Strive for Loving Relationships, and Avoid the Toxic Ones

Today’s post is an excerpt from my book, 7 Thoughts to Live Your Life By: A Guide to the Happy, Peaceful, & Meaningful Life.

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Generally, relationships should be based on love, acceptance, and understanding, which is good and healthy. However, they can sometimes be based on distrust, dissatisfaction, and a lack of understanding, which is not good and healthy. We have to learn to attract good kinds of relationships and to avoid bad ones.

Think about who is in your life the most, from day to day. This will probably include people you live with, whether your parents, spouse, children, or possibly roommates. Some of your close relationships may also be with your coworkers or with superiors at work. These relationships tend to be very important because we spend a lot of time with these people, meaning that they can have a greater influence over us.

Be cautious if you find yourself surrounded by people who are insensitive to your needs. They may belittle you, be sarcastic, attack you verbally or even physically, actively get in the way of your pursuits, start intense arguments with you, and so forth. Depending on the frequency and intensity of these, they can create a toxic environment for you.

Something to be aware of is that healthy relationships have issues too. Don’t worry that if you have an intense argument with someone, this automatically means the relationship is toxic. This isn’t necessarily the case. The problem is when you feel drained and agonize over interactions with certain people. Keep in mind that in some families or some relationships, arguments may be a normal part of life, and it can be an effect of personalities that clash but who still care for each other. In fact, some people may have a way of bonding through their arguments. The issue is if someone becomes distraught through chronic arguments. If such a thing occurs often, we may have a toxic relationship that needs repair.

If you have found yourself holding all of your thoughts inside and becoming resentful to keep the peace, you should realize that this isn’t the best path either. In some cases, it is reasonable to disagree with someone and possibly even to argue. I will ask that you consider the middle path. Do not always argue, and do not always hold in your feelings and keep them to yourself. Perhaps the best option is to state how you feel without needing to argue about it. Be who you are and hold your own viewpoints, and allow others to be who they are. Some people get intensely argumentative because they ultimately wish to control others, and people, of course, cannot be controlled so easily.

Note that if you find yourself in an overly toxic environment that harms you, you should consider leaving that environment if possible. This may involve stopping an activity, changing your workplace, or even changing homes. The more drastic the choice would be, the more deeply you should consider if it is truly worth it to leave the environment or if there is another way to repair the situation. For instance, if you have an issue with a sibling, discussing the matter with another family member could help. Or, if you have an issue with a fellow worker, discussing this with your employer could help.

Even if you are not contributing to the toxicity in any way, you will suffer through everyday exposure to it. For this reason, you may consider leaving such environments even when it is not your fault.

Remember this: Allow others to be who they are, and be who you are. You do not need to agree with everyone, and everyone does not need to agree with you.

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7 Thoughts to Live Your Life By is available on Amazon, Google Play, Apple, Kobo, and Barnes & Noble, and other retailers.

The Daily Drama

Today’s post is an excerpt from my book, 7 Thoughts to Live Your Life By: A Guide to the Happy, Peaceful, & Meaningful Life.

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A fascination with the negative, the dark, and the drama

Have you noticed that most people seem drawn to the darkness? When there is a horrible car accident, we can’t help but look over to see what happened, even though we know it cannot be good. People enjoy gossip, talking about the bad things happening in other people’s lives. We watch violent TV shows or movies, attracted somehow to the extreme and dark depths of human nature.

I call this general fascination with the negative and the darkness and how we are attracted to it, The Daily Drama. This is my name for it because I have noticed that many of us create a lot of drama in our own lives – we experience this daily, yet we don’t even seem to realize that we are a primary reason for its existence.

We can end the drama, often by tuning out of whatever is causing it. Is it a personal desire to always have attention on yourself? Is it a colleague or a friend? Is it your overreaction to any minor event that you did not expect? We can learn healthier ways to acquire attention or learn to overcome our need for this attention. We can minimize communications with the colleague or friend, and we can learn that our overreactions make things worse. We may fear disconnecting from the drama, thinking that we will make things worse by ignoring it or by not giving it our full attention. But often, one drama arises, then it is corrected or forgotten. Then another drama arises, and the cycle repeats again and again. We do not need to worry – the drama will always be alive and well. It is ourselves that we must take care of.

If this daily drama rules your life where every day is filled with it, I urge you to break the cycle. Understand that you are playing a role in the drama by how you react to it and that it is not fully out of your control.

Ask yourself: Am I going to feed the drama? Or am I going to allow it to die a quiet death without feeding it any further?

A matter of survival

Why are we attracted to the negativity and the darkness?

By having some darkness in us, we can better identify it in others and protect ourselves from it. For example, The Prince by Niccolo Machiavelli and The 48 Laws of Power by Robert Greene were both written on the theme of gaining power and using manipulative tactics to get what you want. However, they were not necessarily written with the view that you must do dark things, but also with the understanding that you must at least be aware that there are people out there willing to use dark means to get what they want from you. And thus, if you understand their intentions, you can prevent the use of these manipulative tactics on yourself.

