Liam Johnson
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Posts posted by Liam Johnson
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@Rob06 Thank you! Yeah it's great how much impact the course has had on my approach to music so far and I'm also on the values section at the moment. It's always pleasing to meet a fellow music lover
So far, my plan is to focus on creating new music and content for my YouTube channel. I also do some teaching and function gigs on the side. But it would be really amazing to share everything I've learned so far on my self-actualization journey in some way
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Entry 322 | Coming Out
Theory: When you've been lying to people for years about yourself, telling the truth at long last will provide you with deeper fulfilment than you currently live.
Applying it: If you have been keeping a secret about yourself from everybody, bite the bullet and confess the truth. Once you realise that it's not going to harm anyone, you can appreciate the authenticity of your actions and be happy with the person you are.
Me and my boyfriend made it Facebook official today after several months of being together. The relationship has gone from strength to strength since we first met in June. And although a cynical viewpoint could be taken when it comes to announcing our relationship on Facebook, we definitely weren't doing it for the attention nor the gossip. For us both, it was about one thing: confessing the truth. The truth that we have both been suppressing for many years from those we love.
We were both incredibly nervous about doing it to the point of shaking. But having done it, we both feel so much more relieved and authentically ourselves. Both of us had grown up in a time where being gay/bi was still not as widely accepted as it is these days. Some people religiously detested it and others just wanted to be cruel towards people based on their sexuality. As we've grown older, we both realise that not only has tolerance of sexuality increased in our culture but we also don't need to hide what we are anymore from others.
Sure it might ruffle some feathers and put the cat among the pigeons by telling those dearest to us about our situation. And sure enough, we might have to face rejection from certain other people who just can't tolerate it. But the empowering feeling that comes from declaring my best kept secret from the world has left me feeling confident in who I am in a whole new way. It doesn't matter at all what others believe about me or my partner. We're untouchable now. We proved to ourselves that we can be happy with who we are, not who we tell ourselves to be.
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Entry 321 | My Desire To Be Independent
My commitment levels need to be examined and addressed. There's no way that I'm giving up on this journey but it seems like my sense of direction has gotten muddled recently. My vision is less clear than it once was. More to do with the fact that I believe there is a lot more to it than what it was initially. 2018 is the year that I would like to establish a truly independent lifestyle. Moving away from home and into a house with my boyfriend is my goal. Most importantly, it's the desire to move out of the pretty dead town of Ollerton and into the gorgeous city of Sheffield.
Something is telling me that my music career will succeed much better in Sheffield than it ever could here in Ollerton. There's plenty of venues to wander into and ask for gigs. There's the bustling streets to have a go at busking. But what's going to inspire me most is my living situation. I've found a gem of a partner to be with who is just as passionate about music (even my music) as I am. Moving away from home is going to be difficult but recently I've felt like it's holding me back. It's too comfortable and I can't truly feel myself with my parents.
Although my income situation isn't the best, I've got enough savings from university bursaries to make this work for at least a year or two. It really isn't about earning lots of money with me though. Sure it'd be nice to provide value for people that attracts large sums of money but it's not the goal with me. For the time being, I only want to earn enough money to afford to live. Then once I can prove to myself that this is possible, I'll be able to grow.
Perhaps the reason why I have gotten off-track is because I've gotten accustomed to being comfortable, which is a real danger. There's no real need to earn money living with my parents. It's much easier to indulge in pleasurable activities with my boyfriend than it would be to help each other grow. I must remember not to beat myself up about these things to the point that I can't even enjoy those moments. But I need to have the understanding that much greater things are over the horizon. I need to remember to delay gratification and feel the discomfort now in order to feel the fulfilment later.
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@Benjamin Jackson Yep, there's the Upper Limit Problem that Gay Hendricks describes in his book The Big Leap. He explains that we all have happiness thermostats as part of our psyches and if our happiness levels get too high, we subconsciously try to lower them again to a comfortable level that we have gotten used to. Living happy all of the time is a radical act but is possible
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Entry 320 | Reflection
In a nutshell, 2018 has been a turbulent year so far for me. But I'm getting to the bottom of it. Only a few days ago, I discovered that one of the major things holding me back (which has been there for a long time) is being humiliated. There is a part of me that would hate to be humiliated for showing up as my authentic self. It's a vulnerable place to be in when you try to live authentically. You literally open up your soul to the world. And there's every possibility that you are going to show up in an embarrassing way.
But it shouldn't really matter as much. Because the more I can feel comfortable about being authentically who I am, the more joyful life is going to be. Sometimes, it feels like this journey is so much nearer the beginning than it is the end. That's the point, right? But constantly feeling like I'm at the beginning can impede my progress in creating the things I want to create. After posting several YouTube videos of my latest compositions, my ideas are starting to feel less plentiful. The call to produce something greater is there. It's just about whether I feel willing enough to be vulnerable and go for it.
