Tag: Personal development

Who Would I Be?

‘Suppose you could take away the tics,’ he said. ‘What would be left? I consist of tics – there’d be nothing left.’

Witty Ticcy Ray

Who would I be without my disability?

Perhaps an odd question to ask. The answer should be ‘a better and happier person’.

Unfortunately, it is not that simple. I found myself resonating with Witty Ticcy Ray – I might be nothing without it.

For most of my teens, I’ve had to deal with pain, walking problems, and more recently, the resultant emotional fallout. In the most developmental stages of my life, I’ve grown up with it and lived my life around it.

To some, it’s the same as growing up with a favourite sports team or book series. A lot of the conversations you have with friends and family are around this favourite thing. For me, my habits and motivations have been moulded around my disability.

It’s difficult enough to answer the question of who I am right now let alone who I would be without a life-changing event.

A simpler question to ask is: Would I be a better person?

At first, I thought the answer should be a resounding ‘YES!’ I’d be pain-free. I’d read more. I’d have more fun with friends. I’d live without needless discomfort. I’d still be able to play sports. I wouldn’t have had operations 2 operation in a year. I wouldn’t even have to grapple with this question.

Yet, there was some resistance to my answer. I don’t know if I would be a better person.

I tend to view my disability as a negative thing and wish it gone every day. I have never thanked fate for my problem. Still, my answer to the question was not confident.

My hesitation came from the good things that have happened as a result of my disability.

I probably wouldn’t have become interested in personal development as early as I did. One of my motivations for starting a blog was to see how I could improve life despite my problems. In fact, none of my readers knew I had a disability until I wrote Living with Chronic Pain.

It’s unlikely I’d be as concerned about the welfare of other disabled students. In turn, that’s probably affected how I treat people more generally.

Would I be interested in meditation and mindfulness? These are two things I am forever grateful I started.

My disability has shaped me in some good ways. Would I still have those good qualities without it?

If I say I wouldn’t be a better person, does that mean my disability is a good thing? How can I reconcile that with my efforts to get rid of it?

If my disability is a good thing, why name it a disability?[1] Surely everyone faces some discomfort and this is just my personal one.

If I can’t call it a disability, what has been the source of all my discomfort and frustration?

Currently, I’ve asked many questions and given few answers. When I started thinking about these questions, I thought about what I’d be admitting with my answers.

Despite my attempts to steer clear of this, perhaps my disability is integral to my identity rather than just an addition onto the core ‘me’.

Maybe I can’t complain about my discomfort if I cannot imagine a better future.

Now I know that I have a lot more to consider. I have more questions and uncertainty to live with. I have a difficult dance with self-honesty and awareness.

To take a further step towards honesty, I’ll say it’s really scary. It’s like existential angst all over again. Unfortunately, I don’t think Albert Camus wrote a disabled version of The Stranger or The Myth of Sisyphus.

However, I’m glad Witty Ticcy Ray inspired the question. Given the length of the problem and the uncertainty surrounding the end, it was going to pop up eventually.

As always, thanks for reading.

***

1. The quote at the beginning is from The Man Who Mistook His Wife for a Hat by Oliver Sacks. Put it on your reading list if it isn’t there already. Witty Ticcy Ray was a man who had Tourette’s and was given Haldol to stop them. He became angry because he it took away his wit and quick reflexes. However, he still faced the problem of not being able to live a normal life with them.

2. When I wrote and shared Living with Chronic Pain, I was surprised at how well it was received. To everyone who read it, thanks for giving me the confidence to write more about disability. Hopefully, it’ll not only help me but other people who have disabilities, and those who are simply interested in it.

3. Here’s some more stuff to read:

The last two are positive articles about disability. I’m not sure if I share their enthusiasm but it’s also important to consider that mine is much less severe than theirs. It’s always good to have differing opinions about this subject rather than an echo chamber.

4. There have been a lot of end notes. Here’s another one.

***

[1] Julian Savulescu and Guy Kahane offer a definition of disability in The Moral Obligation to Create Children with The Best Chance of the Best Life. I think I satisfy it but it doesn’t take away from the question.