We have to understand the darkness to overcome the darkness. If you do not understand it, you risk succumbing to it. The issue is that our minds sometimes dwell on the darkness and become stuck in it, plagued by it. This is when we know that we have a problem.

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7 Thoughts to Live Your Life By is available on Amazon, Google Play, Apple, Kobo, and Barnes & Noble, and other retailers.

Exercise: Create a Positivity Box

Today’s post is an excerpt from my book, 7 Thoughts to Live Your Life By: A Guide to the Happy, Peaceful, & Meaningful Life.

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Your Positivity Box could be an actual box, or it could just be a journal, notebook, or scrapbook (physical or digital) that contains quotes, music, videos, pictures, and general reminders of things that are positive in life. You may include a quote by Oprah Winfrey, such as: “Surround yourself only with people who are going to take you higher.” You may have the song Happy, sung by Pharrell Williams, or a card written by your child. Alternatively, you could include a list of everything you are grateful for. Another option is to include photos that record positive memories with family and friends. Any time you struggle to stay positive, open your Positivity Box, and remind yourself of all that is good in the world.

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7 Thoughts to Live Your Life By is available on Amazon, Google Play, Apple, Kobo, and Barnes & Noble, and other retailers.

The Unknowing Teacher

Today’s post is an excerpt from my book, 7 Thoughts to Live Your Life By: A Guide to the Happy, Peaceful, & Meaningful Life.

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The Unknowing Teacher is something that many of us have in our lives and fail to be grateful for. This is someone who teaches you but without meaning to. Usually, this person isn’t a teacher by profession, and they are not teaching you specific lessons on purpose. Instead, they teach you based on the poor decisions that they have made in their lives, and you are the one who gets to see the results of those choices.

When we see people who have made poor choices in their lives, we can see why they now have a bad situation in life. They retired too young, and now they are broke; they ignored their children, and now those children have grown to become criminals; they took everything personally, and now they are perpetually unhappy; they drank every weekend instead of pursuing their dreams, and now their life is filled with regret.

The unknowing teacher teaches us a lot about what we should not do, how we should not live, and what to avoid in our lives. Such a person is a great resource to have and to witness because sometimes we need a reminder of where the bad paths in life will lead us. Be grateful for these people when you see them and learn from their example.

If someone very close to you is an unknowing teacher – perhaps a parent or a sibling, do not feel sorry for yourself. Simply through your everyday exposure to such a person, you will be able to immunize yourself from leading the same type of life. You will see all the bad behaviors that lead to negative outcomes and learn that this is not the life for you.

Remember this: Heed the lessons of the unknowing teacher carefully, or risk becoming one yourself.

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7 Thoughts to Live Your Life By is available on Amazon, Google Play, Apple, Kobo, and Barnes & Noble, and other retailers.

Make Your Dreams Come True

“People are capable, at any time in their lives, of doing what they dreamed of.” – The Alchemist by Paulo Coelho

I recently watched the Who Wants to Be a Millionaire show with Jimmy Kimmel, and he asked his guest what she would do if she won the million dollars. She wanted to start a charitable organization, write a movie script, along with some other goals. At the end of her list, Jimmy Kimmel pointed out that she could do all of those things without the million dollars.

The contestant seems to be a dreamer. Are you one too?

There are many dreamers out there, but unfortunately they often get caught up in their fantastical dreams, rather than living in the practical reality. To make our dreams happen, we must fuse both together - dream fantastically, yet work within the constraints of the real world.

There are many reasons why we fail to make our dreams happen. Sometimes, we just make excuses. We feel like we couldn’t possibly do something because we don’t have the time or money. Yet if you really think about it, the time is there for most of us. You can find ways to free up time, perhaps using less of it on entertainment. Or you can organize yourself better to avoid wasting time. It may even be worth buying certain tools or services to save some time. And you may be able to get around the money issue. Perhaps you can teach someone a skill that you know, and they can teach you a skill that they know. This way, you can both shoot for your dreams without needing to spend money.

Interestingly, this is a time in history where there may be many valid excuses – many of us are legitimately suffering health or financial issues or some increased worry about these things. Some of us may have suffered the loss of a loved one. Any of these things will tend to put our dreams on hold. But that doesn’t mean we should forget them entirely.

For you: you, who have taken the time to read this article about making your dreams come true, I would urge you to question whether you have just been making excuses. This is not the time to be too hard on ourselves, of course. If you are worried about just getting by on a day-to-day basis, by all means, focus on meeting your needs. But if your needs are all taken care of and you are doing fine, take a moment to reflect on your dreams.

Do you know what your dreams are? Or have you pushed them aside and neglected them, perhaps even forgotten them? Think deeply, until you rediscover that lost dream.

