I'm In A Dilemma, Please Help!

[Preetom]

Meditation, awareness, self actualization have made me aware of 2 critical things about me so far.
1) All my nasty self destructive behaviors
2) Unreal daydreaming + crippling self esteem
In this thread I wanna know more about the 2nd point.

The thing is, my default limiting belief is that somehow I feel very weak and under equipped for this life. I feel I don't have the necessary resources and skills in me. As a 23 years old, I almost completing my civil engg. bachelor degree and soon gonna enter the job market. This phantom low self worth makes me question what contribution can I really offer from this weak state and this is creating a background fear thats growing everyday.

On the other hand, everytime I decide to do something or maybe even randomly I daydream about being this worldclass and better than everyone artist, athlete, intellect, cook and what not! I daydream that my skills are so unique and outclassed by all others that everyone is acknowledging and praising me in complete awe. The content of the daydreaming is different but the structure is same." I have become this extraordinary man that everyone is in awe about me and they all wanna be like me"- this is the default structure. Then I come back to present moment and find that crippling lack and end the whole session with bunch of self defeating affirmations. This eventually builds up and heads to a series of self destructive behaviors and self indulgence ( A retreat to hell!!) and I am left alone dead tired and frustrated.

My question is what is the criteria of a healthy vision? The vision or the end result is supposed to inspire the means. What sort of action step or question set can I inquire to free myself from this dilemma permanently? How to live a good life and 'know' at a gut level that I am living a good life so that I don't have to convince myself with these cheap, self sabotaging visions and self talks? Any wisdom, books, videos, other threads suggestions are welcome. Thanks in advance for reading on this long

[Preetom]

Another observation is that I find myself unable to enjoy something in a healthy manner most of the time. For example, when I am listening to a good song, my monkey mind must create this glorified image that I made that song and everyone is praising me for that. This happens with many things I find attractive and inspiring in my daily life. What sort of neurosis is this?  

[Dan Arnautu]

Watch Leo's video on ”The Power of Self-Acceptance”. You must at first love all your flaws to death before a powerful transformation can happen. Leo has videos on how to create a vision too.

[alyra]

well idk really but at the least - well - when I had a frustration with trying to balance many many things that made me confused and lost. it was just a matter of time before I managed to sort it out in a way or another. And what I would recommend in retrospect - is to work on one thing at a time. well, idk how to explain it. because well for me I had several pressing concerns to figure out - and so I couldn't jsut ditch all the things! but it was easier when I focused on one thing at a time - so even tho I had much on my mind, I would write them all down and then pick the one that was most urgent and focus on Just that, for a while - a half hour, an hour, a few hours - even a day. and this I think is a recomendation to help. 

 

another recomendation is to work on something that helps you handle this all, with priority - sorry this makes no sense does it lol. what I mean - for me what I did was -  I worked on being comfortable with uncertainty, because my numerous concerns were all around uncertainty. another thing would be, becoming comfortable with urgency, or with hopelessness, or etc. first become OK aand accepting that this barrier that holds you back is the way of your life right now, not to say that it is neccessarily good or bad but just that it is as it is and if change can happen it will happen, and that's all ok. I think I would say "embrace uncertainty" is it? I had a catch phrase to remind myself of this goal, to become comfortable with whatever it was that was discomfortable - IDK exactly the best way to do this but I found a way. and that helped a lot, to then start to focus on taking action with what I needed to in a focused and effective way, to first just become OK with it. 

[Prabhaker]

@Preetom

Human mind as such is a daydreaming faculty. Unless you go beyond the mind, you will continue to daydream. Because the mind cannot exist in the present. It can either exist in the past or in the future. There is no way for the mind to exist in the present. To be in the present is to be without mind.

Daydreaming will continue unless you start tasting meditation. Unless you are nourished on meditation, you will go on starving and hankering for some food in the future. 

10 hours ago, Preetom said:

I have become this extraordinary man that everyone is in awe about me and they all wanna be like me"

This is what goes on happening to each mind – you long for something, it will happen, but by the time it happens you will see that you are still discontent. Something else is creating the misery now.

This is something to be understood – that if your desire is not fulfilled, you are frustrated; if it is fulfilled, then too you are not fulfilled. That is the misery of desire. Fulfilled, you are not fulfilled. Suddenly many new things arise.

You had never thought that when you will be a king, and horse-men will be in front of you and at the back of you, and a golden parasol will be over your head, the sun can be so hot that it can scorch your face. You had never thought about it. Then you dreamed of becoming a sun, and you become a sun, and you had never thought about the cloud. Now the cloud is there – and proving you impotent.

And this goes on and on and on, like waves in the ocean… non-ending – unless you understand and simply jump out of the wheel. Life is here, life is now. If you are searching him in your daydreams, your search is in vain, because meditation is nothing but deep contentment.

The mind that goes on telling you, ‘Do this, be that. Possess this, possess that… otherwise how can you be happy if you don’t have this? You have to have a palace, then you can be happy….’ If your happiness has a condition to it, you will remain unhappy. If you cannot be happy just as you are – a stone-cutter… I know hard is the labour, wages are poor, life is a struggle, I know – but if you cannot be happy as you are, in spite of it all; if you cannot be happy, you are not going to be happy ever.

Unless a man is happy, simply happy, for no reason at all, unless a man is mad enough to be happy without any reason, a man is not going to be happy ever. You will always find something destroying your happiness. You will always find something missing, something absent. And that missing will become your daydream again.

And you cannot achieve a state where everything, everything is available. Even if it is possible, then too you will not be happy. Just look at the mechanism of the mind: if everything is available as you want it, suddenly you will feel bored. Now what to do?

You are daydreaming about the future because you have not tasted the present. Start tasting the present. Find out a few moments where you are simply delighting.

