am too stressed out, I am most of the time feeling overwhelmed, since this looked like a normal thing since my teen ages, I just kept going and dealing with it as it is, without questioning. I decided I do not want anymore, to live like this, I don't want to keep feeling so much fatigue and miserable and anxious and so on. I wanted to hear what you guys have to say about this, if any of you go through this? I basically have only 2 moments that I can see during the days that I do not feel overwhelmed or stressed out which is: 1) The 1st 2 hours after I wake up, after that it becomes really tough. 2) The next hour after I go jogging. Like I can still live, and work and do my stuff you know, but even my girlfriend said to me, she said: You are always angry, all the time. And she is right I am the majority of the time. I am taking 200% responsibility of this , but I just am not really sure what I am suppose to do, I can't see what are the core things in which is causing this stress. My mind can see many possibilities of why I am that much stressed out, but I do not have a method to find that. Anybody going through the same thing or gone through the same thing in the past? I am really feeling crippled, my productivity, even though I am always forcing myself to work, is low, due to how stressed I always am, any ideas?

Hello @Parki Just so you know, @Shin strategy to deal with your anxiety is pretty much Cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT) (google it up), your brain goes into fight or flight mode once you go on the streets or social places full of people because it perceives it as a threat mostly because of unfamiliarity or doubt, meaning that your whole brain gets activated causing the terrible feeling you feel, I had the same problem in the past, I solved through CBT I would go jog in a place full of people and expose, expose, expose, I don't think you should just do it through sheer force though, but to observe what you are thinking, then once you come home, you write those thoughts in a paper and just question if they are true of false, it will shed great light on things you weren't aware of, if you become aware of the thoughts your having specially the patterns that repeats over and over, you will eventually be able to control them, you cannot control something unconscious, you need to witness it, deeply. In my case I had a RULE of how my hair is suppose to be, if my hair wasn't that specific way, I would get crazy about it (it took me a few years to realize that...), I had the BELIEF that I NEEDED to be beautiful to people at all times, I would need to be beautiful, kind, generous and other shit, you see this is just a bunch of fucked up rules created in the mind that makes you neurotic, it's of extremely importance that you identify those, only then you will slowly become free of them. This exercise will eventually break you out of the neurosis you are in, I know exactly how painful it is for you, in my case I would sweat my whole body, my stomach would get really upset, my hands would get sweat then I would freak out that woman would hate me for the cold and sweaty hands... and nobody then would like to date me(just unconscious fucked up beliefs as you can see) my skin would go pale, my mouth would go dry, the stress would get so high my back and shoulders would hurt, then later once I come home I would need to stay alone for a bunch of hours to calm down, oh I been through that entire hell, and that entire hell is created by your own mind, do the exercises, do self inquiry, become conscious of what exactly, SPECIFICALLY is going inside your mind and you will slowly improve, don't expect things changing suddenly, but I promise if you do the exercises you will see great benefits in a few months.

Sir, that insight was outstanding! Kudos to you

I agree 100% with @d0ornokey I had the same problem in the past, those ruminations are usually perpetuated due to high levels of anxiety, I cured my anxiety by having a large breakfast everyday when I wake up (some of carbs, lots of proteins, some fat, and lots of salad) and making sure I sleep at least 7 hours everyday, and that I go to bed and wake up at the same time, the contrast was so huge you wouldn't believe it. What I have to say is that, you first must CURE the physical problems, I am not saying you have any physical conditions but make sure ALL THINGS are normal optimal physically wise, your eating properly, sleeping properly etc etc, in the past I ALWAYS thought it was in my mind my mind my mind, for more than 10 years I thought i was only on my mind the problem and I invested in everything you can imagine to fix it, but, if your levels of hormones, sugar, vitamins, minerals are unbalanced that create disarmony and there is no way your going to cure a problem in your mind if the root cause is physical, in your body, it's like trying to climb a mountain with a rock pulling you down, you will always fall back to square 1, my anxiety levels was so terrible, I would feel body ache all day, I'd be extremely angry, I'd be ruminating over and over on the same subject for hours and hours, guess what? Changing Diet and cutting sugar in my case was the top 1 most life changing thing I have ever done in my life in my 30 years of life. I HIGHLY recommend you to watch this: Lastly, TAKE ACTION, things will not change if you do not take real action on it, explore, try stuff, then observe the results, see what works better or not, eventually you will discover what works and what doesn't, the things that works will make such a huge contrast that you WILL know about it, just make sure your observing the results after such actions, if right now things aren't working for you, life is just telling you that the life style your living right now isn't working, something is missing, that can be 1 thing or a bunch of things, you must search for those.