When you think of your dream, consider: Is there a way to make your dream work online? (to avoid close contact in the age of Covid) Or with no money? You may be surprised. Spend a day searching online for ideas as to how to make your dream come true with no special technology, no professional contacts, and no money. Again, you may be surprised. Before you search too deeply, please be cautious about people online who want to sell you the road map to making your dream come true - especially if the cost is excessive. I would encourage you to seek out free resources and start there. Books can also be beneficial and not too expensive.

Another reason we don’t follow our dreams is that we are worried about failure or what others will think. These are intertwined. If you are worried about what other people think, you probably worry about what they will say if you fail. To me, the only true failure is not even attempting to do something that you truly wanted to do. The inaction, the giving up before you tried, is the failure. Not being able to get views, or attention, or sales, is not a failure. In fact, this is the default. It is what we should expect to happen.

We are all hyper-focused on ourselves and our own lives. If I start going door to door and telling people about my upcoming book, I expect nobody to care. They don’t know me. They don’t owe me anything. I am just a random guy to them. If someone actually cares, now that is a special moment. That is out of the norm. (For your information, I have never gone door to door to tell people about my books.)

What is the next big reason that we don’t follow our dreams? We build up the dream so much in our minds that we know the reality will probably never live up to this. When you have your dream in mind, use your excitement and energy to make something or build something, not to fantasize. If you overdo the dream and make it into a fantasy, then you’ve basically killed it. This could mean that you will never be satisfied in actually pursuing the dream. In fact, you are likely to set it aside another year, then another decade, and so on. You may come to see that your fantasy is so grandiose that working on actualizing it will either overwhelm you or let you down, as it fails to live up to your expectation.

Personally, my rule is that I don’t really talk about my dreams. I prefer to take action on them and see how it goes. Sometimes your dreams evolve, change, or they even die out, and new ones arise to take their place. That is fine. I don’t need the pressure of having someone ask me how my dream is going. I just do it.

I’m sure I have had many dreams that never came true, but that was okay. My life needs or wishes changed as I grew. Dreams that you wanted to come true at some point probably failed to do so, and maybe you were thankful for that. Maybe we don’t need to achieve everything we thought that we needed or wanted.

However, many of my dreams have come true. Perhaps I am doing something right.

For example:

I dreamed of reading 40-50 books per year. I have been doing this for about a decade. Before that dream, I struggled to read a few books per year.

I dreamed of one day making a living selling books. I have been for years, with most years being better than the last. When I started, I was lucky to make just a few sales per day.

My wife and I dreamed of one day living in Europe and visiting many countries there. We lived in France for a few years and traveled to Spain, Portugal, the Netherlands, Belgium, and other countries.

I think that when you have a dream you really care about, you can find a way to make it happen. We just need to search deeper. It may not come easily, but there should be a way to make some progress.

A great lesson I’ve learned many times is that we should not wait to be discovered. The people who are the best at what they do just do it. You can learn to make music and then make it. You don’t need someone else to tell you that you are good enough. The same with writing fiction, or dancing, or countless other domains and skills. If it helps, forget the gatekeepers. Create something, then share it online for the masses to decide whether they like it or not.

If your dream is too big, perhaps narrow it down a bit to make it more achievable. Perhaps you want to travel to Europe, but the realities of life make this quite unlikely. That is understandable. But do you even know your own country? Or your own state? Have you truly explored it? Perhaps there is a lot to see and learn there as well.

What is your dream?

As I’ve said, I have had many dreams. Some of my dreams now are to write a perennial seller, to buy my dream home, and to write a book of poetry that I am proud of. I suspect if you get back to me in 10 years, some of these dreams will have come true. Or the dreams may change, and that’s fine too. But I find that my dreams tend to come true simply because I truly care about them, and I work on them now, rather than waiting for some perfect situation or time.

As an example, I write poetry, yet I have never studied poetry. I can’t guarantee that my poetry is good, but this is a meaningful project for me. I write it, and then I spend time improving it and conveying the story or message that I find important. Of course, this is something I do for fun in my spare time. Some dreams will be for fun, others may involve your career, and others may involve your family or your health.

If your dreams haven’t come true yet, pick one today, and dedicate yourself to making it happen. Stop making excuses, stop worrying about what others will think, and get busy. Either that, or acknowledge that it wasn’t your true dream, to begin with, and look for another one.

The quote at the top of today’s post is simple, yet it has been quite impactful in my life. I will restate it here:

“People are capable, at any time in their lives, of doing what they dreamed of.” – The Alchemist by Paulo Coelho

Working on my Perennial Seller

“Yet far too many people set out to produce something that, if they were really honest with themselves, is only marginally better or different from what already exists. Instead of being bold, brash, or brave, they are derivative, complementary, imitative, banal, or trivial. The problem with this is not only that it’s boring, but that it subjects them to endless amounts of competition.” – Perennial Seller by Ryan Holiday

I have read Perennial Seller already, but I am rereading it because I hope for my next book to become one. Essentially, a perennial seller is a book, product, or service that continues to sell in time as more people discover it and realize the true value that it holds. You may also think of these as classics.

