Journey to Self Actualisation

[UpperMaster]

There are a few things I want to record in the journal today.

Firstly, I talked about my mushroom trip with my therapist. I explained to her the existential part of it. In the beginning when I confessed I've taken psychedelics, she wasn't too judgmental, she communicated her skepticism around psychedelic substances and how it leads people to make "truth" claims. In her view, we can't know what "objective" truth is. 

Anyway, then I explained to her my experience, I told her about the peak existential part of my trip. I told her the feeling of disgust I felt after retracting from the feeling of love. I told her how I felt bad about the idea of being created, how now I felt as if survival was a burden. 

She responded by connecting it to the challenge of becoming your own person,  of forming a separate identity. She explained that it’s similar to what happens when someone grows up without strong personal boundaries, often remaining emotionally enmeshed with their parents. Many adults never truly separate from their mothers or fathers and end up living according to their family’s expectations and norms. It’s safe and familiar, so they cling to it. But when they marry or have kids, they’re suddenly forced to define themselves, and that’s when they need help. That’s often when they come to therapy.

She said what I’m feeling, the discomfort, the destabilization  mirrors that same struggle. It’s the pain of becoming sovereign. When you lose something profound, like that sense of unity or love, and realize you can’t get it back, it creates space for depression.

She encouraged me to reframe the experience: life isn’t a burden, but a chance. A chance to survive in my own form. It’s tough. Being a separate, sovereign self is hard. But it’s also an opportunity. And that’s how I need to move forward.

 

Secondly. I want to discuss Learned Helplessness. 

Over the past few years, especially after starting high-school I started getting worse academically and every other area in life. I started getting a sort of learned helplessness. 

Before when I had to meet a deadline or pass a test, I would sit down, grind it out without taking any breaks, Taking a 100 percent shot was worth it and easy to justify. 

Now thats not the case, and its only become increasingly apparent as I've fixed a lot of my sleep and focus issues (so the learned helplessness is the main thing that I suspect that it bringing me down). 

Nowadays, if I have a test or anything, I just rather not try, because I've failed so many times before. I really suspect that this is causing me to not give it my all when working towards my goals and exams. 

To clarify and confirm my learned helplessness I asked ChatGPT to diagnose it for me. This is its response:

You don’t have pure learned helplessness (which would look like all 4s and 5s), but what you are carrying is:

Quote

 

⚠️ Learned Futility Syndrome

You try, but expect disappointment.

You plan, but doubt success.

You keep going, but emotionally brace for failure.

You’re not hopeless — just exhausted from hoping and getting hit.

This is a learned mental shield, formed because life (especially school + expectations) made effort feel unrewarded or punished

 

It described my condition perfectly. 

 

Now that I know this, I aim to remind myself and keep myself aware about this learned helplessness. I hope that awareness is curative here, and I can take steps to move forward with my life.

 

[UpperMaster]

My grandfather passed away. I just experienced my first funeral. My grandfather was one of the biggest reasons I started doing philosophy. He was the biggest reason I now find value in what Leo teaches. 

I love you Gramps. You changed my life. I am so grateful to have had you in my life. You lived life more consciously and intelligently then most. 

 

May you rest in peace.

Edited May 24 by UpperMaster

[UpperMaster]

I have a tendency to do things slowly. I rarely ever complete tasks on time. I'm always late to things. I've discussed speed before but actualizing faster work speeds have still been challenging. 

A good trick for this may be to do things before I think it's the perfect time. So basically to do things earlier than I believe necessary. 

I came up with this when I realized that I almost always sleep too late which is problematic, as sleeping too late also means I miss the time window where I sleep the fastest. As a solution, I realized it's best to go to bed even before my scheduled "sleep time", I go to bed even before the tiredness hits. 

 

Maybe this trick will help with procrastination of other kinds too.

[UpperMaster]

If I slept well as a teen I would have been taller and much better looking. Maybe even smarter. Now Im short and fat.

I wanna kill myself Im so unsuccessful. 

[UpperMaster]

An idea for life purpose might be to create the ultimate education system. 

 

I think today's education system isn't the best. Specifically I think that it should incorporate teaching through practice. What I mean by "teaching through practice", is that a subject is thought while doing it. You learn the laws of physics while observing it. You understand chemistry as you do it. Modern education does incorporate this for sure, but much less than I think is ideal. 