A stable physical or psychological property of subject S that,

(1) leads to a significant reduction in S’s level of well-being in circumstances C, when contrasted with realistic alternatives,

(2) where that is achieved by making it impossible or hard for S to exercise some ability or capacity, and

(3) where the effect on well-being in question excludes the effect due to prejudice against S by members of S’s society.

Or more simply, had x condition not existed then the person’s well-being would be higher. But it excludes things like not being able to fly as a disability… so far.

The Courage to be Wrong

Realising we’re wrong can be quite worrying. If we’ve erred there must be something that is wrong with us even if it’s a small thing. It is usually greeted with feelings of shame, anger, sadness or even apathy towards our development. If we get something wrong now, why bother trying again?

Even though, we understand that humans are fallible beings, it is still difficult to accept the feeling of wrongness. We may even look at various motivational quotes say things like “failure is the path to success” or “I can accept failure but I can’t accept not trying” but still close the door on being wrong.

Why does being wrong feel bad?

In light of all of the opinions we have about being wrong and how it’s okay, we’d probably expect to have different attitudes towards it.

The reason why being wrong is viewed negatively negative is due to the various cultural attitudes we have towards it. We view wrongness as harmful, unable to be salvaged or improved upon. When we hear about important mistakes and how they’re damaging to either people’s lives or finances or anything you can think of, we hope to never been in their position.

These attitudes  are also found in our education.  The person who does poorly on a test or ask really simple questions is often viewed as dumb person in the class. They hold back the smarter students from progressing, they mustn’t have studied and they may even frustrate teachers. So when someone gets something wrong they feel like they’ve failed themselves and they’re going to disrupt other people.

It results in a fear about being wrong.

Is Being Wrong OK? 

Of course it is! Failure is the path to success etcetera etcetera. We all ‘know’ this but should we really believe it and take it seriously?

I think so.

When we find we’re wrong, a few things happen. We’re given the choice to keep our false belief or accept a new one. We might fear that we’ve slipped down the ladder of knowledge and can’t climb back up.

These situations aren’t bad. They’re just difficult to handle which is why we sometimes react so negatively to being wrong. But that may not be necessary.

Being wrong about things gives us an opportunity to further knowledge rather than wallow in how little knowledge we apparently have. We have to overcome our resistance to changing our minds.

Embracing our ability to be wrong is difficult and obviously isn’t as simple as just being happy with being wrong about everything. I’m not asking we think being wrong is the best thing possible. As some people may object, getting some things wrong affect the well-being of people in drastic ways and should be chastised rather than encouraged. Here they point to a surgeon making a mistake in a surgery or a bank charging the wrong person exorbitant fees. To that I say:

1) They happen all the time and should be corrected.

2) It’s unrealistic to expect perfection in all decisions regardless of their importance. Such an expectation creates the excuse we see wrongness as inherently bad.

3) Most people can be wrong about things without any severe consequence.

Embracing our ability to be wrong means that we view it as a normal part of decision-making and belief forming. It isn’t something that should create the fear of being judged as stupid and unable to change our opinions.

Fearing wrongness paralyses our progress and prevents us from trying to improve. We’re far more likely to just stay in our comfort zone where mistakes are less frequent and echo chambers are especially loud.

It takes some courage to admit being wrong and use that experience to further ourselves rather than viewing it as an unrepairable fault.

If it offers any comfort, I could be wrong about all of this and we can continue shaming people who get things wrong and feeling bad when we make mistakes.

***

This post was inspired by Kathryn Schulz who gave a brilliant TED talk on being wrong. She also wrote a book about it called ‘Being Wrong: Adventures in the Margin of Error’. I read it last year and thought it was great and can recommend it without reservation (unless you just hate non-fiction books).

So if I write more about wrongness, blame her.

 

Create Without Expectation

I write a lot in my journal. As of today I’ve written over 560,000 words. I don’t expect it to make sense or answer any of the burning questions I might have had throughout the day. It’s easy to write in my journal because I don’t really care much about how sentences read or whether the whole idea is coherent.