The creative approach that aims to build a perennial seller is unique because many industries are based on creating the next fad. Many of them want to build something hot right now and are not concerned about a decade or more into the future.

For example, the popular music on the radio today is unlikely to be played at all in ten years. A trendy new restaurant may not exist in five years. A book that is the “must-read” today may be a distant memory, no longer relevant in a few years.

Many industries are used to the idea that you crank out the work at a breakneck pace, and if it quickly ends up in the waste bin, that is fine as long as some profit was made. Authors or creators are eaten alive and spit out, and it doesn’t seem to matter because there is always a new line of authors and creators, ready to make something new and trendy that will also quickly end up in the trash.

Instead of going down that mad road, perennial sellers will keep on selling, being discovered, rediscovered, shared, and enjoyed for 10 years or perhaps much, much more.

Sometimes I think that the goal of an author, or perhaps anyone, is to become immortal. The goal of immortality is built into us, as when people have children, they pass on their genes onto someone else, who can then pass them onto someone else, and in a sense, reach immortality.

When an author writes a book, I think he has reached true success if his books are still relevant decades or perhaps even centuries after his death. This would be something that truly stands the test of time.

As the quote at the top of this post suggests, I aspire to create something daring and bold at this point in my career, something that does not just rehash or reinterpret the work of someone else. The goal of originality can be self-defeating, for any idea can often be traced to a prior one and a prior one. Everything comes from something and is therefore not truly original. Nonetheless, when my next books are read, I don’t want someone to be able to say: “These books are just saying what another author already said.” Even if they do not like the book, I want them to be able to say:

This was different… this was an attempt at greatness… even if it didn’t work out in the end.

Whether I actually can achieve a perennial seller is secondary to me. The primary objective is to truly create something worth reading, something that will help people to understand and perceive in a new way.

As a regular reader, if I see a book that is similar in style or content to many others I have read, I tend to put it down and look for something else. At a minimum, I need a new perspective on an old issue to consider reading a book. And the books that are most attractive to me are the ones that push me in new directions and open up paths for me that I was not even aware existed.

Whether I succeed or not in writing a perennial seller, I will enjoy the attempt. I will change things in my approach this time. I will strive to get more feedback on my work, spend more time making improvements, seek out higher-level professionals for my cover design and formatting. I may ask my audience, authors, or experts for their opinions if I should reconsider a chapter, a cover, or even a promotional plan.

By now, you may be wondering, what will my next book be about?

It will be about finding our personal truth. I completed the first draft last week, but this week I have set aside the manuscript to approach it with fresh eyes next week and continue to work on it. I will be discussing it in future posts here and on my mailing list.

I plan for the book to be published in June, but I will take the time required for this project. Creating a perennial seller cannot be rushed. I must be patient so that I can create my best work.

After having said all the above about wanting to write a perennial seller, I don’t want you to get the wrong idea. I’m not particularly concerned with the number of people who buy a book or even whether it qualifies as a perennial seller and is still selling well in 10 years. I suspect I will do fine in life either way. I will continue to write many books, and if one book fails, it will not affect me in the grand scheme.

My main objective, rather, is to be able to say:

I wrote the best work that I could, and I broke new ground for myself, pushing myself in new directions, discovering something new along the way. Writing this book was worth it because I learned deeply about myself and the universe. This book is one that I can honestly say: “I think the world would be better if everyone owned a copy.”

These may seem like grandiose comments, but if I can’t say the statement above sincerely, then I doubt I will actually write that perennial seller.

Essentially, the highest standards need to come from within myself. I am not worried about the critics around the world who may or may not like my books. I am more concerned with what I think of it. I am the one who knows all of my background. I am the one who knows what I should be capable of producing. I am the one who knows if I went all the way, pushed myself as far as I could go, and told the full truth, the full story as it needed to be told. Was it a success, as much as I could have ever hoped for? Only I can know. So only I can be the true judge of the work I produced.

This isn’t to say I will discount anyone else’s opinions. I will surely listen to them. But I feel that I am the final judge of my work. I need to know how to judge my work because if a thousand people tell me a thousand different things about my work, who am I supposed to believe in the end?

Ultimately, I must have my own inner compass to know what is real and what is not.

But of course, it would be nice to achieve a perennial seller – that would be a dream come true. No one can deny that.

As a last note, my advice for the new creators is to put in your time. Learn your craft, practice it, hone it. Take the time to do it right. I have 12 years of experience writing, starting with graduate school. Funny enough, I don’t count elementary, middle school, high school, or even college in my 12 years of experience - because I wasn’t working at a professional level yet.

So I have 12 years of professional writing experience. In graduate school, I focused on writing academic articles and book chapters. That is where I learned how to organize my ideas, be concise, and truly write. After that, I have written some fiction and poetry, but most of my work has been self-development books. After 12 years, I am just now feeling like I may be ready to write a perennial seller.

