Preety_India

Taken from the forum. That's a fantastic realization that this happens when you're not feeling good. You pretty much already conquered that monster with that realization. It's done. Congrats! Now, rather than focusing on avoiding the actions or the regret, shift focus to how you're feeling. Make a list, write down everything you want to do when you're feeling great and it occurs to you. Nahm's dreamboard suggestion is ideal. Put a whiteboard on your wall in your living space and write everything you want on there. If you're too shy just start with pen and paper. Now that you know what you want, and you're paying attention to how you feel, regret and avoidance just aren't necessary or even possible anymore. Everything we wrote on that list was a beautiful variety upon feeling better. Everything we want is because we think it will make us feel better. When we put attention directly on feeling, we recognize the stuff or circumstances doesn't cause that, we, WE do it, we are that. We feel so fucking good, we are feeling itself. We are literally both Aladdin and the Genie, because we are the Author of them both. So write. Write what you want. Notice the difference between the thought "I feel good" and the actual right now, experience of feeling good. The thought can never compare. Now you know what you want. My GOD, aren't you lucky! Oh the places you'll go! Wish I were you. Oh wait...

Kinda unique ...

To a certain extent what you say is true. But it's not a 100% true. Nothing can be decided beforehand. There are examples of people who lacked in terms of genetics yet they excelled in life. You need to think a bit out of the box here. You're probably having some fear which is holding you back from seeing what is possible. There are people who lack a lot and find it difficult to succeed. But there are also people who have the genetics in their favor yet they need massive amount of direction and guidance to actually achieve something. Personal development can fill that gap. In regard to those people who feel incapable of doing something due to physical factors like genetics, its mostly a handicap yet its not something that can't be overcome. I'm not going to say that everything is possible. But even a 10% improvement in your lifestyle is a big deal for someone who has struggled for years. Don't underestimate the power of psychological factors like determination and will Power. Everything is not genetics. Personal development also entails pushing boundaries and testing how much further you can go. What you're really talking about is not the disadvantages of personal development but about hurdles in life This is like saying the water pump doesn't work where there is no water. Well, nothing will work where there is no water. Can't blame it on the pump. Use that same pump in places where there is water and it works fine. It's similar to if your computer wasn't working right because of some software issue and you're using an antivrus and assuming that a virus is causing all your problems and you're blaming the antivrus software as defunct. However the antivirus is completely fine. It's the computer software that needs the fixing. You can't blame the field of personal development for things that are almost impossible to change. That is something you can blame on mother nature.

Making money is a part of your core skill set. It's how much you have to offer in a particular industry. Self help and personal development can help you hone your skills but if you are already lacking a lot, then it can't do much. You need to have some leverage to work on. Personal development definitely helps with social anxiety. My social anxiety was like 80% when I first joined the forum. Now it's reduced to 50% I think. I mean in terms of symptoms intensity. In fact my social skills were practically zero before joining the forum because I was very reserved and shy. But after joining the forum I became slightly extroverted but that's a huge difference for someone like me. It helped a lot with people skills If you asked me in 2018 to write something, I would have written only a word, not even a sentence. Now when I talk to people I can write so much more. This was impossible back then. Now when I talk to people in regular life, my social skills are not too bad. Still improving. Regarding relationships, well, personal development can tell what kind of relationships you need to avoid, but relationship is an area in life where only experience can work, too much talk is futile. However watching different videos and reading books can give you helpful insights on the nature of relationships and what sort of traps to avoid. At the end of the day, personal development is a measure, a scale, a pointer, you're the user, you have to implement all those points. What you do with it is up to you But it's not a scam. It helps a lot if you are willing to use it to the fullest extent.

My life improved big time since doing personal development Gained social skills (not too much as I'm slow at picking speed) Did shadow work and figured that my childhood trauma was responsible for my emotional issues. I was stuck for many years thinking that there was something wrong with me but wasn't able to figure out exactly what was making me feel empty. When I did personal development and came to the forum, I came across shadow work suggested by some user here and I did that and uncovered the root cause of my emotional issues. That was a breakthrough and it helped to remove that emptiness I felt for years. Helped me get creative with my art work Interacting with others made me realize how far behind I was in terms of personal growth and that became the drive to work harder on myself. I was stuck in an abusive relationship for 3 years not realizing why I was not leaving. There was nobody in my family I could talk to because nobody would pay attention to my issues. Coming here and getting feedback from people made me aware that the relationship will cause me more harm so I eventually broke up. I did not have the awareness of how damaging the relationship would have been if people didn't tell me their own stories and struggles. I left that relationship and since then I found a lot of mental peace. Otherwise I would have ended up in a hospital. It helped me regain confidence that I can work on myself and still look forward to a happy future despite my past. Seeing people in similar situations not only gave me hope but also helpful tips and advice to deal with my own situations. Self development helped me in my spiritual growth. Although it's hard to pinpoint what spiritual growth looks like it is something up to the experiencer to decide what level of growth they are achieving Before coming to the forum I was not a vegan. I changed my habits and adopted stage Green values. I was already a mix of blue and green but the forum and resources on Spiral Dynamics gave me a framework to focus on and helped me to quickly adapt to Stage Green values and systems. Self development taught me the importance of self care which I lack miserably. My English skills improved My communication and articulation improved, although not so much, since I tend to grow slowly, but Its miles away from what my communication was back in 2018. Huge progress in comparison Self development taught me people skills and handling different kinds of people both offline and online which I really sucked at because of my terrible social anxiety. Now it's manageable although I don't feel fully confident, I came a long way from who I was in 2017/2018. Yea self development did not change my life radically but slowly. Yet without it I probably would have killed myself in 2017 out of frustration of not being able to improve or grow.