In part, writing becomes easy because it’s done without expectation.

I don’t expect perfection. If I have an idea, it’s not a big deal if it doesn’t come out the way I imagined. It can be written and changed around a little bit. Perfection isn’t a goal and that breaks down fear I might when I want to create something.

Writing for an audience (however small or big) seems to create expectations that paralyse progress. It’s easy to have big ideas that need to be broken down into a multi-part series or might be shared with more people than ever before. Holding those expectations over your head inevitably raises questions like:

  1. What if it isn’t shared with anyone?
  2. What if it is shared and no one likes it?
  3. Will it be helpful?
  4. Will people laugh because of what I’ve written or laugh at it?

And so on.

When we think about writing and making it reality, we might fear it won’t live up to the standard we’ve set ourselves. If we write it, we’ll only prove to ourselves that we never should have started in the first place. If we write, we’ll only make a fool of ourselves.

Expectations shouldn’t be hindering our progress. Sometimes, it’s best to do without them and just see what can be created. Sometimes, that can be the most fun. My example is when I wrote The Aspiring Writer. It would have been easy to shelve the idea because no one would enjoy it or it might be confusing. That voice is in the back of my head whenever I’m writing something but it would be sad if it stopped me from creating completely.

After trying to abandon my expectations I’ve found that I’m pretty bad at judging my own work because it always tends towards the critical rather than celebratory. Which is neither balanced nor helpful. The critical voice is quieter because I let it pass rather than believing it to be 100% true.

If you have any creative project but seem to be paralysed by fear, create without expectation. Throw them into a river and watch them float away.

You see your project as it is rather than what it might be and create without paralysing fear.

***

This doesn’t mean that you can’t want things to be good.

You’re allowed to create and change it afterwards. However, it does mean your expectations shouldn’t stop your from sharing it with others. If we think we can improve it, we’re always allowed to. We don’t need to demand perfection straight away.

One step at a time

Currently, the tagline for this blog is ‘becoming better one step at a time’.

I chose that because I thought it was the best way to explain how we get through any kind of journey whether it is long or short. We move forward one step at a time.

Over the past few months,  I can’t confess to have forgotten that idea but to have lost the appreciation I originally had for it. Mainly because taking any purposeful step seemed painful, difficult and almost impossible. As I alluded to in my post ‘I’m 19‘, my mental health has taken a turn for the worse which paralysed my motivation and killed my slow walk forward. In fact, I feel like I’ve taken a few steps backwards.

I’m still in this position but having to force myself to move, write, and generally not become a complete recluse, I’m beginning again to find my appreciation of becoming better one step at a time. Although the appreciation often slips out of my hands as quickly as a bar of soap, while it’s here, I’ll explain the reason for my revived appreciation.

These steps forward need not be large, exciting or even particularly important. They can and probably will be very difficult at times. Sometimes it’ll feel as if you’re trying to walk through mud with bricks in your pocket. Nonetheless, it’ll still be a step forward.

These small victories are invaluable. Whether that victory ranges from putting on your shoes and stepping outside to writing significant portions of an important paper, remember them. Write them down if you must.

They’re a reminder that you can move forward.

It will take some time but you’ll get there and maybe even pick up a light jog along the way.

We’ll all face difficult times when we’re trying to reach whatever goals we have. If you feel that it is becoming overwhelming, remind yourself that you only need to take it one small step at a time.

Even if the step is tiny, it keeps us moving.

We’re all going to become better one step at a time.

 

Living with Chronic Pain

I’ve been trying to put into words what it’s like for me to live with chronic pain for a while now. It’s quite difficult to explain living with chronic pain beyond ‘it’s difficult’ without seeming overdramatic. However, I think it’s worth having a go. I’m going to split this into three parts.

  1. My motivation for writing about it
  2. What the problem is and how it came to be
  3. Chronic pain and me

If you want the main portion of the article, skip to the third section. The other two are brief and largely explanatory.

For those who don’t know, chronic pain is usually defined as pain that’s continued for over 3 to 6 months. Everyone experiences it with different levels of intensity and react to it in different ways. With that being said, this post will be completely personal to me. However, I hope it’s still useful if not entertaining.

