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The best possible version of myself


UndRt0w

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This is my 3rd journal and probably the last one.

My first journal was about quitting gaming. Since I succeeded I didn't really feel like continuing it.

My second journal was about focussing away from gaming and thinking about life and how to rebuild my life. What actually happened was a possible relapse and a too philosophical thread. My opening post was about how life doesn't really have a purpose. I'm not going into this topic because in all reality it really doesn't matter. It's about living the best life possible.

And that's what my third and final journal will be about. It's about living the best possible life, being the best possible human being. Everything I'm doing is always focused on being the best possible version of myself. So I can't really get in a situation where I feel disconnected from my journal unless I stop trying to be the best possible version of myself, which would lead in stopping my journal.

What is being the best possible version of yourself?

There is no answer to this. It changes. Life, motivation, and willpower are like waves. It has ups and downs, it comes and goes, bigger waves are rougher and often more dangerous. 

Thinking about the future I have big plans. I want to achieve great things. This doesn't mean I want to be famous or rich. It means being able to look in the mirror and being able to be proud of myself, ideally at every given moment (which is impossible).

Looking in the mirror what do I see?

I think we should all stand in front of the mirror at least one time a week and think about what we're doing. Are we still on the right track?

For me, yes, I am on the right track. No, I'm not performing my best this year. I had a big meditation streaks, I played hours of guitar, I exercised, ... now none of these things are at the same level as they were. But I'm trying and making adjustments. I'm trying my best, I'm calm, I'm happy and I'm in a good place.

Am I satisfied? No. And I hope I'll never be satisfied because that often means the lack of a challenging goal. At this moment I'm 'not satisfied' in a good way. I feel comfortable with not being satisfied, 

So what are the goals?

This is hard to answer, basically, it's trying to be what I consider to be perfect. This does not feel like a huge burden, it feels like a nice challenge I'll never complete. I think striving for perfection and enjoying the process is my calling in life. It's the only thing that is consistent throughout most of my life. It used to be something negative, a big pressure, but now it's fun.

Where are you right now?

Not very far let me tell you that. I think I actually even may have relapsed in gaming, to be honest. I'm playing several games and last week I actually sometimes didn't work towards my goals to be able and play a game. I even started watching Twitch while I said that would be a very bad idea. For the moment I feel I can still kinda control it even though some habits suddenly are very hard to do. So if I'm honest I'm probably not having the best control right now. On the other hand, I'm still doing a lot of stuff so in a way I am controlling it, there's always the option of not doing anything and just game all day.

 

 

More details about my goals and what I'd like to achieve will come in the following posts. This is definitely a good enough for my opening post.

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Turning myself into a productivity machine

Something I'm really passionate about it productivity. I love being productive. It makes me feel good about myself. At my job, I'm pretty productive. I can complete my work pretty fast while others seem to struggle with it. I use the remaining time to learn.

Obviously, I'm not perfect. I also waste a lot of time, which is also fine at this point in my life. I have periods where my entire days are productive, it makes me lose balance and I suddenly relapse and become really unproductive for much longer. Balance is key. I work with habits and try to increase the time and frequency as much as possible.


At this moment I'm:

- Doing a full-time job: 33 hours a week (yes that's full-time for my job)

- Doing research to start my own business/blog: 7-10 hours a week

- Playing the guitar at least 30 min a day (I play every day, sometimes more, sometimes a bit less)

- Waking up early, 7 am is the latest, mostly it's 6 am

 

I also try to get more consistent at:

- Reading self-help books and actually, implement them

- Exercise: This is really inconsistent, I'm not motivated at all. I have my own home gym. Today I started by doing 5 repetitions of whatever exercise I choose. It's about going to the home gym and pick up the weights for a small amount of time. Just to get into the habit.

- Meditation: I used to do a long streak of 50+ days, then I tried to up the time and I completely stopped meditating, I've been struggling since. Yesterday I found out the app I use is actually a barrier. It forces me to do a certain amount and it makes me do visualisations I don't always like. Also, the voice gets me out of my focus sometimes and sometimes when I really get into a session it ends. The app is adding frustration instead of help. So I'll do a quick 5-minute meditation everyday, with some relaxing music. When it turns into a habit again I might try the app again since I used to like it and I feel the exercises are good when you're motivated.

(Near) future habits/goals:

- Lose weight: Exercise + diet

- Health

- Maybe wake up sooner, not sure yet

- Be a fluent small-talker (I'm an introvert and even though I like being one, it's holding me back achieving several goals)

- Get to know more people, connect with strangers easily

- Do fun things away from the PC

At this time I still have a lot of free time. On a free day like today, I'm often already finished by 11 am doing my 'tasks'. That's fine for now. The rest of the day I'm spending a lot of time on the PC. This will change in the near future.