Things are slowly coming together on a material level though. I've been invited to perform for festivals and charity events that are likely to receive a big crowd. Ideas are forming about where to get money in future. New bands and performing opportunities are presenting themselves to me. There's so much to be excited about. And yet there's still that constant worry of money. Will I ever have a steady income? Will I ever be broke? This is one of the fears that gets in my way. This is where the self-actualization work needs to be focused.
Came away from a pretty charged day today after many days of not living up to my full potential. Had some amazing lessons with my pupils, lifted heavier weights at the gym, ate lots of healthy tasty food, and came up with an arrangement of the Wallace And Gromit theme tune for the guitalele. I feel pretty content with how things are at the moment. My worries for the future are pretty huge though and need to be faced eventually.
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Entry 319 | Live Your Passion In Different Ways
Theory: Even if your passion in life might seem specific, you'll find that you can explore it in plenty of depth and find new ways of living it.
Applying it: Try not to place yourself in one pigeon-hole as a "Fingerstyle guitarist," "minimalist artist," "pure mathematician," etc. Use the skills that you have acquired from these things to apply them in a whole new domain.
It's been a while since I caught up with any music students from university. But today, I drove up to my best friend at uni to have a jam. He told me that he had recently joined a gypsy jazz band and asked if I would be interested. Me and him probably knew as much about gypsy jazz as we did about rhinoceros psychology but we both gave it a go. It was such a fun experience in the end! We were able to utilise our skills in a completely different playing situation. He finally got to use his double bass and I had a blast at some soloing, Django Reinhardt style.
It's kinda put me on a high. Maybe it's the fact that I've missed his company and met his bandmates but it's also to do with the fact that I feel like I've improved even further as a player. My soloing skills were actually pretty tasteful to listen back to. I didn't feel the need to shred some fast scales in order to show that I could shred. And also because it's jazz, it's not easy to solo over constantly changing chord progressions like that. This is ultimately why I love music so much. Learning new pieces in new genres with new people.
It's a healthy reminder that even after so many years of playing music, there's always plenty more to explore. In fact, it's like science and mathematics in that once you understand one thing, then it raises possibilities to twenty other things. And also, this experience has reminded me that I should never be in this for the success, fame or money. I genuinely love performing music, both on my own and with other people. It's one of the biggest jobs in my life. And when I move back to Sheffield for good, maybe I'll feel more inclined to rekindle those friendships I made with other musicians.
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Entry 318 | Oldest Lessons Learnt
Theory: Just because you learned a lesson a long time ago doesn't mean that you are going to remember it for the rest of your life.
Applying it: Remember the nuggets of wisdom that came to you years ago. They may be able to help you in the now.
Once upon a time, I journaled. Then I didn't journal. And now I'm journaling. The End.
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Nah not really!
Yesterday was a bit of a strange one. You'd think after all this time of doing self-actualization work that the things you've learned would stay learnt. But nope. I spent quite a lot of time in self-indulgence before it came to my first gig of the year. It was a student social back at Sheffield University. And when I thought I was arriving at the correct time, it turned out that I arrived 2 hours early. With no phone on me (because it's still broke and under contract), I had to make the decision to stay or go. After 1hr 30mins of searching frantically around the different venues in Sheffield thinking that there might have been a mistake, I tired myself out and went home.
And then I discovered that the event was at 9:30pm not 7:30pm. Well shit! That certainly put me in a bad mood. There's something about music performance that evokes lots of energy. The nerves and excitement build up right until you perform the first note and release it all through your medium. But instead of channeling that energy through a performance, I had to let it extinguish itself the hard way. I came home feeling hopeless, drained, ashamed, gutted.
I called my boyfriend to discuss things over and he allowed me the space and the coaching to help me realise the root cause of my suffering. And as we sat in silence for a few moments, I slowly remembered one of the most powerful nuggets of wisdom that I discovered last year at university. Not to fix the feeling, not to avoid or resist the feeling, but to allow the feeling.
To remember that all emotions are neutral. The only thing that makes a feeling negative is through avoidance, resistance and reaction. And so I sat and just allowed those emotions to be as they are, without trying to fix anything. And sure enough, the pain and discomfort was there. But as awareness levels increased, the emotion started to convert into joy. And I ended up laughing and loving the present moment even more. It helped me to accept what had happened, embrace what is happening and be positive about what is left to come.
This isn't the first experience like this I've discovered. They were really frequent last year. Maybe the older journal entries go into detail about them. But it's a wonderful technique that works wonders. And it's one that I need to remember in future.
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Entry 317 | More On The Upper Limit Problem
Theory: Subconsciously, the mind will want to sabotage any elevated feelings of joy that you feel.
Applying it: Notice the behaviours that follow after prolonged periods of joy. Ask yourself "are these actions diluting the amount of joy that I'm feeling?" Once you become aware of them, you can start to learn from and deal with these behaviours from a loving place.
