Overwhelmed With Self-actualization/personal Development

[Noah]

Hi,

I'm 17 years old and I discovered personal development through Leo's youtube channel about a year and a half ago, but have mostly recently started to take action and implement some of the techniques I've learned about. I started a 20 minute meditation habit on September 4 and have been doing it ever since, sometimes in the morning and sometimes at night. I was motivated to finally put this practice into place because of something Leo has said multiple times: "Meditation is the single most important personal development habit you can put into place." It has been a slow process, and I've struggled quite a bit but I plan to do it for the rest of my life, every single day. I have also started to journal more often. I know that I am just at the beginning, and I know how lucky am I to have discovered this stuff. And now I know more than ever that this is definitely the most important thing I can do in my life, and that the rest of my life should be heavily focused on self actualization. But here's the thing, I am also a passionate artist and musician, and a student in high school, soon to be going to art college in the fall of 2018. I love making art, especially telling stories through art (graphic novel/comic books). Much of my time is spent studying art, and I'm pretty sure I want to be an artist. 

See, recently I’ve been feeling overwhelmed with personal development. As I research and learn more about personal development, and watch more of Leo’s backlog of videos (and the ones he releases weekly), the more I want to do with it, and I feel like there’s so much I need to be doing. I mean right now I’m really only doing meditation, journaling, taking notes on a few of Leo’s videos, slowly trying to master my emotions, and also learning to lucid dream. I know there is so much I should be doing, like reading books, self inquiry, affirmations, visualization, getting diet together, watching and implementing techniques that Leo talks about (ex. Most recent video about existential vocab) and most of all just learning and educating myself about psychology, philosophy, life and the universe. I know I have lots of time, but I also have been feeling overwhelmed - Because I want to be doing all this stuff, but also be hard at work studying and mastering art and turn that into a career. And I'ms stuck in this thing where when I'm doing art I'm thinking about how I should be working on self-actualization, but when I'm actually doing that stuff, I feel like I should be doing art. So I don’t know to find the balance I’m looking for.

Thanks for reading this, and I would greatly appreciate any thoughts on this matter, or if anybody else is feeling the same way!

[Nahm]

@Noah There is much to do, lucky you’re 17. Letting go of this concern - letting go is an art, lucky you’re an artist. All is well. Enjoy the journey. There are no dragons, there is no flood coming. All is well. Post me some art that is you, please. This concern, “The Plight”, we’re all in the fight, alone and together. Show me art that shows me my own plight. Know thy self. 

[haai14]

Understand that personal development is not about the destination but about doing your best every day and being as happy as you can. Just do babysteps, dont try to fix everything at once frist implement good habits.

[RossE]

@Noah Don't try to do it all at once - you don't need to. It sounds like you have your life purpose sorted - that alone is huge. Those habits are powerful, particularly meditation, which you really ought to keep up if you want to live a full life.

If you feel overwhelmed, you're probably too immersed in personal development. 

Most of all, go easy on yourself - this is a lifelong journey, with no destination. 

[Leo Gura]

6 hours ago, Nahm said:

lucky you’re 17.

This!

[Noah]

@Nahm @haai14 @RossE @Leo Gura thank you all for the replies, I really do appreciate it. They helped me be more at ease with myself around this subject:)

[HII]

@Noah Didn't you come across lots of talk in Leo's videos about how mastery of a skill/craft and career are important in personal development and self-actualization? I don't get where you see the conflict.

On ‎06‎.‎11‎.‎2017 at 2:24 PM, Noah said:

right now I’m really only doing meditation, journaling, taking notes on a few of Leo’s videos, slowly trying to master my emotions, and also learning to lucid dream.

This is a good chunk of stuff. If I were you, I'd rather focus on not doing unnecessary things and doing what you do properly and consistently and letting it become a habit first, before moving on to new things.

Feeling overwhelmed is a symptom from doing too many different things. So if you start doing even more different things because you think you have to do all that, you'll only make it worse.

Leo has also talked about how important focus is. Without that, you won't ever get anywhere with anything.

You don't have to do every single personal development technique out there. That's practically impossible. And that's not what these techniques were developed for. Pick specific problems you wanna solve or specific areas where you wanna improve and then find one specific technique for this problem or area and try it out. After a while, you can make an evaluation and then drop it or keep it and maybe try something new.

Feeling overwhelmed is also a symptom from too much theory and too little practice. Watch less videos for a while

[Noah]

@HII Thank you very much for the response! I sincerely appreciate it, and definitely agree.

[AleksM]

@Noah

At the beggining the most important thing is extensive research. While your doing your extensive research, build empowering habits and get rid of addictions. Good habits being like exercise (gym), healthy eating ( a lot of raw fruits and vegetables), meditation, morning routine and nofap.  Find YouTube channels to subscribe to, read articles, if your on Facebook find sites that share consciousness related articles and good quotes, find email newsletters to subscribe to.

[Dan Arnautu]

@Noah

Action Plan

1. Make a list of the things/methods you want to make a habit.

2. Pick only one thing from that list.

3. Do that one thing for 66 days consistently (because that is what researchers found out it takes to wire a new habit into your brain; but 30 is good enough I think)

4. Repeat with the next thing in your list

7. ??????

8. Profit.

 

You are not thinking long term, that's the problem.

If you focus on only one method/habit for 1-2 months, that's either 6 or 12 new habits per year.

Multiply that by 10 years. Insane growth.

If you go around doing 100 PD methods, running like a chicken with it's head cut off, you won't even be able to reap the joy out of doing personal development. 

 

Edited November 25, 2017 by Dan Arnautu