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At this moment I'm:

- Doing a full-time job: 33 hours a week (yes that's full-time for my job)

- Doing research to start my own business/blog: 7-10 hours a week

- Playing the guitar at least 30 min a day (I play every day, sometimes more, sometimes a bit less)

- Waking up early, 7 am is the latest, mostly it's 6 am

Way to go!

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Thanks guys!

Had quite a busy week this week. Had a lot of fun.

There's also a sad part. I'm not controlling my behavior like I want to. I'm wasting too much time on the internet. I'm wasting more time than I'm actually gaming or watching Twitch. I think it would be a good idea to only acces the pc at set times. It doesn't matter what I do when I acces the pc.

Acces times

Working days: Acces to pc between 6 am - 8 am, Acces to pc between 6 pm - 8.30pm

Non-working days between 6 am - 9 am , between 4pm - 8.30pm


About the habits

I struggled when it came to my business. I'm not sure if I enjoy it to be honest. But as long as I'm not sure I'll start doing it again.

Playing the guitar comes fairly easy now, but I'm noodling to much on it. I want to do more deliberate practise

Waking up early, bit off tracks here as well but mostly I wake up at 7am which is still fine.

Meditation: This is going great! Actually bought myself some books on meditation and buddhism

Exercise: Going to my home gym is still not enjoyable. I am doing the 5 repetitions each day so I am succeeding at my current target.

Reading: Doing this everyday! Bought myself some cool books about willpower and buddhism.

Goals

Business: Work 7 hours/week on it

Guitar: At least 30 minutes with 15 minutes of deliberate practice

Waking up early: Stand up as soon as I'm awake (stay away from your smartphone)

Meditation: 5 min --> 10 minutes

Exercise:  10 reps/ day or 5 minutes cardio

Reading: Read at least 10 minutes every day

PC: track pc behavior

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What is the hardest song/solo you can play so far?

For me it is probably original solo of  original "Paranoid". How about you? :)

Greetings, Mad Pharma(Guitar)cist :D

Good question. I'm not sure. I guess it's the solo of stairway to heaven or Hotel California. I have to admit, when I don't play them for several weeks they become very sloppy. When I turn down the tempo a bit I feel like I can control it a lot better. I'm definitely not an amazing guitarist, pretty sure you're better. Listenning to paranoid I think I should be able to do it, except for the small fast part. That would probably take me a while to learn.

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On goalsetting (part 1)

Becoming the best possible version of myself is not easy. First of all it's pretty hard to know what the best possible version of myself would be. Also it keeps evolving and changing. Something that is consistent, is having to set new goal and evaluate them on a regular basis. Setting a goal is not easy, there are a lot of things to consider:

  • Specific:

    • What do you want to achieve

    • How much do you want to achieve of it

    • When do you want to achieve it

    • How will you know if you have achieved it

    • What does the outcome look like, what has changed compared to now

    • Is there any way you could use metrics or measurements to quantify your goal
 
  • Difficult but possible:

    • Gives more motivation

    • When you achieve this goal you will feel amazing

    • Don’t set the bar too low

 
  • Use ‘what’ and ‘why’:

    • Why: is motivational, the reason you set the goal in the first place. Make your why as clear as possible. One technique you could use here is ask yourself why several times in a row. Eg. Lose weight > I’m too fat > I lose  my breath too fast and I don’t look good, I’m not flexible etc. → I want to be more fit. So i can be/feel healthy. Not be limited by my weight. Be more attractive.

    • What: Get clear what you need to do to achieve your goal. Especially when it’s a hard goal or something difficult.

 
  • Imagine how your life will look like if you achieve your goal + realistically think about the sacrifices you are going to make. Also be realistic about the chances. Do you still want it?

    • Imagine 1 thing that will be different when you achieve your goal

    • Think about 1 sacrifice

    • Imagine 1 thing that will be different

    • Think about another sacrifice

    • Etc.

 
  • Even though you should be realistic, you should also be positive and believe in yourself. You can do a lot, but it will take planning, persistance, time,effort

---------

This is just the beginning of goalsetting, but it's a good start. Let's already use this first piece of knowledge. I have called this journal 'best possible version of myself'. Not obviously that isn't really specific is it? What does this mean? Being the best possible version of myself? It's so huge it can't be a goal in itself. It actually consists of hundreds maybe thousands of smaller goals.

So maybe a better question is, what are my biggest weaknesses and desires at this moment? What do I really want to change to set my first steps to becoming the best possible version of myself? What are the first things I want to achieve?

A powerful exercise is imagining your own funeral. I'm dead and I'm a ghost. I'm looking down on my grave, what do I see? Who do I see? What do they say? What do I want them to say? Who do I want to see? What part of me is still alive or what could I have build that's still alive?