My motivation for writing about it

I find writing therapeutic. Trying to write my thoughts out in a clear manner is helpful even if the result isn’t always particularly successful. I’ve made a few efforts to understand what I feel about the illness. They haven’t made it very far since my initial reaction tends to be nothing more than frustration towards it.

However, what could be more important than that is giving an insight into the issue to other people. The reason why this is important is not because I desire a flood of sympathy. It’s because a simple understanding of various illnesses, disabilities and limitations prevents prejudice and judgement formed due to ignorance. Not everyone has learned to withhold quick judgements so it’s useful to educate where I can instead of feeling victimised which will result in an even worse attitude towards the problem.

What the problem is and how it came to be

My medical problem is somewhat complex and boring to explain but I’ll try to keep it short. I won’t run through a detailed timeline of the issue.

The large majority of my pain comes from my back injury that was sustained about 5 years ago playing rugby. At least, that’s what I’ve been told. In reality, I don’t remember getting hit in a bad way or a specific moment where all the back pain came from. It just steadily got worse until I had to stop playing the sport. I have slipped discs in my upper back that rest on my spinal cord which slightly complicates the issue a bit more.

I still use a walking stick because my right leg is weak because of my back problems. More recently, I’ve also found that my hips are a bit rubbish so that’s affected my walking also.

Chronic pain and me

My relationship with my pain has changed a fair amount over the five plus years that I’ve had to experience it. It’s moved from apathy to anger to optimism which is sometimes marred by pessimism. To say it’s been a smooth ride would only be dishonest. Sometimes I wish that I could keep the bright optimism that I once had but of course, the experience has to change the longer I live with it. It’s the human thing to do.

In the first two years or so of my injury, it’d be best to describe my feelings towards the pain as positive.  Yes, I was in pain for most of the time, but that doesn’t matter too much. I’ll get better soon because it isn’t meant to be a very long term problem. The saying ‘other people have it worse so I’m fine’ often found itself in my justifications for why I was still happy. In some cases, I’d feel bad for complaining about the pain because in perspective, while my condition may have been worse than my friends and family, in the larger scheme of things, I was pretty lucky. After all, I could still see, eat good food and laugh. I couldn’t do sport or do things I enjoyed for as long as I’d like. But that was fine. I’d just adapt and slowly get better.

This reminds me of the time when I was stretching in class and my history teacher quickly remarked ‘it looks like you’re dancing!’ to which I later thought, since all good thoughts happen in the shower after the actual event, then invite me to the chronic pain disco! At the time, I laughed and continued to read whatever I was reading at the time. Such comments didn’t really make me feel isolated or worse off because of what I was experiencing. I just didn’t need to feel singled out because I was in pain all the time.

As I grew older, I began to view my pain in a different way. I went from a phase of using perspective to make myself feel better to feeling frustrated and sad.

The longer the pain lasted, the greater my feelings of frustration and hopelessness became. After two years or so, my optimism slowly began to crack and one of my most poignant fears revealed itself to me.

This pain is normal.

That might sound odd coming from a person who had already experienced it for far longer than necessary. Why had it taken so long for this to happen? If it’s normal, doesn’t this mean I can now live a more fulfilling life around the pain?

To the first, I’ll answer with a brief story. I went to my doctor for a check up on the most recent MRI scan I had taken. As is rare with pretty much every person in existence, I remember going to the hospital happy and hopeful. It was possible I’d be told there was a great improvement in my condition and I’d get some kind of timeline for when I could expect all of this to end. Almost as wonderful as being told two hour lecture would end early. I sat down and after a discussion of how useless my doctor finds my Philosophy degree dressed up in backhanded compliments, I was told that there wasn’t a difference in the scans that I had taken months ago. He’ll see me again in a year and hopefully there will be a difference then. When I got home, the frustration of being told such a disheartening thing resulted in me kicking a hole in my door. (Almost shocking from the guy who enjoys writing a lot about the value of meditation, right?)

