We fail for the same reason we don’t live our dream life
If we want change, we have to give up the old ways to reap the benefit of the new way of life. There is no way around it, we all know it.
It is literally sacrificing your in-the-moment egoic pleasures for the long-term benefit of the hole – which also benefits you! (And your kid’s)
“If we maximize short-term pleasure then we sacrifice the long-term – and we don’t want to do that because the long-term is our life”
Most of us are impulsive pleasure-seeking animals and Im saying animals because we react to a neuro-chemical craving called dopamine which determines everything that we do, like an addict hooked to a drug or a dog when you have goodies.
We all know:
- Too much sugar will make you fat
- Too much smoke will choke your lungs
- Too much alcohol will f*ck you up
- Too much TV will make you lazy & your life will lack meaning
- Too much Social Media will make you anxious
- Too much pornography will make regular sex unsatisfying
- Too much “news” will make you anxious & less happy
- Too much talk & no action will make you a fake
What we don’t know is that for every one of these actions, your brain creates a dopamine loop in your brain. No one seems to be aware of the neuro-chemical language of the human brain. It only says “Do this action & and I(brain) will give you a neuro-chemical reward to make you feel good now”
Unpopular opinion: if you give up your dream body, mental & physical health, or dream life because you can’t break your own dopamine cycle, do you know what you are then?
I don’t know what you tell yourself, but I know Im an addict and I try to be less addicted to the reward and more addicted to the pursuit of the reward –
I took that to the extreme = sacrificing my current reward
The journey, LAST-X’s mission & the Part Of The Solution Movement over personal economy. I funded LAST-X with more money than I had in the bank, (I was able to do so by a split payment option for the products), and if it fails and I become homeless which Im very close to because I lost 2 jobs during the launch of LAST-X and if I end up homeless that’s alright because the mission is more important than money or my living standard.
– But for a very long time, I was an unaware addict of the dopamine loop in my brain. This Dopamine Loop controls our actions and our actions control our lives.
You are not going to change by me judging you, so I don’t – do whatever cranks your knob man.
You are going to change by how you judge yourself and if you’re like me, you are hard on yourself and you raise your standard for yourself.
But please don’t be obsessed about your external standard, because you might get fired or lose a loved one or your house might burn down.
The only standard worth obsessing over is how you feel about yourself when you are by yourself.
And if you constantly distract yourself with short-term pleasure and ignore what, you know, you need to work on. (No, not your tasks at a job but things like; your health, a bad habit you need to quit, a skill/character trait like being more confident, cultivating better mental health, practicing gratitude, etc.)
If you constantly distract yourself instead of doing something for yourself which you feel is important, well, do you even like yourself then?
If you love someone, you would do everything for that special someone, well why are your actions different when it comes to doing something good for yourself? Does this mean you don’t like yourself as much as you think?
Whatever story you tell yourself about yourself, is your identity. So please tell yourself a story that motivates you to change into the best possible version of yourself, because then you win.
If you have an excuse then remember:
The limitations you fight for, you get to keep my friend.
Can you look at the struggle/opportunity in your life in a new light that serves you better? By all means, twist it differently, look at the opportunity from a new angle, throw a new light on it – Do whatever you have to do to turn it into a benefit for you! Because why not? Should we just accept things that shrink & limits us?
Well, if shrinking is more comfortable for you than trying a different approach, I guess you have made your choice. Then you can keep blaming others/an event and your life will get 0% better, maybe a tiny tiny bit better because you forget over time or because you get attention and compassion from others but that might only be 2% better compared to 10X if you heal and grow out of your limiting story.
Sorry, I’m just trying to help and to “distract yourself” from the pain of being you, well, you have tried that, haven’t you? You know how it ends – unless you do something new.
I hope you do whatever will benefit you greatly & move you forward,
You deserve to be truly happy!
To finish where we started: If we all were better to sacrifice the short-term for the long-term, we would have a much greater chance of solving Climate Change, because we would be much less selfish & choose what’s best for our future & our kid’s future.
With love,
Rafiki, Revolutionarie
Ps: Heavy artillery is designed to crack your armor, so you have enough emotional pain to contemplate your choices in life because your choices are why my words may have hurt you. If you had healed yourself from your own suffering, I couldn’t cause you pain with this post. So if you feel hurt by my post, it means you have work to do. And your mental health and mental resilience is the most important thing you can ever work on, but your mental health will only get better if you listen to what you know you need to do. If not for yourself then do it for the ones you love.