Why do I tend to avoid hard things?

[Viking]

Whenever something takes some effort, when I have to think, to exert physical or emotional labor, I dont want to do it.

Lately all im looking for is these small dopamine hits, and if something doesnt give me them, i dont want to touch it.

I know that there are people who love to think critically, love to exert themselves, and I was like that at some point. Why am I not like that now?

Edited August 2, 2018 by Viking

[Joseph Maynor]

Because you haven’t found your Life Purpose yet.

[Viking]

Just now, Joseph Maynor said:

Because you haven’t found your Life Purpose yet.

Lmao finding my life purpose is one of those things I dont want to do that takes work 

[Joseph Maynor]

5 minutes ago, Viking said:

Lmao finding my life purpose is one of those things I dont want to do that takes work 

Yeah, but see once you find your Life Purpose — that’s where you’ll wanna pay someone to let you work on it for 12 hours per day.  It will give you super-human work ethic — and it will be like play, it will be easy, passionate, and fun.  Your problem is you haven’t found that, so your motivational system is not brought out of its shell.  Your motivational system is laying dormant.

Edited August 2, 2018 by Joseph Maynor

[Viking]

Just now, Joseph Maynor said:

Yeah, but see once you find your Life Purpose — that’s where you’ll wanna pay someone to let you work on it for 12 hours per day.  It will give you super-human work ethic — and it will be like play, it will be easy, passionate, and fun.  Your problem is you haven’t found that, and so your motivational system is not brought out of its shell.

but I also struggle in the dating scene. I have a lot of anxiety and fear about it (only in the body, in the mind I understand its stupid) and I just feel it's not worth the emotional labor, im lazy about it.

[BarneyBunch]

"There's no growing in the comfort zone, and there's no comfort in the growing zone"

One of my favorite quotes and hopefully applicable to you and your situation. Finding your life's purpose and motivation for what you are doing are key to doing things. There are a lot of things in life that we don't want to do, but we need to do in order to find happiness over time. 

[Viking]

Just now, BarneyBunch said:

"There's no growing in the comfort zone, and there's no comfort in the growing zone"

One of my favorite quotes and hopefully applicable to you and your situation. Finding your life's purpose and motivation for what you are doing are key to doing things. There are a lot of things in life that we don't want to do, but we need to do in order to find happiness over time. 

So to get that life purpose I gotta suffer, yeah?

[BjarkeT]

I remember in one of leos video i think the one called on simple rule to ace life where he said that all we basically do is to seek comfort which make it hard to chose to do the hard things. 

@Joseph Maynor life purpose doesn't help it is still as hard as before. I think it comes down to making the decision to face the challenge. (feel the fear and do it anyway)

@Viking you don't have to suffer to get a life purpose. just get so good they can't ignore you and passion comes as a side effect a long the way.

I think a trick to help one motivated is something called loss aversion which is the idea that we are more motivated if we have something to lose so for example pick a goal and set a specific amount of money on it you could lose if you don't finish it. it should help one to get motivated to do it.

https://www.blenderguru.com/podcasts/get-good-blender-fast

Edited August 2, 2018 by BjarkeT

[Viking]

1 minute ago, BjarkeT said:

feel the fear and do it anyway

I feel its not worth it

[Viking]

1 minute ago, Feel Good said:

Depression. Maybe you have just given up? 

lmao your comment triggered victim mentality in me and I slapped myself (mentally)

I dont know, I do feel excitement for hedonistic activities (kinda rarely but still)

I also have sometimes anger fits (by myself though, not at other people and not at myself, just anger, at life maybe)

Edited August 2, 2018 by Viking

[Light Lover]

It could just be a phase! I went through this as well during my meditative stages, where I will still yet to have a raising in conciousness, it seemed my laziness and anxiety and all that had gotten worse, and of course I realised that the reason it was getting worse was that it was being gotten rid of so it was coming up to the surface! Do you meditate? You are not alone, I can defintely relate to this, maybe change your diet as well, that could increase your mental energy!   @Viking

[BarneyBunch]

25 minutes ago, Viking said:

So to get that life purpose I gotta suffer, yeah?

Suffer doesn't seem like the right word. It just sounds like you need to prioritize what you want out of life and work towards the things that matter. What are your life ambitions and goals? 

[Joseph Maynor]

1 hour ago, BjarkeT said:

I remember in one of leos video i think the one called on simple rule to ace life where he said that all we basically do is to seek comfort which make it hard to chose to do the hard things. 

@Joseph Maynor life purpose doesn't help it is still as hard as before. I think it comes down to making the decision to face the challenge. (feel the fear and do it anyway)

@Viking you don't have to suffer to get a life purpose. just get so good they can't ignore you and passion comes as a side effect a long the way.