Following from that moment, I guess it dawned on me that I could be stuck like this for a while. I could no longer fight it by comparing it to people who were worse off than me. I lost the comfort of genuinely being ok with my situation. I had to begin the arduous process of accepting my condition.

To the last question, yes and no. Realising the pain is normal has led me to improve some areas of my life. For example, I started meditation much earlier than I probably would have in an attempt to find more peace with my pain. Studying, by necessity, had to become much more efficient otherwise I would never get anything done on time. Such skills have spilled over to other areas of my life since being like this has simply motivated me to learn more about how I can improve myself and get back on a normal level playing field.

As you have hopefully guessed, the positives comes with its negatives. Realising the pain is normal has highlighted the fact that being in pain every day and tired as a consequence of that shouldn’t be normal for a 19 year old. With the pain being such a large part of my everyday life, my feelings of loss likes to tap me on the shoulder then punch me in the face. “You can’t go out with friends without being in pain!” “Can you walk around university without feeling tired and frustrated every single day? Of course not.” “Let’s be real, I took away parts of your teenage hood and I’m fine with it.”

Well, that’s what it would say if my feelings could talk like they were separate people. Instead, I’m faced with the wonderful task of reminding myself of those facts. It leads to a strange situation of trying to toe the line between self-loathing and blaming something on my pain. My situation has taken away small freedoms that I usually would take for granted and they’ve cumulated to restrict me greatly. Being able to work on something I enjoy is frequently marred by pain that hinders my concentration. Working on an essay takes far longer than I think it should because I’m too tired to work for longer than 20 minutes at a time. Even not being in pain is interrupted by the knowledge that it will come back. It leads to feeling extremely guilty for resting during those periods instead of making the most of it. Simply living my days without pain in mind was taken away.

Far too often, I fall on the side of self-loathing. I blame myself for things I know are not completely in my control. I get angry when I can’t complete something on time because of the pain. Why can’t I just work through it? Man up and get it done.

As much as I try, I cannot. I try to convince myself I can but it results in anger and disappointment. I’m unable to just brush past the pain even though it’s so familiar. Despite the pain being a regular occurrence in my life, it definitely hasn’t lost its potency. In a way, this familiar thing always feels new. It’s as powerful now as it was when we first became acquaintances.

Following closely from this is the indefinite nature of the whole thing. As I mentioned earlier in my brief story, I was told to wait by my doctor. Years later, I’m still waiting. I haven’t been told any kind of timeline for when I can expect my condition to get better nor have I been told it’s permanent. Given that information, I’ve tried a large variety of things to cope with or fix the problem but none have shown themselves as a solution to it. How many times need I answer the question of when can I expect to get better with “I have no idea”? Having to say that to other people and myself has proven to become a huge emotional burden. Maybe part of me has become tired with it all. Dealing with it day in and day out not actually knowing when it’s going to end has sometimes driven me to the point where I’d rather just disappear. Not die, but no longer exist so I finally have some rest.

If I’ve made it to this point, what could I be waiting for? It’s been years and an end doesn’t look to be approaching any time soon. I’m waiting for it to get better. I’ll eventually be free from the pain, worry about regular things and enjoy my days like I should have been for the past few years. My optimism has not failed completely. Even during the times where I’ve felt the most depressed. This problem is very difficult but I have valuable positives to take from it. I’ve become much more involved with personal development. Helping myself and (hopefully) other people become better and find peace with themselves is wonderful. I have wonderful friends and family with colourful life experiences who have and continue to bring joy to my days. I have a place to talk about this where people will listen so what I have written won’t be greeted with silence.

And finally, I’m still here.

Chronic pain for the most part is silent. One needn’t grimace all the time if she’s in pain nor does she need to cry when she gets home. She can just have the pain and live with it.

For those who have suffered in the past or currently are dealing with the problem of chronic pain, I hope that your relationship with it doesn’t become one of hate or anger. Of course, it’s terribly difficult to remain the happiest person in the world when you feel the suffering is so potent, meaningless and unfair. However, if it’s something we are to live with temporarily or permanently, that time, hopefully, won’t be of complete despair.