-----

For me, at this point in my life, this is hard. I'm not sure who's visiting my grave. The people who are the most close right now are my parents, coworkers and best friends. I definitely want them to think of me as being a nice guy. I think they probably will, but if they are completely fair they will also know I can be very stubborn and I have quite a temperament sometimes. I'm not always a good person, my mood is swingy , but they know I'm a good person deep down. In critical situations I can actually remain pretty calm. I want to be remembered as this last guy. Someone who's objective, a good person and shows great amounts of respect towards the people most close to me (goal 1, this is why I meditate).

Maybe there's a wife and kids. I'm not sure. I want to have a legacy of some kind. This could be in the form of a wife and kids (possible goal), but it could also be that I was a go-to expert in something and I helped hundreds of people in their lives and I got great respect for it. (business goal). I was known for doing a lot of personal development and trying to be healthy and smart (goal: reading, exercise).

They will also know me as an ambitious guy. Someone who's always trying to improve himself. Someone who doesn't just believe what they tell him, but who can think about his own idea's. I was good at my job, but I kept a healthy balance. Not just for myself, but also for the people that I have to lead. I was strict, but I was also correct and there was room for fun. I showed great potential and I did a lot of stuff to make my workplace a better place. I get great respect from these people and they missed me when I got my new position at my workplace OR when I quit my job to grow my own business (Carreer goal)

Next to this ambitious guy I was also this guy who was fun, good at talking to strangers (goal) and meeting new people. I definitely had a lot of fun and made sure my friends also had a lot of fun. Fun is definitely not the first thing they thought about, I'm still the more ambitious guy, but the fun-side was definitely a side of me as well (goal). Even though I seemed pretty professional I also had a creative outlet (Guitar goal).

----

The goals I'm pursuing right now are:

- Business and carreer (doing both and exploring) --> Waking up early and tracking PC

- Get more willpower to be this person --> Meditation, Waking up early and tracking PC

- Being more healthy (which improves everything) --> Exercising

- Learning: Reading and applying knowledge (like I'm doing right now)

-----

Business and carreer (&learning)

WHY  ?

Well that's easy. I found out money plays a part but it's not the main factor. I'm someone who needs ambitious goals in life. When gaming got in the way of having ambitious goals I became unhappy. I got the feeling of 'same shit, different day'. I need something to work towards, I'm pretty competitive as well. I want to be someone who's able to help people with difficult things. When I got my bachelors and masters degree, I didn't go to the graduation ceremony. I found it very weird all these people around me were so proud like they did the impossible, while in reality a lot of people get a degree.

Now this may seem very pessimistic, but it's not. I would rather be the person who was happy with their degree. Statistically people who get a degree are a minority so it's something you should be proud of. It's not a guarantee for succces though. There are a lot of people without a degree who are very succesful and a lot of people with a degree who I consider to be unsuccesful. Anyways I'm getting sidetracked. My point was, getting a degree was not a goal, being a go-to expert or someone who can help people with something complex is! To be completely honest it's not just about helping people but also about my own ego.

Like I said, money is also a side-factor. It can make life easier or make things more comfortable so there's more time for uncomfortable things I choose myself (achieving better mastery in things I'm interested in, instead of putting time in cleaning my house). Money provides a new sort of freedom in a way. For me being rich is being free from having to worry about money.

WHAT ?

Hard question. I'm exploring both building a carreer and starting a business. Building a carreer comes more intuively to me. I already made several promotions without really knowing what I was doing. At this moment I'm trying to master things like being a good coach, being a powerful  but also likeable leader, working on projects, ... By actually doing my job and by setting more challenging and higher goals each time I'm achieving all these things. I'm making great progress.

Business is harder. At this moment I'm doing something called 'immersion'. I'm trying to understand my field (productivity), get a better view of possible audiences, understand the audience I want to pick better by actually talking to them.

So what am I doing right now?

- Work 7h/week on my business

- Read forums, reddit, quora, facebook groups,... on a consistent basis

- Connect with fellow business starters to keep myself accountable

- Try to pick a niche and understand the niche as good as possible

- Learn about interesting topics (reading) in my free time

------

Willpower

WHY

Sometimes you want to do things, but you actually feel you don't want to do them right now (procrastinating). I want to wake up early, work on my business, exercise, spend less time on the internet, ... but somehow it's not always working. In the past I used to have tremendous amounts of willpower. I had a very strict diet, workout regime and I had really good effort at the gym. I was disciplined when it came to school work etc. Now I'm struggling a bit and I don't really like to be that person.