It's been a while that I have been trying to change my behavior, @Leo Gurait is very true that you are a slave of your own feelings and desires, and it seems that in order to change your behavior your suppose to go against your feelings and desires, and that might lead into more discipline. I have been finding really hard to change my behavior, for the last entire year I have been trying to create a reading habit, every week I read but for like 15mins here or there and this is just isn't usually enough to develop the idea on the subject. Now an interesting thing that happened few weeks ago, I went jogging, I usually would jog for 25-35mins, I wanted to increase it to 1 hour, then one day I put a timer on my cellphone and pushed with pure force until I reached 1 hour, then I came back home. When I arived at home, I did some journaling immediately about how I was feeling, if there was any difference compared to 25-35mins, what I became conscious is that the benefits was even greater, and by becoming more aware of that helped me to stick with it for the next entire week. I also decided to stop jogging and go swimming, and I started swimming for 1 hour everyday, but right now it's starting to become boring and I can see myself starting to procrastinate. As you guys can see this story is old and repetitive in my life, you start something, then skip the next day, then repeat this vicious cycle, I never managed to really stick with something in a real consistent way. My question is, how do you make sure your new behavior sticks? I feel that right now I am very aware of the self talk, the manipulations I tell myself to not do it etc etc, usually what works for me is just put the cloths on and go, don't think too much otherwise you will procrastinate. And seriously, the main reason that made me keep jogging and to increase to 1 hour is that I feel the need of doing it to control my anxiety levels, I feel that if there was no anxiety problems, it would be extremely hard to it because "it's just important" instead of having a true desire of doing it. As you can see it goes to square one, I am a slave to my own desires I do it because something inside pushes me to do it. Maybe I am addicted to outcomes and results? Does anyone here truly does something without desiring it? Just because it's necessary? Have you been able to stick with it? What's your guys thoughts?

That's the tough part, if I let go, and I don't force myself out of the comfort zone at least a little bit everyday, you go back to be very lazy and just float with whatever you feel you should do, addictions and desires. I manage to jog everyday because I forced myself with brute force to do it. With time it is becoming easier and easier but just in a very slow pace. Also here is a quote from Leo about discipline in an old post:

Oh ok, so what am I suppose to do with this?

I'm sorry I do not understand, can you elaborate?

Explore life, get in touch with what you want, be authentic with yourself, get yourself around people you really enjoying being with, I feel that the more alone you stay, the more lost in your own world of thoughts you get. It traps you when you don't see things from a different perspective. I also struggle sometimes because I really need to cry but often times the pain isn't enough to make me cry, drama in movies can trigger you to cry, and many other things, you just need to be observant and learn from it. Careful when 'figuring out' your issue, if you start to think/google the amount of possibilities is going to make you crazy, because you might take things for granted which isn't real so take sometime to contemplate what is it, journaling is extreeeeemely effective for that. And lastly, it would be interesting to ask why you have such a heavy heart right now, what's missing in your life? Is it companionship? Is it physical exercise? Is it a hobby? It is sex? A partner? A friend? What's exactly, specifically is missing?

Thanks, I will watch it later!