Epistemology should be thought. I actually had Theory of Knowledge and epistemology in highschool as a mandatory subject as part of the IB system. It's a great subject, but I don't think anyone got out of that class with an understanding of why it is even important to understand the Theory of Knowledge. By everyone, this subject was disregarded as an extra bs school mandatory thing. 

I think execution was poor. I don't think many teachers questioned these things enough themselves. 

My grandfather was like a one in many type of guy. He unlike other people was awarded a scholarship education due to his abilities, and studied engineering, which in those days was something super special. An education completely separated him from the pack. An education gave him new perspectives and opportunities, and as a result he lived his life super differently, and the family took an alternate direction. 

What if I can help provide people with an education that will enrich their life to the same effect (or even better effect). How good would that feel? How much better would the world be?

Not only that, I see an opportunity here with AI. Maybe I can leverage it to build a school. Where students learn to live life to the fullest. 

Edited June 6 by UpperMaster

[UpperMaster]

I have crippling self doubt. I feel so unsure of myself. How will I ever actualize, I don't want to keep failing. I am moving too slow. How will I get a good girl. I'm scared. 

My sleep hasn't been good lately. 

 

My motivation is just to do whatever it takes, pay whatever price I need to pay, so that I can live the best life possible.

Edited June 7 by UpperMaster

[UpperMaster]

I went on the insomnia sub reddit. I feel validated. People do feel suicidal from less sleep. Through-out highschool I had no sleep and my parents told me that I was being a wuss. i barley felt alive.

[UpperMaster]

I just realized, that no way am I gonna be able to work a 9-5 with a sleep issue. 

I'm done not treating this as a condition. Its been improving for some time. But I cant go to all my classes for example, because it would fuck up my sleep and that would fuck shit up for me. 

But now I realize that that would remove any possible jobs for me with strict time schedule. I probably need to start my own business. Noway Im living the life I did in highschool.

[UpperMaster]

Sleep problem started because of myself when I was a kid I'd be on my phone every night. 

[UpperMaster]

A lot of people have it significantly worse than me. 

But I genuinely feel suicidal. I have such high standards and aspirations it physically hurts how I am not even close. Now it's like will I ever get there?

I hate myself. I don't want to hate myself. But I can't let go of my standards. I never will.

Edited June 17 by UpperMaster

[UpperMaster]

One true intuition that I feel is super real is that all of life is just side quests and that the main plot is to figure out what this is. 

Everything else I do is just distraction. I remember having this intuition several times through-out my life. 

[UpperMaster]

My insomnia has come back. So many years to get better just for it to come back. Fuck this. 
my hair will fall again. Do much I did to reverse it and it worked.

but fuck now I’m cooked. I don’t want to go through it all again.

 

maybe this time will be easier but I seriously feel like killing myself

[UpperMaster]

Fuck perfection.Fuck greatness.

Edited July 10 by UpperMaster

[UpperMaster]

Last message was just me crashing out. I'm so ambitious it hurts, I want to be great, I will be great, but that high standard hurts when your not close to it.

It's been a month since I properly journaled. A lot has happened. Some I am excited to share here because it is a very important journey in my development. 

Firstly, I just want to say that I've passed all my exams for the second semester and am going to the second year which is great. I have one more mathematics exam to clear. If I clear the math exam I won't be carrying any subjects from year one to year two.

Secondly, at my therapist session, I've uncovered and started to recognize the abusive parts of my relationship with my parents. I have great parents, they are good people, but some bad things they've done had incredible psychological impact on me. 

This was something that my subconconsious did not want to look at, but when I eventually did look at it, it was devastating. 

I can to the therapist complaining that I have an inferiority complex and a sense of very strong self-hatred. She suspected that the root cause was something else and we looked at my relationship with my parents.

I won't elaborate too much, but to whoever reading, if you have inferiority complex, or emotional issues in your life, the root cause could be something or partially in denial about. Go to a therapist. There is no simple fix. Root causes can be incredibly complex. 

Processing through my trauma is something I have to do going forward.

I've also looked at my own behavior towards my younger brother, some of which was abusive. I am making sure that mistakes I have done, or mistakes my parents have done to me isn't repeated with my younger brother or my children.

I think the past two weeks have completely changed the way at which I will orient my life. 

A lot of my pain has been validated, and I am starting to love myself.

 

[UpperMaster]

Are you using Truth Seeking as a way to avoid action?