Unfortunately, I cannot give any professional advice on dealing with chronic pain but I do invite others to share any experiences they may have had with such issues. Perhaps we can help each other. For those who know someone else suffering from chronic pain, I can say the least one can do is to offer a warm smile and helpful hand if they need it. Depending on the length and severity of the pain, the relationship with it can change quite substantially. Chronic pain is just as emotional as is it physical.

In a way, writing this post has exposed a vulnerability I could have hidden but chose not to. Sharing my experience with it may have helped or you might simply know me slightly better now.

Whatever you may have gained from this, thanks for reading. It’s greatly appreciated.

Letting Go of Judging People

We all judge people. When we engage with people, we often cast some kind of judgement on them. Whether it’s as small as thinking their hair looks bad or as big as thinking they’re probably a boring, self-centred person with no interests other than themselves.

If everyone does it, why is it a bad thing to do?

General judgements about people can be helpful and often are. However, we also fall into the trap of making quick negative judgements about people based on ignorance or lack of understanding.

This judgement closes our minds to who they could actually be. Instead, we build a faulty image of them which only harbours anger and unnecessary negativity.

Most of the time our negative judgements of people are built on some kind of ignorance about the person, the desire to put ourselves in the limelight or simply being unthoughtful.

That’s why people are surprised when they talk to someone and realise they aren’t how they thought they would be at all. They lose the previous misconceptions they’ve had about the person and realise there was no reason to jump to conclusions.

When we say negative things about other people, we’re simply harbouring negativity in our minds instead of being happy or concerning ourselves with more important things. It’s extremely useful just let go of the unnecessary dislike we have of other people. If we can’t help the person we should move on with our lives instead of keeping negativity in our minds.

You’ll harm your relationships with others if you cast premature judgements.

You’ll become frustrated for no good reason.

That frustration is easily avoided if you refrain from petty, unnecessary judgements.

Gossip less (preferably, not at all)

Conversing about how other people are annoying or do get a lot of things wrong tends to result in two different outcomes. Either, you let yourself re-live the initial anger you had towards that person or you simply begin to take pleasure in the flaws of others. Neither are great yet it seems to happen often.

When I find myself doing it, I notice that I become a much less pleasant person to talk to and generally be around. What gives me the right to talk about someone behind their back for no reason?

I feel it comes from the mistaken idea that we should vent our frustrations instead of keeping them inside. We don’t work like pressure machines. Venting our frustrations is a much easier path to follow than calming down over a longer period of time but it isn’t effective because we become far more likely to continue venting in the future.

Withhold judgement

I’ve spoken about why you shouldn’t judge people but this doesn’t mean you need to think positively about everyone that walks down the street. Of course, that would be nice but not everyone elicits positive reactions from people.

This simply means to withhold your judgement of them. How is this done?

  1. Be aware that you’re judging them.
  2. Ask yourself why you’re doing so.

At this point, you might find that you’re judging them because of a previous event that’s put you in a bad mood or your justification for doing so is poor.

  1. Put yourself in their shoes.

Trying to gain a better understanding of who they are will make you more compassionate and less likely to jump to false conclusions. Maybe there’s something about them you didn’t know about and as a result of that, they’re cast in a negative light to you.

Let go of judging people. Hopefully, you’ll feel much calmer for it.

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The Struggle for Self-forgiveness

I’ve written about the importance of forgiving yourself in a previous post and I’d like to expand on it.

Forgiving and accepting the mistakes you may have made in the past is difficult. If we’re used to criticising ourselves about everything we do wrong, downplaying our achievements and complaining about the lack of perceived progress, it’s difficult to change that mind-set.

I’m still struggling with it.

A helpful question to ask when you begin criticising yourself is:

Would you talk to your friend the same way you talk to yourself?

If your friend failed to start learning a language like she said she would, would you call her worthless, lazy and stupid? If your friend didn’t make consistent progress with programming, would you say he’ll never learn in the future?

Hopefully, you wouldn’t.

There’s an important difference between being honest and harmful. If we wouldn’t pile on these criticisms to a friend, why the need to do it to ourselves?