Do the Wim Hof Breathing Method, it takes only a few minutes and then right after it I go sleep quite fast Remember, you breath in fully then let it go, don't put force to air go out, just let it go, repeat it 30x, on the last one let it go and then hold until you need more oxygen, breath in hold until you feel the need to exhale and now your good to go

After almost 2 years of studying self development, I am right now into this, existential crisis. Sometimes, a few hours in a day, I go into this feeling of everything I do is completely worthless, there is no point, because once I die, I am dead, and then everything is gone forever, life itself seems to be just a passage into the unknown. @Leo Gura videos has definitely been incredibly helpful on increasing my consciousness helping me become aware of how the mind works(thank you very much man, it cured many of my mental illnesses and suffering), I am aware of so many things in which I wasn't, but, I still can't get the idea that he says on the Absolutely Infinity video on DMT, that death doesn't exist, that there is no death. When I look around, and I see parents dying, friends dying, everything is decaying slowly and slowly, that is simply the way this universe works it seems like, that's the nature of it, at least that's what we can verify empirically speaking. This doubt of 'what is going to happen to me once I die?' have been really torturing me lately which is leading to tell myself, stop trying to grasp something in which I don't have access of, and instead accept it. I once used weed, I had a terrible terrible trip with it, the Time notion we humans being have, got distorted in such a way, that I got paranoid that that trip would last forever, because at THAT moment, I couldn't understand anymore what Time is or was. I lost the capacity of understanding it which led me to constant, non stop panic attacks until the effect vanished, it was one of the worst experiences I had in life. That leaves me with a big doubt, since I am a skeptic mofo, how can you know that, such drug, isn't altering your brain, and all the things your seeing, all the things your experiencing, isn't just caused because of the drug itself? In my case, weed in my case almost completely destroyed the notion of "Time", so what can other drugs do? Just by looking in history and the world we can see that, people really have a hard time living without knowing about their future, what is death, what is life, hence why there is so many religions out there creating more and more rationalizations in order to explain the inexplicable, just tricking themselves for relief. Right now I do understand why, it is definitely disturbing not knowing that. I hold no sacred belief about death, what I am basically saying is that, once your dead your dead, that is what we know and that is verifiable isn't it? What is beyond that is a completely, utter mystery to me, it is the absolute unknown to me, and I have been working on accepting this but man, it has been really tough. Have any of you went through this process?

@TruthSeeker47 Thanks man, you know when you try to speak to all the people you know in real life but they just don't listen to what you have to say? They just right away start judging you, holy fuck it's like I can't connect with anyone about this subject, it feels almost that I am suffering alone with this, your words made me feel that I am not alone. Now about trauma, I think being born is a trauma itself, every baby that comes to this world (I just assuming) feels derelict, in the past I had terrible parents, I can't recall any specific trauma, I will definitely try Leos Holotropic Breathing, I tried Wim Hof Method before, I saw the results right away, will see if I go more in depth with that. I also feel that, one my main issues is that the anxiety just amplifies all this pain and doubt. My anxiety is severe I have adapted my life around my anxiety it really is something, I can't be in the moment but thinking about the future. Thanks again man, all the best.

I am into it because: 1) Connection 2) Sex 3) Status All my entire life when I was single, I wasn't really happy, actually, when I was 19 years old, it hurted so much not having sex and connection with a female, I was imploding, it was one of the toughest pains I ever felt in life, now, my life quality without a doubt improved a lot since I got a gf, now that I am almost on my 30's, I still feel the necessity it is just better manageable, and I am certain that if I was living solo, my life wouldn't be as nice as it is, it definitely fills a hole in me, that's my experience.