I've been awful quiet recently. Can't really give much of an excuse for the weekdays. But last weekend, I had such a joyful time with my boyfriend. We hadn't seen each other in about a month and I wanted to spend as much time as possible with him to catch up. We watched "Coco," which was a beautiful, emotional film that hit home for me (guitar player, y'know!). And it felt real difficult to have to leave that joyful environment to come back home. Well, at least that's how this morning went.
The behaviours that I've done in the last 24 hours have been a result of the Upper Limit Problem. I stayed up too late last night watching YouTube videos and generally did very little throughout the day. But the reason why I don't feel like beating myself up is that I can see that this is the Upper Limit Problem working subconsciously. After a beautiful weekend, my subconscious mind has been trying to bring my joy levels back to a more comfortable range.
Being mindful of this through the day has helped me to keep making the right decisions, especially in terms of snacking on food. So many times, the thought of eating some chocolate chip cookies occurs in my mind but reminding myself of the Upper Limit Problem keeps me in check. Also, visualising my boyfriend encouraging me to make the better choice has helped too. And so I can forgive my actions and learn from them now. No need to guilt trip myself like I often do.
The good things I've done today have been very good indeed. That's all that matters to me right now.
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Entry 316 | Resistance As Usual
Theory: For every time life hands you a huge opportunity for growth, resistance will always have to be defeated first.
Applying it: Force yourself to do what is right for the long-term even when you feel like you don't want to.
Hehe, it's been a while hasn't it? So having made that huge breakthrough on Tuesday with my values, resistance has fooled me once again. The ego is still wanting me to quit after all this time. But when the excuses sound logical and convincing, that's when you have to double down on the progress that you've made. Admittedly, I haven't totally quit everything for the last few days. Mainly the journaling and the course videos (probably to give my subconscious mind a break to process the new information).
Sure resistance may have had its victory over the last few days in that regard but there is no way that it's going to become a reason to quit. As the resistance becomes stronger and stronger, I'm getting tougher and tougher with every time I manage to overcome it. It's like that video game boss who just keeps getting back up time and time again to kick your arse.
It's certainly not felt like the easiest year so far. As I start to get back on track with one habit, it's like something else gives way to accommodate it. I've had to stop reading books for a while to accommodate the course. My music work has started to take over the self-actualization work that I do. Perhaps I'm still finding the perfect balance for everything yet. Things just seem really overwhelming at the moment. And that's the resistance. Opportunities for growth are coming at me more and more nowadays. It's just a matter of whether I can be accepting of them instead of resisting them.
Bit of a naff entry probs! But as with resistance, I felt like something needed to go in this space. Just sitting down and working through it proves to myself that quitting is never going to be an option. Not today.
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Entry 315 | Had Another Paradigm Shift
So I've just completed another task of the Life Purpose Course and was reminded in a shocking revelation why buying this course would be a good idea. There's a whole "chapter" on discovering your top values in life. Within the first few tasks, I was convinced that of the ten values on the list, my top value was excellence. It made so much sense. Without excellence, I would not have been able to experience the life of a musician in this way. My pursuit of being an excellent guitarist has lead me to some of the most memorable moments of my life. I seriously love what I do!
Just a moment ago, I completed the 8th task in the chapter. This one had you visualise two different lifestyles in such a way that you could decide which value is most important. This was a pretty lengthy task and the first two days I did the list, it seemed like a foregone conclusion. Excellence had to be my number 1 value, that much felt certain... Except, it wasn't. Excellence came in as my second most important value. Wanna guess at what value might have appeared at the most important?
Suffice to say that I'm utterly shocked. It does honestly feel like a paradigm shift in terms of what implications it has had on my life up until this point. Having pursuing excellence for so long, I've failed to realise that for so many years there has always been something underpinning everything in my life so far. A life with lots of excellence and little of this value would honestly be less fulfilling to me. Even if I had very little excellence and an abundance of this value, I would die fulfilled. There's only one word I can use to sum up this value and that is joy.
Not just the dictionary definition of joy, but joy in my own terms. A life without resistance or self-doubt. A life whereby everything feels so alive and beautiful. A life where every problem is not an obstacle but a challenge, knowing that there is no problem I cannot solve.
That is the exact feeling I get from playing the guitar and it's the exact feeling that I have been addicted to for so many years. I got it all so fantastically wrong! I don't enjoy playing the guitar because I'm excellent at it. It's always been because I feel so joyful with it! Hell it had to be because if it were the former, then I'd have chucked the guitar away years ago as a beginner because of my lacking ability to play a tune.
And so, on the journey I'll keep on going. With what I've discovered today, there's a whole life to live where joy is my top priority above excellence.
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Entry 314 | Embodying The Authentic Self
Theory: You can be absolutely great at what you do and never stand out in your field of work. The only way you can is if you embody your authentic self.
Applying it: Search within yourself to find the authentic quirks that you possess. Then be brave and amplify those quirks in your field of work.