[Christian]

@Preetom

In your comment, you state that you like to fantasize about how great you are. You are a day-dreamer essentially and you imagine that people are applauding you for how great you are. But in the end, obviously that does not improve your life in any way. All this day-dreaming just gets you out of touch with reality. Reality might be hell for you at the moment, but eventually, you are going to have to confront it. The hard truths you are trying to avoid will always persist.

The best thing I can advice you to do is to find your life purpose and find a job. Maybe start working at a grocery store, a flower store or something where you can make some sort of contribution. When you make a contribution, you will realize that you do matter and it will give you greater confidence when entering the job market. You want to have some experience working. The reason why you fear entering the job market is because you fear what contribution you can make. That probably ties in with the fact that you have not been contributing enough so you simply don't know what you are capable of. Maybe also low self esteem, feelings of not being enough. To rebuild your self esteem, read "six pillars of self esteem" by Nathaniel Branden.

In regards to your life purpose, find something that you love doing so much that you feel like time just flyes by and you are not even thinking about working. If you want to be great at something, be engaged, but not attached to outcome. To find your life purpose is tricky and nuanced; that is why Leo created the life purpose course. Maybe you should get on board with that and start to do some soul searching.

 

[Nahm]

The hinderance isn't the feel good day dreaming, it's the "crippling lack" verbiage that you are keeping alive. Dream your dream. It's your superposition / imagination. You can be anything because you are and are made from everything. I suggest you keep your focus on your dreams and watch them come true. Just employ more patience, feel good about being able to have positive vision, know that practice and repetition, combined with connection & inspiration, will lead you to anything you want in this life. Belief & focus & practice become the skill level you desire. Don't ever repeat any of that self doubting stuff again. Realize you are the only thing keeping it alive. Let it go. 

If you struggle to let it go, admit to yourself you are not meditating properly every day. 

[Shin]

How many minutes do you meditate, and how many minutes do you think you're aware of your thoughts everyday ?

@Preetom

No, dysfunction is brought to you from your increasing awareness, it has always been there.
This is why so many people after picking up meditation, declare an increase of dysfunctional behavior/thoughts after a certain time.

The thing is, nothing really changes the first weeks/months, after a certain point you suddenly can see all your bullshit, and THEN you start to really act towards them.
You can't act on something you don't even know it's there

Edited May 19, 2017 by Shin

[Preetom]

Thanks a lot everyone for replying from your experiences. One thing is getting more and more clear is that there is really no shortcut in this work. I've been doing everything other than facing myself for so long. Almost to a point of threshold. I've been a workaholic student, musician for most of life and produced good results through them while still beating myself for more efficiency. But over a year now my motivation has dropped after realizing how selfish and unsustainable it really is. So now i feel it's impossible for me to pretend that nothing has happened and get back to that short sighted workaholic and daydreaming state. For about 2 years I've been strolling back and forth with dozens of books, techniques, meditations, self help videos but still haven't made a permanent breakthrough mostly because they were stopped before having a significant impact on me while going back and forth to all my addictions and neurosis parallelly. 

I feel like my awareness and dysfunction is raising at the same time. At times I feel so anxious and fearful that it feels like something is gonna burst out of my chest. I am gonna take every single suggestions presented here to consideration. Thanks again everyone for helping me out!

@Shin My meditation routine is 15 minutes of concentration practice followed by 45 minutes of mindfulness with labeling. Being present ALL THE TIME throughout the day is something I am considering very recently. I can sense almost all of my negative affirmations, daydreaming, additive urges but soon give in to them. I have decided to meditate/inquire/contemplate 4+ hours for next 3 months starting from tomorrow. I really need to break free this boredom/miserable barrier.

[Ritu]

hey @Preetom , i have gone through your question and as far as i observed ,you have to work on two areas of your life

1) as you have told about your daydreaming , "that you like to be unique and better than everyone " my friend this comes in mind only when you underestimate yourself or may be your surrounding is affecting you, see there in nobody is better than anyone else everybody is UNIQUE ...remember EVERYBODY (including you) you can not compare yourself with anyone else. so the first area to work on is " completely accept yourself and believe me  that is the best feeling " once you accept yourself then start knowing yourself that would help you to know about your strength and weaknesses , when your base will be clear about yourself only then you can make a better foundation of your life.

2) BELIEVE in you , once you accepted yourself the main thing is to do is believe in , make your short term goals(towards getting your long term goal) and start fulfilling them, if you fail don't worry try again ,if again you fail try again, this will gradually boost your confidence and you will start seeing in you A Perfectionist , these little little goals boost your confidence .

remember one thing that do not compare yourself with others rather compare yourself with you , this would help you to grow better

i agree that it is our human nature that we start comparing even i do this sometimes but we can reduce this to some extent and everyone has the different way to do the same thing so do not worry just be happy , i have a technique whenever you are comparing yourself with others just also think about both of yours conditions because these are circumstances also which are different .

and yeah for more help you can watch Leo's  video on personality development . " ALL THE BEST  "

[Preetom]

@Ritu Thanks a lot for your concern  Never thought this many people will actually come forward to help me. 
I'm going through 4+ hours of meditation/contemplation for the next 3 months starting today. You see I've accumulated so much self actualization/spiritual theories and concepts for over 2-3 years that now for me they all feel very shallow and toxic just because I've haven't really grounded them in my direct experience.

That's why my plan is to meditate and reflect non stop on everything I've gathered so far and taking lines like, "Believe in yourself", "There is no competition", "Anything is possible" etc that have become cliche and meaningless for me and contemplate/ground them in my direct experience. Sort of like a gut level opening up and realizing the truth and power of these concepts in first hand experience. I'll update my progress after 3 months

Have a nice day, Sir!