@Charlotte I suffer from severe anxiety, and that makes me stressed and then very easily irritable, then I become very very explosive with my girlfriend, I AM SO SORRY for that, but it's just something really out of control. One thing I was going to suggest is doing the Wim Hof Method Breathing, 2 times a day, for 5-10 minutes just each time, here how it goes: 1) Lay down comfortably 2) Breath in deep (into the belly, putting force but not too much) 3) Let the air go out (do not push it out, just let it go out) 4) Repeat that cycle 30 times (in and out, 30 times) 5) After 30 cycles, exhale and stop breathing (if he does correctly, he should start feeling some tingling through his head/face and body) 6) Listen to the body, and don't breath until the body asks for air, when it does, breath deeply in again, hold it again until the body asks to exhale and then do it That's it, in my case this always trumps the anxiety, and the anxiety in my case is the main cause of my angryness/irritability, I become so angry sometimes that I do not want to see or talk to anyone, I just wanna lock myself in my room forever, I think this could be worth a try, it was the strongest technique I have ever found for myself together with a proper diet. This method is scientific proven, and have many other benefits other than dealing with anxiety, it helps with stress immensely and so many other stuff, you can read more about it here: http://www.icemanwimhof.com/files/2016wimhofmethod-revealed.pdf Take care

How important do you guys think it is necessary to communicate things in a proper smooth way? What I mean with that is, often times I am very honest and too straight forward with whatever I say, and sometimes people get hurt my hearing the truth. Here is a example of that: My girlfriend have issues financially speaking, she does manage to barely pay her bills and whatever little money is left she spend with junk food and woman stuff. She also do not invest her free time to learn something, like reading a book, or investing money in a course, to evolve at something, so she can change her life for the better somehow. There was a day we were in the market buying stuff, and she started complaining about of how hard her financial life is, and this is very repetitive, then, I right away told her: "All that complaining won't change your life, instead you should invest your energy thinking and working to improve your financial situation instead of playing the victim, If you don't take responsibility for it, if you don't save money, if you don't invest part of your free time mastering something, how do you expect it to change?" She right away replied: "Oh so I cant' complain anymore?" I said "Well you can, but what does exactly does that accomplish in your financial life?" She does get mad when I call her a victim, so I usually try to avoid saying that, but I did say that, my fault here. Now I was wondering, am I being an asshole for saying things like that? Am I being too insensitive? If so how I should have communicated that? Should I just listen next time? Maybe I should be less judgmental? Like I am genuinely looking to improve that is why I am asking this because I do not know if I am too honest with what I say, or if people can't hear the truth, or both, I just can't see to find a middle ground here, does that make sense? Maybe I am telling her what I want her to become for my own egoic desires? Am I too fanatic of my own ideas? Here is a phrase I've read somewhere a while ago: "People play roles and do politics, they are so used to hearing lies, brutal sincerity will shock them and make you look arrogant" What do you think? Any books/videos you'd recommend?

@Rebec Could you please explain further what exactly made you realize you can't help or give advice to others? I want that insight you had!

Hey Guys, So my actual strategy is: 1) Doing 15 hours fasting every day. 2) 2 Big meals, one when I wake up, one another in the afternoon. 3) Lots of water 4) Jog for at least 20 minutes a day 5) Sleep at the same time, wake up at the same time (usually I would go to bed at 10pm) In the beginning this worked pretty well, but then all of sudden I would just feel this huge insatiable need to eat whatever is in front of me, if for some reason I would skip one of these meals because I didn't buy them, I would eat whatever the hell there is in my home because the pain would just be almost unbearable, I would become extremely irritable, really bad mood, stressed as hell, I would go like, "I don't give a damn what I am going to eat, I must EAT!!!" Sometimes in the weekend I would hang out with girlfriend and she is always eating garbage, ice cream, etc etc, I would SOMETIMES eat with her, am I maybe having sugar cravings here? So I am just lost here, like, is there a specific balance between carbs/fat/protein in my meals to keep satiated for longer, and making me nourished enough to no go crazy? Can you guys please share your strategies? Like this stuff just became much harder than I thought, I only manage to lose 500g in 3 months. Like I just can't stick with it I feel, I always have those relapses from time to time, is it just part of the process, can you please shed some light here for me? I am also thinking about going to the nutritionist, maybe he/she could give me hints here on how to deal with that. I am completely zero knowledge on this area of nutrition, if you guys could also reference books/videos/articles anything that can help me educate myself that would be wonderful. Thanks in advance!