As a kid growing up in the late 90s and early 00s, one of my first passions was wrestling and fighting. Although we never had Sky TV at home to watch WWF Attitude back in its heyday, I remember owning videos of some of the pay-per-views around that time and I loved the shit out of them. It resonated with me at such a young age that I then went on to take karate lessons long before my first music lesson until I got my first black belt at around 10/11 years old. Around that time, my passion with music started to bloom which led me to this day.
This information is important to me in searching for my authentic self. I knew that there was something about WWF (now WWE) that attracted me to it but the reason was never clear. Thanks to YouTube, I've been able to rewatch some awesome clips from that era to realise what I missed out on as a kid and also to learn about what drew me to it in the first place. In summary, it felt incredibly pure and authentic. There were exciting matches and stunts, excellent characters to become invested in, men and women kicking each others arses, and some of the best insults and profanity ever. It was completely unapologetic about its flaws and delivered content with great confidence.
I watched some wrestlers on YouTube talking about what makes a successful "character" that stands out from all the rest and it boils down to the same thing: self-expression and authenticity. Specifically, to discover your own unique character traits and quirks and amplify them up to eleven. Of course, I'm no wrestler. But I am a performer. And in terms of making a profit from providing entertainment, this advice is what I need to be listening to. I need to completely embody and amplify my authentic self in order to stand out. I've got the skills. All that's missing is the "character."
And I'm starting to explore that already. For example, the way I dressed today was a bit of an experiment to step into something more authentically me: baseball jersey over a longline tee, light denim jeans, blue Adidas shoes and a grey cap to top it off. Not many people seem to dress like that where I'm from. Maybe it's a stupid look! But to me, there's just something pulling me towards that style. It's something I'm continuing to explore along with many other quirks that are mine as I discover them.
These days, people can tell when you're being a phoney and inauthentic. That's why authenticity, no matter what shape or form, is the way to go.
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Entry 313 | This Is the Rhythm of the Day
Theory: As you begin to implement new routines and habits from the beginning of the day, you gain momentum which helps you reach flow states of creativity. When it gets interrupted, however, you lose that momentum. This puts you off for the day.
Applying it: Don't get frustrated when you get interrupted and lose momentum. Although it may seem difficult to get back on track for the time being, the worst thing you can do is to quit.
This is something I've become incredibly used to living with my parents. The interruptions are very consistent. And because it's the nature of my parents, I could get angry about that and stop caring any more about trying. But I don't. Instead, I've come to realise that there are ways I can prevent such interruptions. Even though things sometimes seem out of your control, prevention measures can be put in place to minimise interruptions during the day. And it's really important to do that when you're trying to embody the lifestyle that you want.
Today was another recording day for me. I was planning to record a Michael Hedges piece for YouTube but unfortunately the only take that was good enough happened when the camera battery died. The underlying reason was that I had been completely thrown off my stride at the beginning of the day. My dad needed me to drive him to a fitness class during the day and during the trip I had a pretty darn unhealthy lunch. (I think it's so annoying food places these days have absolutely nothing healthy). All of these things completely ruined my flow because I didn't plan for them and I suffered later because of it.
It could be argued that my lack of practice with this particular piece was the cause, along with my inability to recharge the battery. But I could have done both of those things this afternoon. Instead, what did I do? Literally can't remember. That's how brainless and unconscious I was. That was the result of eating a big portion of pizza for my lunch. Every part of my psyche hated being myself having to digest that shit. It was tasty shit though! But it's little things like that which take chunks out of your momentum and eventually lead you to screw up when it matters.
But one thing is for sure: we can wake up every morning and start the day afresh. And that's exactly what tomorrow will be.
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Entry 312 | Back To Creating
Theory: Sometimes, it's too easy to believe you're making progress based on the passive action that you've took. But the indicator of growth is the amount of massive action that you take instead.
Applying it: By all means feel free to learn as much as you want about how to do something. But never prioritise it over actually doing the thing that you want to be doing.
Listening to Brooke Castillo's podcast again today reminded me of this important distinction between passive action and massive action. She has a "best of" episode which is 1hr 30mins long that serves as a montage of her best bits of advice from several years of running the podcast. If you like Leo's direct approach to self-actualization, then you're probably gonna resonate with her too. But here's the distinction:
Passive action: learning about a topic, reading books, going to classes, attending seminars, talk to people about a topic.
Massive action: "taking action until you get the result you want."
The main difference here can be summarised into two opposing words: consumption, creation. I've found that so long as you are doing one thing, you can't be doing another. And the way you determine someones growth is not by how much they have consumed but by how much they have created.
This wisdom stayed with me today as I went on to create three separate recordings each for different things. There was the usual video recording that I do, there was a talky informative video that I recorded about how to transition from electric guitar to acoustic guitar (trying out something new), and also some background music to accompany these videos (which is just a bit of a jam). That's all on top of meditation and working out at the gym. Sure it means I missed out on doing some work with the Life Purpose Course but it's not like it was sacrificed for something worse.
