It’s amazing what happens when you externalise your thoughts.
And even better when it’s online for others to see.
Why?
Because you only have your own thoughts to deal with when setting goals by yourself. When you announce them to the world (even if no one is watching), those thoughts change.
Your thoughts become the assumed thoughts of others, which creates a completely different dynamic inside yourself.
And that can lead to greater self-awareness.
The Basics
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- Time spent: 0 minutes
I had a lot of shadow material coming up today. The best words to describe it would be pressure, anger, and guilt.
So instead of working on this project, I took some time for myself to do “whatever I wanted”.
Before I Started
It wasn’t until around midday that I decided to pass on the writing today.
But I had a busy morning so I wouldn’t have been able to start until early afternoon anyway.
Nevertheless, I still felt a lot of resistance.
Resistance level: 8/10.
Then, that resistance went down to zero as soon as I decided to call it a day.
But that resistance turned into guilt and a sense of obligation, like I was letting people down.
This led to thoughts that sounded like:
- “I’m not responsible for anyone but myself.”
- “Why should I do anything that feels like pressure?”
- “I don’t have prove myself to feel good.”
- “What am I even doing this for?”
This eventually became quite comical. I was aware that I was defending myself… against myself!
That’s how the mind works. That’s literally why we have core beliefs; to defend the vulnerable parts of ourselves.
And those beliefs show up as voices in our head that try to dictate our day.
Worse: Dictate our worth.
Luckily, I’m pretty observant (and accepting) of shame and guilt attacks these days.
When you spend enough time with yourself and learn to just sit with emotions, no matter how uncomfortable they feel, you start to welcome them as they arise.
Instead of allowing thoughts to dictate your worth or emotions to influence your behaviour, you just let them be.
That’s when you can start a dialogue with them.
And what I heard them say today was:
- “I’m not doing anything wrong.”
- “Everything is fine.”
- “I’m allowed to change my mind.”
To me, that sounds like forgiveness, and forgiveness feels like freedom.
What I Did Instead
With this sense of freedom, I chose to read. I read a lot. I journalled a bit. And I learnt about prompt engineering.
Also went shopping, saw a friend, and eat pancakes in the evening.
AND… I created a custom AI sound boarding assistant for Mental Projectors. I’m yet to test it out properly, but I’m excited to see if it can actually help me make decisions.
It was a good day.
What I’m Learning
I’m learning a lot about myself. Not that that’s new, but it feels different.
I’ve set myself goals like this in the past and tried to hustle my way through them. Then months or years later realised that my intention behind these goals were self-absorbed.
They were to overcompensate for a lack of worthiness and a lack of security.
To try to prove myself to the world. To try to become “somebody”.
But I don’t have to be anybody but myself. A self that feels calm and centred. That doesn’t need to perform to feel accepted.
And that’s the attitude I’ll bring tomorrow, on day 3.