I would encourage you to take some time to build up your expertise before you can hope to create a work of true perennial value. Have fun in your first years, and allow yourself to explore new ground. Learn about yourself to figure out what your true perennial value will be. What can you offer to this world that will still matter in 10, 20, 30 years?

Will I be able to create my perennial seller? Will you? Only time will tell.

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The book I discuss in this post is now available. It is called Your Personal Truth: A Journey to Discover Your Truth, Become Your True Self, & Live Your Truth.

Who Can Truly Teach You?

“Believe me: It is no teaching and no instruction that I give you. On what basis should I presume to teach you? I give you news of the way of this man, but not of your own way. My path is not your path, therefore I cannot teach you. Within us is the way, the truth, and the life.” – The Red Book (Liber Novus) by C. G. Jung

This is a powerful insight and one that I have been contemplating in my own way. This Thought suggests that no one can truly teach us, and in the end, we must find our own way. Ultimately, anything that we are taught is likely to apply to someone else, perhaps of a different time, context, and situation. In that way, the teachings we are given have a way of leaving us behind if we do not adapt and find our own way.

My current way is to read as much as I can and absorb as much knowledge and understanding as possible. Yet, some of the most advanced thinkers I have known of (some personally, and some through books such as Jung’s) have spent great deals of time searching for their own way rather than looking beyond themselves for it. Perhaps they haven’t merely searched but created and cultivated their own way of seeing and being. They have reached a stage of not needing the teacher and not even needing to teach, necessarily.

Of course, a key part of thinking involves knowledge, and where do we get our knowledge from?

In reading, or in learning generally from the world around us, we can see different types of knowledge. There is anecdotal knowledge – meaning that there is some information that pertains to a particular person at a point in time.

There is scientific knowledge – meaning that some information has been found to apply to a particular group of people, and we can figure that this information is likely to transfer to another similar group of people. For example, research conducted on smokers is likely to apply to other people who smoke, even those who did not participate in the research.

Then there is spiritual knowledge – meaning information that has somehow surpassed the need for the anecdotal or scientific understanding. With this kind of knowledge, we come to know some deeper part of ourselves, the universe, or others without necessarily being able to explain it in words or relationships.

You may be surprised to learn that often, none of the above types of knowledge will give you certainty. Anecdotal knowledge may apply just to particular cases and not universally. Scientific knowledge may apply generally and not necessarily to your specific case.

Spiritual knowledge may apply to only the individual spirit, yet this spirit may be interconnected with other spirits or the universe more deeply. Theoretically, spiritual knowledge can transcend our finite being, and tap into something much deeper and greater, perhaps even infinite. Yet this knowledge is not easily put into words and cannot be conveniently revealed to anyone else.

Jung is interested in spiritual knowledge and seems to have lost the need or desire for anecdotal and scientific knowledge, which has failed him on his quest for true spiritual understanding.

Jung clearly believes in a soul, which is the idea that we have an eternal element within us. Given this idea, it makes sense that one could gain deeper truths within rather than searching for them in a universe that is in constant states of change. I have read other works which state that scientifically, there is no proof or even evidence of a soul – and you can make of that what you will and figure out where you stand on this issue.

Some assume we have a soul, and others say there is no evidence of one. What do you think?

Do you have a soul? Do you believe the idea is misguided and does not exist? Or do you think we have lost our souls, and need to find them once again?

Are you part of an eternal, infinite realm that connects you to the past, before you were born, and the future, after your death, and perhaps to alternate realities and dimensions? Or are you just here, just now, just limited to what we see? Personally, I think it is fun to speculate on this. However, I am also a pragmatist, and I like to focus on ideas that can help to learn something valuable and not just get stuck in speculation.

On a practical level, I believe that there is some true knowledge and understanding to be gained by looking within, rather than spending all our time captivated by the whims of our external reality, of the happenings around us.

But who can teach us to look within, and what does this even mean? First, this has to be something that we wish to pursue. We have to get fed up with the transient noise that everyday life brings us. Is every day just some new trivial drama to attend to? Some chores that must be taken care of? Some enjoyment gotten from a silly task or screen? A search to satisfy our need for more, whether it be more money, things, or the adoration of people we barely know? Is that what we are here for, or is there something more?

Then we have to get fed up with teachers who have led us astray. The teacher who taught us to want a particular thing, solve a certain problem in a certain way and not in some other way, see some as good and others as evil, follow arbitrary rules, and so on. Perhaps some of the teachings led us to make more mistakes, question or dampen our own spirit, or ultimately regret having been taught.

I have found that the best teachers are the ones who allow you to create your own path, make your own mistakes, and form your own distinct footprint on the world.

I admit, I sometimes wonder – what would have happened if I had never been taught? Would I have learned more through my own curiosity, will, and searching? Or would I have become a hopeless case, an ignorant fool? Ultimately, I would have found my own way, just via a different route. The key is to teach our students how to find their own way, and not limit them and make them need to have a teacher for life.