Speaking of creating the new talky video, I felt very nervous about delivering it. Would it sound good? Would I communicate my advice well? Would it be boring? There were a few anxieties about these things but having heard Brooke's advice on another matter, I did it anyway. And damn it felt good. This thing that I had been putting off for a good few months was finally getting started. And this is ultimately why I started doing my stuff with YouTube in the first place. It's not just pieces and performances that I have to offer. It's little bits of wisdom that I can maybe impart to other musicians and guitarists.
After a day of lots of creation and little consumption, it feels like time well spent.
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@Ayilton It is, and thank you!
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Entry 311 | The Ultimate Satisfaction
Theory: Living up to your full potential in the day leaves you the ultimate satisfaction of hitting your pillow at night knowing that you couldn't have bossed it any better.
Applying it: Be willing to sacrifice short-term satisfaction for the fulfilment that comes from choosing to act for the long-term.
Sometimes, personal development and self-actualization can sound like a broken record. This little piece of advice is something I've heard time and time again: long-term gains over short-term benefits every time. But I suppose there are lots of different ways of understanding this lesson. The way I've come to understand it over today is to do with eating. It's far easier to snack on something like a snack bar, slice of toast or cereal because they're easy to prepare (if they need preparing at all), they're simple and tasty. They "fill the gap" caused by the hunger.
This is something I've been doing over the last month, perhaps the last few. I'm starting to realise that what would be a much better idea is if I take an hour or two out of the week to prepare some salad dishes, side dishes or other mini dishes that can sit in the fridge for days and be snacked upon in the same way. Sure it's extra preparation with lots more ingredients but in the long run, it will be far more nourishing for my body and it will actually deal with hunger issues much more effectively.
So that's what I ended up doing. Tonight I prepared my breakfast smoothie and did half of the preparation for a lemony kale salad dish with help from The Immune System Recovery Plan. I can tell that already it's going to be so much more beneficial to scoop some salad onto a plate and feast on that when I'm peckish than the current habits I've got going at the moment. It's just little realisations like this that remind you that the piece of advice that you're sick to the back teeth of hearing over and over again aren't to be dismissed. They really do help a great deal.
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Entry 310 | Reflection
It's time to flect and flect once more!
It's been a few days since the last entry because of some personal family business back at home. Don't want to dive into that. Suffice to say that it was unexpected and important but all is well. And when it comes to reflecting on what's been going on the last few weeks, I feel like I already started doing it this afternoon. So let's keep going with that.
I've discovered there are two main addictions that need to be dealt with in order to fully embrace my authentic self: YouTube binging and snacking. Today, I managed to find the root cause of these things and discovered that it was to do with the Ego kicking and screaming for dear life. My newly implemented routine (which is looking to be really promising) threatens my ego's existence. There's so much meditation, exercise, guitar practice and self-actualization happening in the day that what's left of my ego is hanging on for dear life. How does it manage it? Through these addictions.
These are habits that I've been very accustomed to over the majority of my life. And whenever there seems to be a free moment, the ego rushes in with these addictions to fill in the emptiness. It's so successful at it because it likes to use the excuse that "this is who I am." This creates a massive disconnect between the vision I have for my authentic self and my past self. Because my brain has become efficient at choosing the unhealthy food options growing up, it's easily convinced when temptation hits.
I know that just cutting these addictions out completely with no understanding of them would be no good in the long run. That's why I need to keep examining them. Why are they there? Why not some other addiction? Are there any other addictions? When does temptation come? What am I doing when I give in to it? There's so much to unpack there. But ultimately, I know that it's all just a part of me clinging onto the person I was.
But enough about those. Because despite those silly moments of the day, I'm feeling pretty darn fulfilled these days. It really is the best feeling in the world when you go to bed knowing full well that you've done everything you wanted to do in the day. And it's not necessarily about the results. It's about putting the time in. Making the choice to live up to your Higher Self.
And perhaps the most exciting thing of all is that I'm literally becoming one with the guitar. It might have appeared that way for a while now but these are my prime years. Perhaps the prime years are still yet to come. That would be just exciting! But as of right now, the boundary between what I want to play and what I can actually play is breaking down. The music is starting to flow through my fingertips so effortlessly. Making guitar mastery the main pursuit in my life has filled me with such joy recently. Honouring the Muse is what it's all about.
Only a few years ago, my sole motivations for playing the guitar were for approval and fame. Albeit negative motivation, I managed to get those things at university from those things (or at least that's how it felt). And so once that job was out of the way, playing guitar suddenly became pointless within that paradigm. I had gained enough self-confidence to realise that these things aren't satisfying after all. Which is where I had to recommit once more to the path of mastery. A commitment that I've been making this last year. And it feels like it's going to be one of the best choices I ever made.