Hey @Siim Land! Thank you so much for your reply, What is the regimen you would give me in order to do what I want to? I am really thinking about going to the Gym, but how should I administrate this? Can you refer me to a specific regimen?

Hey @ShinThanks for the post! I am 29, started jerking off in a daily basis since my 15, 14 years of almost non stop consuming of porn, so stopping for 1 month gave a biiig contrast on my sexual desire, in the first 2 weeks I got limp dick, zero desire for sex, but after 2-3 weeks, I am becoming a sex freak, wonder what happens after 1 year! I started doing nofap like 1 month ago, It just made me more lusting for sex, zero fap since then and still going. There's a restaurant I buy food everyday, all the younger chicks flirts with me, not sure if nofap is actually influencing this. Another funny thing, I became so horny in some moments, that I wanted to go out and get some chicks, I just don't because I have a girlfriend and I value trust extremely. I get much harder boners with gf and I can last long during sex!

Interesting point @Melwyn, but could you elaborate this? What exactly creates self doubt and why does self doubt trains us to lie to ourselves? Coud you please clarify?

You got it! Sit down and try to stop thinking for 1 minute, and what your going to discover is that, it is just inevitable, thoughts just flows and flows. That's just how the mind works, if you try to control it, your going against what is, it's the same thing knowing that 1+1=2, but then you come over and say NOPE, 1+1=3, see, your denying what is. Just become aware WHEN the separation mechanism starts, WHEN you start saying to yourself "this is wrong stop it", WHEN you start demonizing yourself, observe it happening, don't judge, just notice it is happening and learn those patterns, and what exactly they are causing you. And from that awareness, once you become conscious of those thoughts and patterns and how they work and how they influence your feelings, you will then connect the dots, you will then realize this is just causing you pure suffering, and from that starts the healing process, you will naturally surrender to just be. Just remember, you are who you are, just surrender to it, just be. And be ok with being.

Hey @Melwyn I had the same things in the past, so, maybe my advice might influence you; I think first it's very important for you to realize that, you don't control your thoughts. You just don't. That's how the mind works. Secondly, all those thoughts, are thoughts, and it's ok to have thoughts, even if they are terrible/bad/disgusting/abominable, if you are having them, they are not a part of you, they are you, instead of disgracing them, judging them, trying to repress them, work to accept them instead since you can't control them anyways. They are who you are, accept them, it won't make you a worse person, actually, it will resolve the inner conflict inside and make you more kind. Notice also that, the more you try to tell yourself "STOP HAVING BAD THOUGHTS" the more you have it. Do you have a belief inside yourself saying something like "NO PERMISSION FOR HAVING BAD THOUGHTS", and when you have it now you wanna kill yourself? Thirdly, it's very important that you stop being so hard on yourself, are you your own worst enemy or your best friend? Who you choose to be? How you think towards yourself? With love or with hate? Become aware of how your thoughts behave towards yourself I think it is fundamental for healing what your going through. Journaling can be amazing for this. What can possibly be happening is, you learned in the past how things in life are supposed to be, and now, your having thoughts that goes the opposite way, against what you learned of who you must be, then now you have this inner conflict, and from that conflict arises all the stuff your feeling, anxiety, uncertainty, doubt, fear and many "but what if". You are in a battle against yourself, how can something good arise from that other than self destruct I wonder? The fact that you resist those thoughts, can be one of the main reasons you feel what you feel, and then it triggers all the anxiety and pain. Now, if this does resonates with you, if it makes sense, you just need to surrender to who you are, that's it, there is "evil" and "good" within us, both are part of you, actually, they are a part of you, it isn't even a part, because you are not two parts, you are one, just one and that one, is who you are, realize that, spend a while thinking about that, evil and good doesn't exist, it's a creation from the human mind, you are who you are, labeling things as good/bad just separates what is. When you separate things as "good" and "bad", then you have this belief saying that "bad is wrong", you create inner conflict against anything that is "bad" understand? And that might be one of the root cause of all your pain.