What advice would you give to younger you?

Imagine if you some how could magically go back in time to have a conversion with your younger self.

Obviously everything happens for a reason [and you would not be here now] if events of the past did not unfold the way it did.

That’s not the point.

With reflection we have the ability to uncover gold nuggets to share from the past that will benefit the lives of those currently undergoing suffering to find the meaning behind their current life experience.

It’s one of the most productive behaviors you can engage in that will benefit not only your life but those influenced by you.

If somehow younger me would have ever met this version of him now…

He would not believe a radical transformation could happen in a matter of years - yet alone it being even possible to his very limited imagination.

Seriously.

Today’s entry are lessons to my former self that obsessive had the following thoughts:

• Why did my life unfold the way it did?

• How is it others can change yet I find it as an impossible task?

• Why is it so hard to change and get the life I want?

• So is this it? Is my fate predetermined to live like this…

• Why do I feel like my life is slowly falling apart right before my eyes?

• and so many more self-limiting beliefs…

If you ever had similar thoughts - you will absolute love what you are about to learn.

I can definitely see this turning into a “Letters to My Former Self” series [as I have priceless value to offer to my younger self] that not only saves time, but to help become ridiculously efficient to enter exponential growth to surpass who I am today.

STOP WAITING UNTIL YOU FEEL “MOTIVATION” TO DO WHAT YOU MUST

Remove the word “motivation“ from your vocabulary completely.

I mean that with every ounce of seriousness.

Human beings allow their actions to be governed by their emotions.

Emotions become a double edge sword that can be either used to your benefit or to your detriment.

Evolution has wired human beings to seek pleasure and avoid pain as the baseline that determines survival success or failure.

If you look around today you see billions of examples how slippy of a slop this can be.

Maturity and responsibility is absolutely necessary with this fact.

Especially when you consider the levels of self-awareness each individual has while considering the collective as a whole entity.

Motivation is a slippy slope in itself.

You have a multi-trillion dollar industry that caters to this very sensation.

Remember: human beings are incapable of making a decision unless a emotion is present.

Motivation is a emotion.

Emotions come and go while fluctuating up and down in levels of intensity.

Is this emotion really the foundation you want your entire life outcome and desired life experiences be dependent on?

I highly recommend you reread that and take sometime to grasp how profound of a question that is + read “How Connecting with Your Emotions Fuels Lasting Self-Discipline“ so that you understand how to leverage long term emotions to your benefit despite how you feel in the moment.

By removing “motivation” it leaves you to depend on the most reliable resource human beings have access to every waking moment:

Self-Discipline

Every single human being possesses this very trait as we are born with it.

If you are a human being, you have self-discipline.

The only difference between every individual is the level of self-discipline each one possess at their current stage of life.

That level is determined by how the individual responses to The Resistance.

When you have a rock-solid foundation [you can stack whatever it is you want that’s within your control] on self-discipline and it will still be there to support it - no matter how high it reaches as there are unlimited bounds.

What about motivation?

Motivation is sand. There’s an infinite amount everywhere.

Add water to sand makes it perceived as solid, but when you add weight onto it [exactly like the outcome of your overall life experience] it will immediately crumble under pressure.

There are limitations to motivation, self-discipline is unlimited.

Motivation [inspiration to acknowledge what is possible within the human potential if self-discipline is applied] can be a spark to get started but it should never be depended on to be a campfire to save your life when you are freezing to death.

Self-Discipline is Action.

Self-Discipline you do what you must while completely disregarding the short term emotions present that attempt to block you from achieving your most desired life outcomes.

When’s the best time to build self-discipline?

When you do not feeling like doing it.

Nobody wants to hear the cold hard truth but those that adopt it live happier and more fulling life sooner than the ones that don’t accept this reality.

WARNING: This next section will shift to a different tone as I am quite literally writing to my younger self that needs to hear the cold hard truth and experience tough love in order to wake up from this zombie like haze.

YOU DO KNOW YOU ARE AN IDIOT RIGHT

Ego is your biggest enemy.

When ego is not under control it becomes so disruptive leaving chaos in it’s tracks with no signs of slowing down.

I have experienced and observed others’ ego self-sabotage due to being triggered which resulted to unrepairable situations.

One of the many ways ego sneaks through the backdoor is believing it knows everything and doesn’t need any assistant from anybody because it can do by itself.

Well jackass if you knew all there is to know then why don’t you have it now?

[Insert a never ending list of excuses to preserve the ego’s lack of internal identity here]

Compare your physical size to the city you are in then the country, now the continent, the size of the seven seas, the entire globe, our solar system then try to comprehend the entire universe compared to you…

This distant reveals only a tiny faction of what you do not know that you do not know.

Pride due to fear of how one is perceived becomes a major sticky point in the early stages of the improving self-awareness journey.

It makes perfect sense:

The sense of Self is quite literally - wrapped up in the external realm of thoughts and opinions dictated by others - as the internal realm of Identity has not been developed.