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@Benjamin Jackson Good point! I've been in both of those places with music practice and can say that both are necessary in balanced amounts. One thing I've found incredibly useful is to separate the music of the mind and the music that comes out through reality. The music that you hear inside versus the music that you hear outside. If you can imagine yourself playing the piece of music correctly on the inside, then it really doesn't matter if you make a mistake performing the music on the outside. The essence of what you intended will still be there. That's the power of imagination!
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Entry 309 | Let's Pretend
Theory: Why wait for the future to come around to live your dreams when you can live them right now?
Applying it: Let the power of pretending work its magic by pretending to be the person you deeply desire to become right now.
Made it to the end of the first week of my newly crafted routine. And damn it feels good! It definitely hasn't been perfect but the majority of it has felt like a joy from start to finish. Just a few hours ago I finished some guitar practice. But it wasn't boring old guitar practice. It felt like just the right moment to put some mood lighting on (a cheap-ass lamp), put on a rockstar costume (pants and a bandana crafted out of my old school tie) and just pretend that I was performing to an audience of hundreds!
Sure it might have looked goofy as hell but it felt awesome and special to me in the moment. It was the result of living my dreams in the most literal sense: pretending. Not to be confused with visualising. The difference being that pretending involves you interacting with the fictitious landscape that you've visualised in your head. It's so much fun! And I'd actually say it's perhaps one of the most overlooked elements of my self-actualization journey, if not the most overlooked.
Back at school and college, I would often pretend that I was this all-knowing, all-out performing guitar player with years of experience and mastery beyond belief. It would usually take the form of me pretending to record a teaching video of all the intricate licks and musical phrases I had been learning. And then when it came to performing, I would always pretend that I was a far better player than I was. Still do! Perhaps it's what allows me to be humble. Because part of me knows that the person who performs is not the same person who washes the dishes. Although, things are changing.
If it weren't for pretending to be a better musician than I was, the amount of growth I had on the instrument would probably have been far less. It was certainly easy to pretend of a better life during school years. But now that life is actually pretty darn good, the need to pretend may have declined. But with bigger dreams and aspirations of an extraordinary future, it might be time to start deliberately pretending more often!
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Entry 308 | Some Things That Needs To Change Right Now
So it's nearly the end of the first week of a full routine of pretending to be a guitar guru and it's been a really great change to make in my life. It still needs refining though as there's a part of me that is resistant to this drastic change, as has been demonstrated by some of the actions I've been doing. So it's time to be honest about all the things that I've been doing that really need to stop. But fortunately, there's not a lot.
First of all, the most important thing that needs to stop is watching YouTube videos. I'm going to put it out there: YouTube is great. Without it, I would have never been able to become the guitar player I am today. Free and instant access to a huge database of videos (old and new) is a wonderful thing to behold. But perhaps I've fallen in love with it a little too much. It mostly interferes with my life in-between the activities I've set out for myself. Like a filler, I end up putting it on to fill the silence on most occasions.
The solution would be to be present with the silence and accept what is happening in the now.
The next one is eating too much of the wrong foods. Again, this happens when I want to avoid sitting there with nothing to do and there's only silence. I end up eating muesli, toast, protein/snack bars (usually whole-food ones) outside of meal times. The justification that I tend to use is that I'm trying to put on weight, which is true. Whilst a healthy weight, I'm a little bit on the lighter side. But I know deep down that this is not the way around it.
The solution would be to increase the size of the portions of breakfast, lunch, and tea times (including only 1 snack in the day) whilst making sure that the protein intake is high and the fat intake is low.
And apart from wanting to call my boyfriend more often, there's not actually a lot that needs to change. I've kept to my word with everything else this week and it feels so fulfilling to be living this way. Even looking in the mirror today, it's like I can just see that twinkle in the eyes that shows how much I'm loving this. Yes it's hard work and unpaid. But it sure does feel awesome to be using my skills and abilities every day to create something meaningful. Not necessarily tangible, but meaningful. And right now, my life is pretty darn meaningful.
Pick of the day:
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Entry 307 | Music And Emotion
Theory: Music is much loved by cultures across the world because of the emotions it can evoke.
Applying it: As a musician/performer/listener, make a conscious effort to become emotionally invested in the music. You can appreciate it on a much deeper level this way.
After 4 hours of guitar practice in the afternoon, the time came to record another performance video for my YouTube channel. After all that practice, I felt confident in my ability to perform without any hiccups. But the reason why things didn't go to plan was because of something unexpected. The piece is called "Waiting For The Good News"and it was written during one of the most difficult times in my life. It was around the time that I felt so low that I had to entertain with the idea of doing self-actualization work, where I was first introduced to Brooke Castillo's podcast.