When we finally get fed up with the fact that our daily patterns, teachings, sources of information, and everything in our lives is not truly teaching us anything worthwhile, then the only place left to look is within. You do this by being quiet with yourself. Meditating, or not. Simply sitting in quiet, thinking about your life, your wants. Then you think, “Why?” Why did you do things this way and not that way? Why did you want this and not that? What did it ultimately matter when you got that thing you wanted? Or what did it matter when you didn’t get that thing you wanted? What was the difference in the end?

What were the things that ultimately mattered? Was it the things as they happened, or your beliefs about what those things meant? Was it the experience, or the interpretation of that experience?

What are you thirsting after? It’s always something. The next TV show. The next book. The next teacher. The next restaurant. The next place to visit. The next thing to buy that will solve all our problems (but it never does).

But do we know ourselves? Soul or not, do we know who we truly are? Are we here to fall in line and be told who we are by others? Or to discover our own true path in life?

I can’t teach you who you are. I can’t even teach you how to figure out who you are. I am the teacher who doesn’t know how to teach and doesn’t want to teach, but maybe that is the best teacher to have. I’m not sure anyone else can teach you who you are or how to find who you are. No one can be your teacher for this. The universe itself must be your teacher.

I wonder: What are your fundamental truths? By this, I mean the things you know to be true and do not need a pile of evidence for. You simply know them. Maybe this is something that points you toward your soul. Or maybe this is something your soul is pointing you toward.

Where is your spiritual knowledge? Have a conversation with your spirit, and learn about your true self. Not the wants, but something deeper. You may have to invent a new language or create a new way of perceiving. Perhaps your spirit has its own unique way that cannot be easily explained or thought of in mere words, relationships, and images. You may be surprised that who you are in your daily life is not at all the spirit within. And that is fine. This experience is just learning, and discovering your spiritual knowledge, your true self.

If it helps, release yourself from the pressure. Sit in silence, and do not pressure yourself to go in any direction. Do not question and interrogate yourself and judge yourself. Just let yourself flow out from yourself, like a river, a stream. Pour out, and stop holding it all back.

Our human ways in modern society are walls, dams, holding back our spirit’s way. So this may be a journey for you, a new path that you need to set on.

Pursue Your Joy, Spread Your Joy

“It would have made things a lot easier if we understood there was no way of living that can immunize you against sadness. And that sadness is intrinsically part of the fabric of happiness. You can’t have one without the other.” – The Midnight Library, by Matt Haig

The new year is here. Have you fallen into the same old patterns as last year? Did you make resolutions, knowing that you probably won’t make them happen, because that’s how it usually goes? Or did you make a long list of things you want to do, and it’s simply too much, so you know that even if you want it to happen and work at it, you may not have the time and energy to make it happen?

Or, perhaps you made a shortlist of critical things in your life that you are motivated to change. And you made a list of specific steps or actions to take. Then great! I’m guessing you will fulfill your plans in that case.

Or, maybe last year was hard enough to get through, and you feel good about yourself if you’re just able to get by at this point. I’m sure that this is a reality for many of us.

As we make our plans for the new year, keep this in mind:

Let’s not forget what brings us true joy. Let’s do more of that, and put more of that out into the world.

I just saw The High Note yesterday, and Dakota Johnson’s character says that she wants to make music that can help people feel less alone. Music helped her get through hard times in her life, and she wants to make music that will do the same for others.

Sometimes I think we view the pursuit of our joy as something selfish, but that isn’t necessarily the case. Often, it seems that in bringing ourselves joy, we can create something and share it with others, and they can share in some of that joy with us.

Is there something that brings you joy that you have neglected? Could this also spread joy to others?

I believe it is never too late to learn, try something new, and become who you truly wanted to become. Personally, it gives me strength to see that the things that bring me joy could truly mean something to other people too. There is no way to know until you do it or create it and share it.

Often, we get stuck in a rut and repeat the patterns of yesterday, and the day before that, and even last year, and the year before that. The first step to break these patterns is to see that they are there. Some hidden forces are guiding you to do just what you did before, again and again. Going to the same places, talking to the same people, doing the same things. Maybe this is fine if this is what you wanted. But is it truly what you wanted?

If not, only you can choose to break free from the mold you’ve created for yourself.

I find that to move toward joy, you have to make a commitment to yourself, and perhaps to someone else too. Then, you have to make the time for what you really want to do. I sense that my mind is always subconsciously monitoring and thinking this:

What would I normally do at this time? Let’s do that.

At breakfast time, I eat breakfast. At work time, I work. When it’s time to eat dinner and relax and watch TV, I do that. At my usual reading time in the evenings, I read. Usually, in the evenings, I also do some quick chores such as cleaning up, dishes or running other errands. In the course of a normal day, most of my time slots are filled. So this leaves weekends to work out anything I want to accomplish beyond my work goals. I make it a point to leave my weekends mostly open. This can be good and bad. They’re open and free, so I can do anything, but in reality, this may be time that goes wasted.