My intuition tells me this: It’s hard to pursue the truth about something when it directly affects your survival, because in those moments, you stop seeing things objectively and start making conclusions that help you cope or explain your choices.

This is something I keep running into. When you’re in survival mode, pragmatism is useful, and even though pragmatism isn’t necessarily about discovering truth, it gets you through tough situations.

In many areas of life such as building a business, dating, and learning new skills,  I catch myself getting stuck trying to “figure out” the truth before acting. For example, with dating, instead of just going out and meeting people, I overthink the whole process, trying to deeply understand how it all works. That can easily become a trap: the more you analyze, the more you might absorb ideas or beliefs that only serve to justify inaction.

I see this same pattern everywhere.

At the end of the day, a healthy dose of pragmatism is necessary. Sometimes, what feels like a search for truth is actually a subtle way of avoiding action.

 

Bonus example in my life:

Sometimes, I look at another persons progress and I make it a "truth seeking exercise" to figure out whether or not he will be more successful than I am. This often just makes me feel bad and prevents me from focusing on my tasks fully. 

In occasion, trying to understand the reality of a situation before committing to an action is necessary. But 9 times out of 10, my intuition tells me  that it becomes an excuse to not do action. 

[UpperMaster]

I am studying for my mathematics exam, but am doing so at a very slow rate. 

I'm honestly panicking, handling the pressure is tough. My friend invited me to volleyball today evening, I ended up shouting at me because he needed a justification for why I am not coming. 

The exam is in a month, so there seems to be a lot of time, but I know that this exam is difficult and I need to use the time effectively in order to pass.

I hate the fact that my friends think I am overreacting when I tell them that I want to work instead of hang out with them. They say that I don't work that much anyway, they laugh that I procrastinate so much anyway, might swell go out and hang.

I hate this because they're right. I do procrastinate at times, but I am trying really fucking hard to change, to work more effectively, to reach my potential. So yes I feel like they're spitting in my face when they insinuate that I am overreacting or not disciplined. 

 

I haven't had much sleep. After my argument with my friend for some reason I've been super stressed. It's like every time I take a break I am proving him right, and that stresses me so much I just end up procrastinating more. 

[UpperMaster]

I leveraged superstitious OCD to make me study mathematics. 

 

I've been studying very hard, 6 hours a day, very intensely for 25 days now. The tactic works. I'm exploiting it. 

I hope I make it. 

 

I haven't journaled here for a while. I want to organize all my thoughts. I want to write here. Just without pressure. Although I studied very hard there's a topic I didn't fully cover yet. I had to chose between just focusing on what I know vs studying this topic (probabilities). I decided to commit to the topic. 

 

I am still empty. I want that "winning in life" feeling. I don't have it yet. I know some people have it. I know some people never feel it. I want to have it. 

I ignore problems temporarily just to get through my studying. I have some hairloss. It started due to poor sleep in the past. No-one in my family went bald early. My hair is falling a bit more now. So much effort to preserve it I am honestly scared. Will it affect my results on women. Can I fix it? Maybe I should just focus more on sleeping better and lifestyle. But Ive tried so much. I forgot how much I tried. You try so much you forget. 

Im so sick and tired of being worried of these disturbances, like hairloss, like the fact that I am not fit...the fact that I have so much work to do in therapy, the fact that I don't know what I want to do, and most of all, I am so worried. Am I even going to make it. 

Is it all just a pipe dream. I want to be successful. So successful. So successful. I want to win in all fronts. Can I even have it all? 

 

Wait I gotta go eat 

 

 

[UpperMaster]

I feel super numb. 

I have contacted a Ramana Maharshi teacher. I am learning about that now. Plan is to finish this math exam, then language exam, then cram Ramana mahrashi for two weeks to I can make the best use of my teacher. I want to spend two weeks getting a good foundation on the theory, so I can turn it into consistent practice and get value from it over time. 

 

In addition, I need to learn another language as I am going on an exchange program. And while doing all the things I just said, I need to also go to the gym. I am out of shape. I really want to find a girl now. Long overdue. I feel so empty, I feel like I should be doing these things. 

 

What's really fucked for me is that I have been on this path for so long. The path to self development. But it seems like I keep taking step forward and two steps backward. Ironically, I have problems with women, whereas most people that don't have such a bias towards self-development have girlfriends and seem to be reasonably fulfilled. 