I would never tell a friend that she’s worthless I don’t believe she is. They’re capable of doing better and if I can I will help them reach their goals. This isn’t the same as simply excusing all the bad things one might do. Sweeping it under the rug will only result in more problems in the future.

We can run into the problem of holding ourselves to an extremely high standard without making the necessary changes to reach it. We skip the fact that building habits takes time. We skip the fact that being good at most things requires a lot of practice.

Such a trait might be seen as admirable but it’s useless if it simply results in self-hatred. Eventually all the criticism we pile onto our shoulders will bring us to a halt instead of making us stronger.

We don’t deserve the relentless criticism we give ourselves.

We don’t need to hate ourselves to make a positive change.

We deserve compassion. If anyone should be kind to you, it should be you.

The first step: awareness

I would be lying if I said I had this all figured out. There are many times in the day where I still feel disappointed with myself and wish I had done better in the past. There are times when I look at the progress I’ve made and see it as useless.

However, the first step to reducing the self-criticism is awareness. Realising that what you’re doing to yourself is not beneficial but instead harmful to your progress means you have identified what you need to change.

Forgiving yourself is the first step to accepting who you are and identifying what you want to change.

Mindfulness is Beautiful

For my last post, I gave 5 reasons to start meditating and I want to focus on the last point I made about increased mindfulness.

Mindfulness is a beautiful thing.

A few days ago, I was drinking a hot chocolate after my lectures and I realised something wonderful. I was enjoying the drink.

I wasn’t thinking about what I wanted to do for the rest of the day.

I wasn’t self-conscious about being alone.

I wasn’t feeling sad because of the pain I was in.

I wasn’t reading anything or looking at pictures.

I was just enjoying a hot chocolate.

I was simply immersed in what I was doing in the present moment and loved the experience. I didn’t need to do anything else . This is something I hadn’t actively done until I began meditating.

Of course, this doesn’t need to be limited to drinking hot chocolate. When I’m talking to other people, I give them more of my attention. When I’m writing, I immerse myself with the ideas I’m trying to get onto the page. When I’m walking, I take in my surroundings instead of rushing to where I’m going.

Throughout the day, I feel that we don’t allow ourselves get properly immersed in the things we’re doing because we’re scared of being bored. Even when we’re walking, the desire to look at our phone becomes overwhelming. When we’re talking to other people, our attention seems to shoot off into a different direction.

The beauty of mindfulness comes from its simplicity. Experiencing what’s happening now instead of being a slave to superficial desires and distractions, allows us to experience what we’re doing with complete immersion. You don’t need to be doing something all the time. You’re allowed to spend time with your thoughts.

The experience of just being without external distractions or harmful self-criticism is something I wish I experienced more.

Being more mindful of the simple things you do everyday definitely takes practice. You’ll need to remind yourself many times to bring your focus back to what you’re doing. Sometimes you’ll be frustrated, other times you’ll feel experience small moments of happiness. You can do this by practising mindfulness meditation or making an active effort to focus on the small things you do everyday.

With this being said, go and enjoy your hot chocolate :)

Do you have any similar experiences you want to share?

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1. The picture comes from dharmaschool.co.uk

5 Reasons to Start Meditating

I’ve been meditating for about 6 months now. It nearly skipped my mind because it feels like such a normal thing to do but I feel like I’ve learned a few important things during that time.

Here are 5 reasons to start meditating.

1. Increased Focus 

Staying focused on things can be difficult because we have to remind ourselves not to succumb to small distractions. That requires energy and it’s significantly easier to be distracted than ignore them.

While meditating, you aim to just focus on your breathing (at least the mindfulness approach to meditation). Meditating daily means that you’ll improve your ability to remain focused on one thing instead of following every thought that pops into your head.

I no longer feel the need to follow everything that pops into my head because I understand them for what they are. Small urges.

2. Less guilt

Noticing that you’ve failed to do something we think you should have done can result in a lot of self criticism. It can be extremely harmful to your overall well-being and difficult to stop. I’m still quite self critical. However, while meditating I don’t have those feelings at all.

It’s a beautiful moment. Even if it is brief.