I have patterns that tend to hold for my weekends. I may be inclined to sleep in later, watch more TV, and play video games, but instead of this, I should be asking myself: What will bring me true joy and help spread this to others as well?

And so, for me, as far as making time for joy goes, this is the solution. I need to more carefully examine my weekends to see if I could do something more. For example, I can make time to read, learn to cook a new dish, chat with friends and family, look for ways to help out the community, exercise, write and review my poems or short stories, and so on.

I have many, many goals, but it makes sense to take some of that free time on the weekends and convert it into something that brings a longer-lasting, higher-quality type of joy. For you, you may consider if you can make some time first thing in the morning, right before bed, during a lunch break, or perhaps on the weekends.

Ask yourself:

What time am I wasting, that I could use to do something that brings me joy?

I included the quote at the top of this post because it makes a good point that we should not forget. The sadness is inevitable. I pursue joy and wish to spread more of it, but there are times when anyone can feel sad or down. I’m not in the pursuit of pure bliss, as such feelings are, of course, fleeting. I aim to make the best of the moments that come my way. But I also aim to create a world (in my own small way) that can build better moments for us all.

I aim to be content with what is while still making improvements. This can seem paradoxical – as if you are content, why would you need to improve? However, I’m not just content but also tremendously grateful for everything in my life. I feel it is my responsibility to work hard, help people, and spread joy and wisdom however I can.

Joy is something that I do pursue, but I know that this is not something I can ever catch. You may as well try to catch the oxygen sitting in front of you. And the fact that joy inevitably will come and go also means that sadness will inevitably come and go. If joy leaves you suddenly, sadness will tend to come and fill its place.

Joy and sadness are a normal part of the ebbs and flow of this human life.

All we can do is try to sit in peace with this reality. And those who are filled with joy can do their best to spread some of that to those who truly need it.

Don’t Let This Year Pass By, Wasted. Pursue Your Joy. Spread Your Joy.

Don’t know what to do with your time? Consider doing something for your health, such as exercise, mental training, expressing your creativity, or volunteering to help those in need. If you love to do something, you can spread the joy by introducing someone else to the topic or activity.

Are You Collecting Thoughts and Insights?

In 2021, I want to be more consistent with how I collect Thoughts. For Christmas, my wife gave me a book journal, and the best way to gain insightful thoughts, I find, is from books. A key way that I plan to start collecting thoughts is to write down some of the most insightful ones I come across in my readings.

If you are curious, my way of doing this is to write down thought-provoking or insightful quotes in my book journal. I also write down the page, so I can go back and explore the context more deeply if I wish. Then when I finish the book, I can reflect on these great insights.

I want to stick to the habit of writing down these insights to reflect on them more deeply. When I reflect on them, I may ask myself – Is this truly insightful? Have I come across this idea before, perhaps just stated differently? Have I applied this in my own life or seen it applied? What are the limitations of this idea? Might it work under some conditions, but not in others?

Of course, insights are different for everyone. An insightful idea to me may be mundane for you, or vice versa. What is insightful for someone depends on life experience, the goals we set, and our interests. Also, many great insights may come from anywhere, not just books – it could be an experience, a conversation, observing people, a podcast, a class, and so on.

As I have already explored much of my history and life experiences and some of my own key insights in my prior posts (see some of them on the Start Here page), going into the future, I plan to discuss and site particular sources of insights. I see no reason to summarize a whole book, but rather, I may mention a key insight I gained from a book and discuss what I believe some implications may be or how the insight could be applied for our benefit. I may even aim to apply it first and then let you know how that went for me.

Keeping track of sources is important, so if you find a post especially useful, you can explore that Thought more deeply by reading the source material.

Hopefully, you can gain manifold insights this way. For example, I will share an insight I read about or experienced. Then, I will share my personal insights about that insight. Then I may ask you to reflect on this, hopefully allowing you to build new insights based on the ones I shared with you. We shall see if this works how I think it will – stay tuned to future posts to find out.

I will admit that I am often stuck in my own mind – and so it could be quite beneficial if I were to focus on applying some insightful ideas to see what true value could be gained from them. If I find some useful insights that I can apply, I will aim to do this and report back to you on how it goes. I hope this will keep the site useful, interesting, and inspiring for you.

In 2021, I wish to have more insights and share more insights and apply the best ones to help myself, and you, and everyone.

I wish you an INSIGHTFUL 2021! May you be full of great INSIGHTS.

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To discover how to read more deeply and attain more insights through your readings, I recommend: The Insightful Reader: How to Learn Deeply & Attain Life-Changing Insights from Books

As a final thought, if you have any new insights, I would be glad to hear from you in the form of a comment (on this post, or any relevant post). Keep in mind that the comments are not just for me. Usually, they can benefit many other readers who could learn from your valuable experiences. For instance, you may ask a question, share an experience, or provide your own thoughts on one of my posts.