The first take of the piece was pretty good but still not perfect. But after trying more takes, I started to become very resistant and nervous. Sure, I've had nerves whilst filming my previous videos but none were as prominent as this. I blamed it on the work I did earlier at the gym (it was leg day and standing up to record a video may have felt uneasy). But also, I believe that what also happened was that I started to 'get' the music emotionally. Those emotions that I felt way back when writing the composition seemed to have came straight back the more and more I played it.
Sure enough, this didn't just happen whilst filming. Yesterday when I practiced the piece for a little under 2hrs, I started feeling really sad and emotional. The tears were only just held back. Even typing about this tune is making me feel the same way. Perhaps sorrow is the right word. This piece meant so much to me and it still does. I remember performing this piece in first year to the students in the group who, at the time, had never heard me perform before. And at a time when I was real desperate to just be liked and appreciated by people, they loved it and my wish came true.
Those exact feelings manifested in my mind after performing the piece over and over again. But of course, it's not actually the music that creates the emotion. It's the associated thoughts about the music that create them.
Pick of the day:
(A recording of Waiting For The Good News)
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Entry 306 | Circumstances Vs Thoughts
Theory: Problems don't come from current life circumstances. They come from the way we think about them.
Applying it: Whenever you must deal with a problem, always ask "what am I thinking?"
I didn't manage to journal last night because of another heart-to-heart conversation with my mum. Everything was going really well through the day until it came to sorting out my broken phone. It's on some contract so there's likely to be some financial loopholes to deal with. For some reason, I became stressed and confused about the whole process. But after talking about it, we discovered together that the problem was not dealing with the broken phone. It was dealing with my beliefs of incompetency.
It has felt very true for a long time that without my guitar playing, I'm not a very competent human being. And there's evidence to prove that to be true if I choose to look for it. But on reflection, there are many ways in which I have become more than competent. For example, cooking food. I only started cooking for myself just over a year ago. Now, I know how to prepare tasty, nourishing meals thanks to reading books like The Immune System Recovery Plan. Also there's meditation, teaching, exercising, understanding and awareness.
If I choose to think about my current life circumstances in a positive light, it makes me feel emotionally invested in my ability to create an awesome life here and now. And then from that place, I feel more compelled to give it my all in the work that I've set myself. Because the truth is that competence and incompetence are just labels to describe what is going on in life right now. We are neither of these things. What matters is what we choose to believe that we are.
So it's a new day. Lets continue on the path.
Pick of the day:
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Entry 305 | Repercussions Of Massive Action
Theory: Whenever you decide to make bold changes in your life, be prepared to encounter the persuasion trying to revert you back to how you were.
Applying it: Realise that people can act in very subtle ways (involuntarily) in order to prevent you from making massive changes in your life.
So after two days of the new routine, it still feels empowering. The music is flowing, my muscles are getting a good workout, meditation is as strong as ever... Although (facepalm) I did buy some cookies from Tesco! I decided to make a ritual out of it being the last time I ever buy such junk food. It was serious this time. And I ate them as mindfully as I could knowing full well that I meant it this time. It was like waving goodbye to a past-time that was once a huge part of my life. Now, it's more like a hinderance and so it's getting dropped for good.
Went off on a tangent there!
Despite this routine feeling like one of the best things to happen to me this year (which yes, there's not much to compare it to), it has had some repercussions. Most notably with my boyfriend. He expressed concern for a few days that we would have no time to time to video call in the evening. My routine involves doing self-actualisation and journaling around the same time as we had gotten used to calling each other. This led to him suggesting that I should consider changing my routine to accommodate time to call.
It was an innocent request to say the least but I could understand what was going on at a deeper level. The decision to take massive action in my life had indirectly caused him to feel insecure about the future with me. And if I didn't know any better, I could have just screwed the routine there and then in order to please my boyfriend. But that would mean that my attempts to grow myself would have been snuffed out before they even started.
But ultimately, I don't feel negatively towards him. Not even a little bit. This is, after all, what happens when you decide to make massive changes in your life: people unknowingly try to revert you back to the person they know you to be. If you've ate chocolate your whole life and then decide to give it up, people who've known you for a long time may try to reason with you to give in to temptation. "Just have a little bit." "It won't do any harm." "This isn't you." But they don't intentionally mean it. And I've almost definitely done that to people in the past myself. It's a natural reaction to change: resistance.
We talked it over anyway and are both on the same level of understanding now. I told him that I'm not going to sacrifice our call times completely but they're going to be more prone to change from now on. I'm glad it happened though. It serves as a reminder that no matter how much of a positive change you try to make in your life, your mind will always be tempted to revert back to a place of comfort. Especially from the people you love the most.
Pick of the day:
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Entry 304 | First Day Of A New Routine
Theory: The first day of a new routine is always the easiest. It feels the best. The hard part is to maintain the routine long enough for you to reap the long-term rewards from it.
Applying it: Don't be so disappointed when your routine starts to feel like a grind. Keep faithful that it will eventually lead you to create the long-term lifestyle that you seek.