 

Im just venting. To be fair, I've had to deal with other struggles along the way that other "normal" people didn't; have. But I guess they had struggles I probably don't have too. I'm not sure. 

I'll be honest I just want to keep writing. I don't want to stop. It's giving me some closure. I'm not particularly sad but not happy, like numb. I want to feel something, with depth. Maybe it's just the exam season talking. It's constantly exam season. I need to pass this exam, so I can climb out of this situation . 

I want a women in my life, that I really like and a women that really likes me. It's really bothering me now and I am embarrassed by the situation I am in.  

 

I just hope that this journal is beautiful in retrospect. If and when I become successful I can imagine reading these paragraphs and feeling pride. 

But we're not completely there yet. We've made progress but there's so much more to do. I hope I get it done in time. 

[UpperMaster]

I just meditated. And did visualization...after a 6 hour study session of course. 

The meditation that I do now is body awareness meditation. In one of Leo's videos..I forget the title, but it talked about how we store tension in our body unconsciously, and that directing awareness to a specific part of your body could rid it of unnecessary tension. 

Body and mind is connected. Holding tension in your body can mess with your mind, and trauma, mental trauma, can be stored as tension to your body. 

I am not sure how much all of this is true. But when I did the exercise shown in the video (I was asked to direct my awareness to different parts of my body) I realized that I was in fact storing so much tension. And what was so cool was that my tension evaporated as soon as I directed awareness to that part of my body. 

Body and mind are in fact connected, psychomsomatic or whatever you call it. 

Anyway so, because of that video and nice it made me feel I decided to change my meditation style from simply fociusing on my breath to body awareness, After every body awareness session I feel so different. 

What really slaps is if I do body awareness meditation and then right after go for a walk. It's so amazing. im so curious. I am at awe on what is going on in the world. Im at awe that reality exists, that everything is so complex but complements and works together, im at awe that I am human, that I live in a society, so big, so relatively advanced., Im at awe that I might have had ancestors who lived I such a different, radically different world. I am at awe at the possibility of history being so much different then what was thought to me.

Im at awe at the birds. At the fact that ideology exists. Im at awe that there are so many different paradigms, that language exist. Im at awe at all the complexity. How is this nothing but amazing. This is crazy. 

Those walks were the best I have ever had (2 so far) 

Other than that. Today was slow. Again I don't want to keep sobbing or whatever but yea I felt negative at times. Now I feel positive I just meditated. I feel pretty good. 

 

I want to write all my thoughts down. Yesterday I had great sleep and I thing writing down my thoughts might help. So that when I am asleep I don't stay awake thinking. 

 

[UpperMaster]

I know Leo is against luxury or whatever. But I'll be honest. I love luxury. I want luxury. 

I've seen how lower income individuals live. The hardships. The struggle that's imminent in every moment. 

Many places in the first world is a bubble. The richer you are the more you seem to be in a bubble. But god is living in that luxury bubble just amazing. I love luxury. I love being treated like royalty. I love the idea of going in first class. Great hotels. So much more opportunity. High fashion.

Don't get me wrong, I also love the idea of renting a van and traveling that way. That's super cool too, Im just saying being rich and having luxury is just great. 

Luxury means when I turn my computer on to use it, it never crashes. it's seamless. It means that I have 4 screens, a comfortable desk. The experience is different, the experience is amazing. I feel like that is what Apple sells. Man I love apple products for that reason. Its just seamless, everything works.

Android isn't as luxurious. I remember as a kid rooting my phone, finding ways to root my phone putting in a custom rom. I mean I jailbroke my apple swell, but there is less need to. 

I remember playing watchdogs 2 in some shitty laptop. I went to the settings and increased the pixels significantly, to the point where I was playing in a completely pixelated screen. I didn't care, I still played and had fun. 

Luxury means playing in the best specs. 

Maybe the pursuit of perfection is what gives satisfaction. idk. Im yapping but whatever that's what I have the journal for. 

People who are rich live is a different world. It's so much more green. Probably because their lifestyle stands on the low income laborers. 

I want to be rich. I want to be able to afford the super oversized coffee and 300 meal in a restaurant every single day. 

No worries. I can worry in luxury. Money would protect me low-key. 

or not.

One of the last things my grandfather told me was that : Money is always a problem, if you don't have it, it's a problem. If you have it then your busy protecting it from people so its a problem.