Today, I Stand Still (and I ask, “Who are you?”)

I was wondering if just sitting still would be the highest moral ideal to strive for.

For the most part, all our human activity and busyness is actually just making things worse for the planet – requiring more food, fuel, production, and creating more waste. And so, a high moral ideal may be to sit still and do nothing all day.

We all assume that a hard worker is valuable, but perhaps just as valuable would be the one who did nothing.

It seems that everywhere we turn, we are being urged to do more, accomplish more, sell more of our own widgets, and buy more of other people’s widgets - of course, this relates to The Busy, Entertained, Exhausted Cycle that many of us get caught up in. The fear that strikes us deep inside is that we must operate at the highest level of efficiency and productivity, or we may someday learn that the widgets we helped create have a higher net worth than we do.

Actually, when we reach an artificial intelligence higher than our own, then it is logical that we will have produced something with a higher value than ourselves. Imagine when we have an artificially intelligent machine that can build improvements upon itself, and then that one creates new improvements, and so on.

Is our destiny to render ourselves obsolete?

Speaking of value….

What is the value of your home? Not in dollars, but lives.

Our homes are worth too much, to where the bank will happily take it from us when we cannot pay. The home is worth more than the lives inside, it seems. Out of the house, out to the street if you cannot pay. Wherever you go, no one knows, no one cares. Stripped of a home, then of humanity and dignity. This is the fear that drives us to do what the boss says, whatever it is, no matter how backward or senseless – we do it and live to be human another day. That is the hope – to cling to the empty shell of our human selves, just one more day, and hopefully, everything will turn out okay. The prior sentence is written from the perspective of what someone may feel when they have been worked to the bone, only with the mere hope of keeping their home.

It’s quite a downfall to do what is expected of you, just not quite as efficiently as a well-oiled, artificially intelligent machine, and then to find yourself without a home.

Sometimes…….

I want to clear my mind and pretend for a moment as if every message that came my way during the day was actually just a trivial bit of nonsense. I want to pretend as if everything everyone said were a virus that had been repeated ad nauseam out of habit and not for any reality of the content itself. That way, I can comfort myself that everyone has just been repeating silly little lies, and there was no reason to waste any of my brain space on it. If I could ignore it, then maybe I could focus on figuring out what actually mattered on my own. Then I ask – but is this pretend, or is this actually true? Am I just pretending that things are as they actually are?

I’m a writer, and my books are in paperback, and I wonder, am I just contributing to more dead trees out there? Could some animals have lived and sheltered inside the trees that ended up becoming my books? Will the knowledge in my books be worth more somehow than these trees? Is it possible for something to be worth more dead than alive?

When I pump my gas, sometimes I imagine that I am pumping my tank full of dead and decomposed and liquified dinosaurs. And then I think, maybe that is our fate too, for some distant alien civilization to find us in time and to use our remains to fuel their spaceships. (By the way, even though I imagine dinosaurs, actually the fuel is made up of other plants and lifeforms from before the ages of dinosaurs.)

I have meandered, but here is the Thought I started the post with: I was wondering if just sitting still would be the highest moral ideal to strive for.

I thought perhaps I would take the high road today and sit still. And then I realized this is what I do every day, since writing and managing my business is mostly done sitting down and with stillness. And doing the same thing we do every day in habitual fashion couldn’t possibly be the highest moral ideal, could it?

So rather than sit, today I am going to stand and meditate in stillness.

Today, do something still, even if it’s just for five minutes. Then ask yourself, is this going to make things better or worse for all of humanity? Then ask yourself, what would happen if all humans sat or stood still for a full 24 hour day? Would we go mad, or sane, or both?

In stillness, perhaps we can let go of some of the insanity of our ways, and just for a moment perceive the actual truth as it is.

In our stillness and lack of productivity, would the world notice that we hadn’t helped produce a new widget? Would the world starve more because of our personal absence from it, or more from the absence of our widgets?

When we meet someone new, we often ask what they do, not who they are. Is that because we all know the widgets that we make (e.g., I make books, or at least the writing inside them), but few of us truly know ourselves or our own value independent from what we are making?

I once had a great fear that a stranger would one day ask me, “Who are you?” and I would stumble and blabber like a drunken fool, spewing incoherent syllables that led me nowhere, and the stranger would laugh and walk away.

Do any of us really know who we are?

As we approach the new year, imagine that a stranger has walked up to you and asked, “Who are you,” with a smug grin. He seems to know that you couldn’t possibly produce a worthy response, despite all your travels, book learning, friendships, and widget-making. How do you respond?

WHO ARE YOU?

¿QUIÉN ES USTED?

QUI ÊTES-VOUS ?

QUEM É VOCÊ?

CHI SEI?

КТО ТЫ?

你是谁？