Ego vs Self-esteem is the common topic that takes place within psychology if you’d like to dive deeper into the nuance topic.

Said individual has not undergone a Deep Identity Level Change.

Instead the individual over compensates for a lack of Self through several coping mechanisms to preserve the sensitive ego:

• Blaming others instead of facing the responsibilities head on.

• Engaged in an internal dialogue [repeating delusional affirmations] to change the perception of objective reality to a subjective view point that serves the ego.

• Calculated changes to the external appearance to influence how one will be viewed and treated due to the lack of internal confidence.

There’s a lot more nuances but once you see “it” - it becomes very hard to unsee it again.

Quite frankly it’s sad to see modern self help shift in a direction where grown men are so preoccupied with how others perceive them ie ego based confidence.

Society has many boys appearing to be men - especially when you consider male initiations have been has been slowly weeded out within the last century.

I’m all for expressing yourself whatever way you desire but it must come from a place of a healthy sense of self-expression that is constantly evolving, not trying to over compensate…

These “self improvement” quick fix gimmicks appeal to the reason to buy now by solving a painful problem overnight without effort.

Only for the ego to experience validation as it delusional believes progress is being made in developing internal confidence.

What this gimmick is actually teaching to the Self:

“only when people treat me in a specific way am I able to feel like this about myself and when I don’t get what I want I feel a stronger lack of what I am not so I must double down my efforts so I can truly feel what I want”

Quite literally the ego is constantly pinging off the environment.

Self-improvement is the furtherest thing from a quick fix solution. It is a marathon that lasts for years [while the ego is put through the grind and will experience many mini deaths] before you can experience a deep identity level change.

This process does not appeal to the mass market’s desire of immediate change so naturally it makes sense for others to capitalize on this for profit.

Human beings have a special ability to read social cues as our survival demanded on belonging to a community for safety and security during harsh living conditions.

Every individual gives off honest signals that cannot be hidden no matter how hard one tries to hide it.

*Unless you are an actor/actress.

Remember those times after meeting someone you just couldn’t ignore something felt “off” about the individual?

This is it.

In many cases there are people that have become such good actors that they constantly play a façade and persona [out of fear of being rejected for being who they truly are].

This unhealthy mode of behavior is quite literally training the individual to repress who they truly as the byproduct is being accepted and validated on an ongoing basis for who they are not.

In my humble opinion: one of the worst ways of living is constantly having to pretend to be someone you are not to the point you feel drained all the time.

You see.

Social intelligence is an absolute must have skillset as modern culture transitions more into the digital landscape from the physical social origin we evolved from.

Obtaining the special abilities to gauge if someone is truly being authentic or not becomes a critical skill to cultivate if you want to have meaningful connections.

Because it doesn’t matter how many vanity metrics is obtained - it is glaring obvious to the trained eye - that knows how to see through all noise, façade and persona others fall for.

OUTCOMES REVEAL WHAT IS KNOWN

To think that you “know” is only one part of the equation…
and it’s still not enough to actualize your most desired outcomes and life experiences.

You only truly know as much as your results reveal.

With an unlimited amount of information it often leads to paralysis by analysis to the point of inaction.

Attempting to think about a subject without any experience is a mental ferris wheel that doesn’t end.

You can talk about all sorts of thoughts and ideas but without implementation it ultimately becomes meaningless as substance is required to make it tangible and relatable.

Focus on speed of implementation.

The moment you obtain information you must immediately follow up with relentless experimental actions to embody the information into your being so results actualize itself.

Life experience grounds information providing you with a deeper understanding of the subject and you will uncover new discoveries based on your experience.

This is exactly how you engrain information into your Being.

That’s when the “know“ information has transformed into wisdom [knowledge that has been applied] as it is now apart of who you are.

This is the lost art form:

The Process of Embodiment

I once heard someone say…

“Do as I say, but don’t do as I do.”

A sentence I remind myself of every day to never become like this individual as it just reeks lack of integrity.

Preaching before putting it into practice…

This paradigm of mind is something I never want to adopt into my own life as I see far too many avoiding the responsibility of doing the meaningful internal work before preaching it to the public.

However, I completely understand the headspace as I once too was there…

I decided to stop before my ego lost touch with objective reality and would not trade the world for that critical decision made years ago.

These very individuals receive recognition, attention and validation as if they have already accomplished such a daunting task which exceeds the age of their social media accounts.

The brain is experiencing an insane amount of dopamine so it quite literally believes that the work is already complete despite not putting in the work.

Now add in the money being rewarded coming from such a place - you have a huge demon to slay - why would one stop as their are no immediately consequences?

Eventually the consequences come later…

If you enjoyed this first part of the series - be sure to sign up to the private newsletter so you get it sent directly to your inbox upon release: https://www.philosophyofjiu-jitsu.com/subscribe

See you on the mats,

POJ