I think a trick to help one motivated is something called loss aversion which is the idea that we are more motivated if we have something to lose so for example pick a goal and set a specific amount of money on it you could lose if you don't finish it. it should help one to get motivated to do it.

https://www.blenderguru.com/podcasts/get-good-blender-fast

IF YOUR WORK IS HARD AND GRINDY — YOU STILL GOT LIFE PURPOSE WORK TO DO — LIFE PURPOSE IS A LIFE-LONG PROJECT — FINDING YOUR LIFE PURPOSE IS JUST THE TIP OF THE ICEBERG WITH LIFE PURPOSE WORK

Your authentic work shouldn’t be hard and grindy.  If your work is hard and grindy, something’s wrong.  You still got more work to do in Life Purpose, that’s all — and that’s no surprise.  If you know your genuine Life Purpose and you’ve done a lot of infrastructure work after finding that out — your work-life should become both easy and super-productive over time.  It takes at least 3-5 years of investment in Life Purpose work to get to this point.  And that includes doing Leo’s Life Purpose Course.  If you don’t do the Life Purpose work, you’re not gonna get there.  What you work on is what you improve.  Life Purpose work is not merely knowing your Life Purpose.  It’s hacking away at it every day to get your whole life revolving around it over the course of months and years.  It’s your authentic work, your authentic craft — your art — the object of both your Muse and Will to Explore — your Life’s Calling.

Edited August 2, 2018 by Joseph Maynor

[BjarkeT]

@Joseph Maynor I don't think life purpose work that way I am more into the idea of life purpose that cal newport talks about in so good they can't ignore you. I have found my life purpose and it still as hard as before. try to find a person who had life purpose and didn't have challenge in life. life purpose isn't easy or super productive but it is a challenge in it self. Look at the movie whiplash it is a good example of the craftman mindset cal newport talks about. 

i recomend that you check out cal newport book so good they can't ignore you which is based on scientific evidence on life purpose. 

also if you are looking for something easy and super productive you won't become any superstar because that requires practice outside your comfort zone always aka deliberate practice.

what you are talking about is what seems to be somthing called being in flow or flow state which is basically producing work that you already are good at but that doesn't make you a superstar as its not much about improving your work.

to become a superstar it probably take 20-40 years not 3 years and then passion comes as a side effect a long the way of getting good most likely at something rarer and valuable. (however problems in life dosn't go away from that even albert einstein had problems in life if you read hes biography or the tv series based on it so did nikola tesla, elon musk, steve jobs, franz liszt, mozart etc.)

the key to deal with life problems seem to be what scott m peck talks about in the road less traveled not life purpose. They are two separate things.  

Edited August 3, 2018 by BjarkeT

[NoSelfSelf]

People dont understand what you trying to say well its hard to do hard things when you know you will only get a little high and lots of struggle is it worth it idk what is there else to do but to struggle for something better bigger...i have this same problem 

[moon777light]

It might have something to do with your health, do you have low energy levels? examine your sleep cycle/diet/how much sunlight your getting. It could be wonderous how just fixing a crappy sleep cycle alters your mood and motivation.

[Ingit]

@BarneyBunch I agree ? with him

[ajasatya]

2 hours ago, Viking said:

Why do I tend to avoid hard things?

because your life is too easy.

when your parents die and your food doesn't appear magically on the table and nobody else show up to pay the bill for you, then you'll feel engaged.

good news: you don't have to wait until your parents die. you can make your life more challenging right now. why? because challenge is healthy.

that's what i did. i left my parents' house.

check this out.

[Consept]

Dont do anything, just wait until your life gets bad enough, either depression, boredom, financial difficulties or something else, when these things happen your current life will be worse than any process of change could ever be and in that instance youll feel motivated to change.

You could of course do something before it comes to this, but im guessing you wont given your current mindset in your posts. The thing is its never easy to do anything, you dont just get a sudden boost of motivation out of nowhere and then start doing it. That feeling of things not being worth it happens to everyone and the only way out of it is just to do it anyway, there are no quick fixes, im not sure what you expect someone on this thread to tell you. But anyway like i said if you dont feel like doing anything then dont just wait til it gets bad enough at some point youll have to  

[Waves]

19 minutes ago, ajasatya said:

check this out

Wow that was powerful, even though I watched the video I forgot about the power of that perspective.

@Viking Maybe it is just a lazy period. It happens. You've got to accept the fact and allow yourself to be completely lazy for some days, and then rise up rejuvenated. But I don't feel it's the case here.

One thing that I'd like to add to what has been said and that helped me is the realization of the fact that life is short and that we're going to die pretty soon. Get in touch with that, really feel it, see it as something concrete that will happen, and remind yourself of it every morning.

Also be grateful that you can breath, that your heart beats, that you have legs (I suppose), that you don't have some mutation that compromises your health or prevents you from doing what you like.

Once you realize and remind yourself of the opportunity you have to experience the magic of life, you will start moving towards challenges and playing this game hard, because you'll be aware of the waste that would be not doing so.

Some helpful old videos of Leo (sometimes it helps to refresh our memory):