When thoughts of inadequacy rush into your head, it’s tempting to follow them into an even darker train of thoughts. However, all you have to do is bring your focus gently back to your breathing. You’ll probably find it quite difficult to do but it gets much easier with time.

The practice is something you can do even when you aren’t meditating.

3. Less stress 

When we’re stressed, we’re often worried about things that we need to do in the future or there are too many things that are going on in the present moment. We feel overwhelmed and want it all to stop but we can’t make it stop.

Meditation is fantastic at reducing stress. When you meditate you’re just trying to focus on a single thing instead of allowing yourself get consumed with the various commitments you have. Taking a few deep breaths and slowing yourself down will let you approach the things you need to do with a clear mind.

4. Better posture

I have a bad back problem and tend to slouch a lot because of it. While the problem is far from being over, my posture has improved slightly. Both in front of the computer and while walking.

Meditation promotes a better posture because you need to be fairly alert. Eventually, good posture will become a habit. It’s improved my concentration and breathing is actually easier!

Remember, having a good posture does not mean keeping your back completely straight. That’d hurt more if you have upper back problems.

5. Increased mindfulness

When I think about my position before I start meditating and now, I’d say that meditating is a positive aspect in my life now.

However, the biggest influence it has had on my everyday living isn’t the act of sitting down and meditating. It’s how I go about my day.

I think about the things I’m doing instead of thinking about what it’ll do for the future. I savour meals and drinks more instead of rushing them for no good reason. I get completely involved in what I’m doing instead of continuously dividing my attention with unimportant things.

Ultimately, I actually feel like I’m experiencing the things I do instead of just doing them. That is what it’s like to live in the now.

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If you want to know how it felt after 1 month, you can read my last post on meditation. It’ll show you my experience when I first started. It can be quite frustrating but like anything else, it requires a bit of persistence to get used to!

I hope at least one of these reasons is a reason to begin meditating for at least 5 minutes a day.

If you already meditate, how would you convince someone else to begin? I’d love to hear your reasons! If you don’t, do you think you’ll try it?

1. You may ask why I didn’t do 6 reasons after 6 months to meditate. You may not. Either way, I don’t have an answer to your question.

2. If you feel like a peaceful person after reading this, you can share the peace by sharing this post.

3. I like meditation and will write more about it. If you want to keep updated on whatever I write, you should follow the blog. It’s easier than not laughing at any of my jokes.

The Productivity Trap

xkcd.com/874
“I never trust anyone who’s more excited about success than about doing the thing they want to be successful at.”

This trap is extremely easy for people to fall into.

When we treat productivity like a hobby, we can fall into the trap of spending significantly more time reading and writing about productivity instead of being productive. If you find yourself learning loads about various productivity systems and how to make the most out of the day instead of being productive, there’s a problem.

You might not have even noticed that it happens because it feels like you’re being productive (you’re learning more about productivity) and you’re always looking at things related to being productive. This way, it reinforces the false idea that you’re using your time to accomplish important things.

Keep it simple

A large reason for this might be the increasing complexity of productivity systems. Trying to juggle two different calendars, three email accounts and one hundred to do lists is extremely overwhelming and actually detrimental to getting more done in the day.

You don’t need multiple aspects to whatever system you decide to use. When you look at the different things you utilise to help you get the most out of the day, ask yourself how much you can get rid of without losing any effectiveness. For example, if you have two apps that help you make to-do lists, get rid of one or both and use pen and paper. Also, don’t rely on apps to do everything for you.

A small reminder 

Remember that reading about doing work isn’t the same as doing work.

Using all your motivation from motivational pictures to look at more motivational pictures isn’t a good use of your motivation.

Information about productivity is only useful if you go on to do something productive!

 

Do you find yourself reading more about productivity than doing what you need to do?

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1. The comic is from xkcd.com/874. It’s a fantastic web comic. If you haven’t heard of it before, I strongly recommend reading through one or two or five.

2. If you found the post helpful, share it. If you thought it was more concise than War and Peace, you should follow the blog. Then get back to work, of course. Or be happily unproductive.