This one is very much a reminder to my future self. Today was the start of a new routine that I devised for myself a few days ago. It was created with my long-term vision in mind. Imagining how a guitar guru, with 50+ years of experience, would go about his day was the basis for this routine. And what can I say? The first day has gone ridiculously well. It feels incredibly fulfilling even though I'm knackered. The pacing of the day was near perfection. In short, it consists of breakfast, meditation, exercising, lunch, guitar practice, tea/dinner, "artist development" work (or 'grunt work'), self-actualization, journaling and bed.
The timing of each activity was almost bang on. Having 4 hours of consecutive guitar practice every day fills me with so much joy and faith that only good things are going to come from it. My evenings are going to be the hardest part of the day because my mind will automatically want to revert to rest. But in order to get everything done that I would love to be done, it's gonna have to be a final goodbye to recreational YouTube viewing and video game playing. I've set it up so that every Sunday is a day off though, so it's not gonna be all work and no play.
But as wonderful as today has gone, I know from previous experience that there's every possibility that the next few days, weeks and months of this routine are going to be difficult. This is a way of life, not a novelty. It's going to feel tough at times. But if I can just recapture the vision in my mind's eye, then I can regain faith that things will all work out in the end. As I envision the guitar guru sat meditating by the window of his workshop, I'm reminded that perhaps this will be the person I become. Perhaps not. But optimism is the most constructive attitude to cultivate at the moment.
So dream on.
Pick of the day:
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Entry 303 | Selfish Mediocrity
Theory: A life of pampering yourself is likely to turn out mediocre in the end.
Applying it: Remember in the power and promise of delayed gratification. Be willing to put yourself through discomfort now in order to reap the greater, nobler rewards later.
First of all, there's absolutely nothing wrong with mediocrity. It's pretty darn awesome compared to what life could have looked like in another time or another country. But personally, there's a drive within me that strives for more. It's not necessarily a drive that I've cultivated myself. It just seems to have manifested within me. But it's a drive to make the most out of life and to explore it in as much depth as possible. Reaching the highest levels of guitar mastery possible, being healthy and fit, exploring different places, learning and understanding the world are what makes my life extraordinary.
At least, this happens at times. It's not permanent. There's still plenty of mundane work to be had. But I think that's the trouble. In this culture, we seem to be influenced to think that we are somehow above doing ordinary, mundane tasks. Why wash the dishes when there's a machine that can do it for you? Why cook a meal from scratch when you could just order a takeaway? Why walk to work when you could just grab an Uber? These are the ideas that we have been fed with. But for anyone who is serious about personal development (which not everybody is), these ideas prevent growth of any kind.
Why spend an hour doing meditation when I could just watch an episode of Doctor Who? Why read a book for an hour when I could just lie on the bed and play video games? These thoughts have crossed my mind a good few times whenever it ever came to actually doing the work. And these kinds of thoughts are prevalent in society today. But ultimately, these are common beliefs. And as a result, they lead to common lives. If you truly desire a more diverse existence than you already have, then you have to drop these beliefs like a sack of spuds. They're only gonna weigh you down.
Pick of the day:
in Self-Actualization Journals
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Entry 323 | It's Snowing... Whoopee-fricken-doo
Theory: If you're lazy about doing your job, you'll find any excuse to weasel out of it. Even more so if you live in the UK and it snows.
Applying it: If you feel the need to excuse yourself from your work, get in touch with your intuition and figure out whether you are avoiding your job or if you legitimately cannot do it. In nearly all cases, it's going to be the former.
What's happening in the UK today? The news has been whining like a little bitch about a bit of snow on the ground. And a lot of other important things but none more important than a little bit of snow on the ground. The news want to put the fear of God into everybody in the country because there's a bit of snow on the ground. The cars on the road dare go no faster than 30mph because there's a bit of snow on the ground. And there's snow on the ground. Snow. SNOW. SNOW!!!!
So there's the broad strokes about what the UK is looking like right now. If it weren't for the fact that the snow in our area isn't even an inch thick, I might believe that the news is giving me something to worry about. More than that, if I hated my job, it might give me an excuse to not go to it. Or an excuse to not go to the gym. "Don't drive, it's not safe" is pretty much what they are saying. But I did it anyway. Might have skidded a bit but it wasn't anything that bad. I managed to do my job and go to the gym without being a sucker for the worries that the news wants to throw at me.
My intuition tells me that despite the commotion on TV, there's nothing to worry about whatsoever. There are countries in the world far worse off than petty old Britain is when it comes to snow on the ground. And the work I do that involves me braving the weather (today was gym and guitar tutoring) has become almost sacred to me. I do the work because it's deeply fulfilling. And there is no amount of weather in England that's ever going to stop me from doing what I love.
So my message for all UK residents: keep chill. Don't listen to the news. Use your own judgment and intuition without having anyone put thoughts in your head. It really isn't all that bad.
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