I found something that satisfies my needs a bit. A chalkboard lol.

Sometimes it all comes down to the habits that we form You are your own energy drain so to speak, but aren’t noticing this yet. Be willing to be aware of self referential thinking, and double negative thinking. Give it a google. Get back to your dream board. Utilize the emotional scale to understand and transcend, or, see through doubt. You’ve a habit of focusing what you don’t want. Not a big deal. Write a long list of it. Then step away, go for a walk. Then come back to it and write the opposite of each thing you wrote. That’s what you do want. Write that on the board.

I found the notepad on my device to be extremely helpful. I will note down all the stuff that I need to do and I can categorize it into folders by dates..

Still i made this list maybe i'll do them: • Learn programming • Read a new philosophy book • Read a book in different genre • Listen to a new podcast • Take a course on something that interests you • Message 10 people randomly and talk about life, interview them • Start a blog or youtube channel • Learn art, design • Do nothing for 24hrs • Make memes

I have decided to use a productivity notebook that will help me jot down certain important tasks and schedules everyday so it can be easier for me to form a habit or pattern. I am using it right now and it's incredibly helpful.

It's hard to stay on track when there are like a million different thoughts going on in your head.

Private journal entries.

I don't know why I keep doing this

I'm going to make bullet points of what I'll be doing next and keep reminding myself about it. It gets harder to maintain a schedule. Maybe talking about productivity will help me.

So this question constantly hovers over my head. Like "what to do next?" And my mind is generally left blank.

@Marcel

@Marcel @Marcel A bear hug

@Marcel When I read your posts that's what happens to me

@Marcel aww. You brought me to tears. With you I feel a sense of hope I never felt in so many years. You're so awesome and I mean it..

@Marcel aww thank you. I like using light effects on them. It's almost like 3D designing. Good morning my Ewige Seele (btw).

Try three things. Mild exercise Steaming the face and nose. Breathe in steam Vitamin D Eating Himalayan salt helps.

Try to work on your addiction one step at a time. Use limited portions of time and observe your behaviours in these portions or durations of time. Try grounding yourself into a steady discipline. This is most likely due to a lack of discipline. Also discipline your mind not just your body. See how it translates into your life. I'm trying to discipline myself but it's hard. Do you have emotional issues? If you do, then try journaling it to get it off your chest. Venting really helps in keeping those emotions away. Be more aware of yourself and how you spend your time. And try to be more calm and relaxed I saw that there is a huge mental difference between a headspace that is stuck in neurosis and depression and a headspace that is feeling loved, calm and happy. The differences are huge and radically shift your mindset and perception to your inner and outer condition. Devote yourself to extreme self care and discipline and most likely this problem of yours might go away.

One way to mend myself. One way to mend myself is to completely stop everything that is self destructive. No more of those games I was playing. No more wasting time on unhealthy habits. No more listening to bad music to cope with the home environment.. Schedule sleep and eating strictly. Last night I didn't eat anything because I felt like I didn't deserve to eat. The emotions of self destruction were quite strong.. I felt sleepy and I slept off and woke up feeling better. Just two days ago she was banging on my door threatening to kill me if I came out. So I stayed in my room and didn't even go out for the whole day, not even use the bathroom. It was very painful. So I kept doing my art to distract my mind and not think about the death threats. Next day morning I went to the kitchen and she followed me. I was panicking very badly because I thought she would attack me again so I picked my bottle of water and immediately ran to my room. It was sheer primal fear. That night I didn't sleep again. The fear was too much. But after doing some art work I feel better. I channeled all the body stress into my art.

A new wave of hope These days I'm thinking there is still some hope in my situation. Even if things get better financially, the emotional part is a challenge I feel like even if she is violent I can handle this somehow. If I don't allow myself to be damaged. If I really find ways and places to be at so she doesn't discover me. She can be a bit stalkerish Last time I stayed away from her at a friend's place she was desperately asking me my address. I kept telling her no.. But she won't have a no for an answer. She even followed me to see where I was exactly going. So I took a bus and went somewhere to throw her off the trail I will have to use little tricks to evade her as much as possible. She is a total sociopath I feel like if she went somewhere things would be so much better.. Sadly that's not an option now. So I'll try to use escape strategies to get away from this psycho bitch

What could i have done in retrospect? I could have taken better care of myself instead of neglecting and abandoning self care which I did for years. I could have done the counter intuitive thing. But instead I did self destructive things like insomnia, playing video games, being in abusive relationships, eating junk food, not taking my medication and constant distraction and crying and self harm. There just wasn't a proper way to deal with the hopelessness I experienced. It was too much negativity in my system Combined with the lack of money made me miserable. I felt like my life was over. I wasn't ever gonna get out of this woman's hold. So I figured my life was useless anyway. I stopped sleeping and ate very little. I lost weight due to hyper stress and I lost memory as well, I mean my memory worsened big time. I was slowly killing myself because I didn't see myself getting free from her problems.. I had seen my dad die because of her mental issues. I felt I was going along the same route.