To make it more specific: I want to be able to set a certain timeframe like 6 am - 6 pm and be productive throughout that entire period without giving in to tempations.

WHAT

I'm reading this book on Willpower, pretty sure someone on this forum suggested it to me.

I'm doing meditation as science seem to confirm that it helps. At the moment I'm doing 10 minutes each day and I really like it. I don't use an app for it anymore because the app kinda started annoying me.

Everyday I do some small habits that also help with being disciplined. These are small things like doing 10 pushups, 10 minutes of meditation, 10 minutes of reading,... even when I don't feel like doing them I will do them. They are easy enough to do and by not allowing myself to avoid them I'm building my willpower muscle.

------

Be more healthy

WHY

This is something I feel I have to do. I'm not healthy at the moment. My breakfast this morning was 4 scrambled eggs (which is fine) and some brown bread (which is fine) and a Twix + 5 cookies (which is definitely not fine at all for breakfast .. :D ). I also used to have great endurance and look pretty athletic, but now everytime I put on a dressed shirt or pants my conclusion is I should be careful about my weight. I'm definitely not fat, but if I continue like this I will be. I'm also tired faster and have a lot of headaches almost on a daily basis.

Basically I want to go back to the old me.

WHAT

Exercising is something I'm building right now. I'm just doing 10 pushups per day. I'm also considering a smart trainer for my racing bike. It allows me to actually gamify my workouts. Zwift (https://zwift.com/) definitely seems really appealing to me! It also has a community so that seems great as well. The investment would be around $500 to get what I would want and I'm really considering it. But for now I'm building up my pushups. I will probably add 10 pull-ups soon.

Diet is for the future. I will wait with dieting untill my house is finished and I moved. It's easier to buy your own food and not have 100 temptations each day.

-----

 

*** post will still have to be updated with the contrasting exercise ****

 

Edited by UndRt0w
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great reflection, mate.

it takes time to find all these answers. be patient and believe in yourself!

Thanks Reno! I really believe in myself. Sometimes a bit too much, which is a source for procrastinating because I believe 'I will get there anyway' (very destructive thought!). Luckily I'm doing a lot of reflections and I know when I'm making excuses and procrastinating.

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HEy as the man who recommnded the book to you: Good Job actually reading it ;)

Seems liek you do a lot at the Moment and I wish you the ebst of luck. Be Aware of teh fact that pull-ups can be pretty hard if you don't made any similar progressions before. IF it doesn'twork at the first try you could do negative pul-ups and assisted pullups before. Or jsut do a pull-up every hour. This last trick helped me to get over the phase where I was only able to do 1-2 pull-ups wiht good execution and now I am able to do 5-6Reps or with 3 sets around 4 reps.

Glad to hear from you.

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HEy as the man who recommnded the book to you: Good Job actually reading it ;)

Seems liek you do a lot at the Moment and I wish you the ebst of luck. Be Aware of teh fact that pull-ups can be pretty hard if you don't made any similar progressions before. IF it doesn'twork at the first try you could do negative pul-ups and assisted pullups before. Or jsut do a pull-up every hour. This last trick helped me to get over the phase where I was only able to do 1-2 pull-ups wiht good execution and now I am able to do 5-6Reps or with 3 sets around 4 reps.

Glad to hear from you.

Yes it was you! Now I remember!

About the pull-ups, man I used to be good at doing pull-ups.  Last year I did 6 pull-ups with 20kg of added weight and a strict form. I wasn't really known as a strong guy in my gym, but when it came to pull-ups... not a lot of people could do much more than me :D Good pointers btw, these are the same things I used last year to build up my strength!

What helped me the most was not going to failure. I would always keep 1-2 reps in the tank. Like you said, it's better to do 3 sets of 4 reps than 1 set with 6 reps .. and maybe then the next one with 3 reps and poor form.

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I almost cried a few minutes ago

Wtf .. why is this special? People cry all the time dude... Well not me. The last time I cried was over 10 years ago. People died, bad things happened, I got bad injuries, never shed a tear. But around 15 minutes ago I came really really close. So what happened?

Well I watched a series called ER (yes I know it's old). I don't think it's the greatest series, but I kinda like watching it sometimes when it's on TV. Anyway, something happened in ER and it made me so sad an happy at the same time I almost started crying.

In this episode there was an elderly patient who had alzheimer. The doctors didn't know who he was. As the episode progressed it came clear he actually used to be a doctor himself. At one point a patient was next to him in emergency and she was dying. Suddenly the old guy start panicing and pointing etc. He managed to make clear the right diagnosis to the doctors. In my head I was like .. ok that's kinda cool, probably very unrealistic, but still I like what they came up with.

The touchy feely part still had to come. When he did this they doctors realised their elderly patient used to be a doctor as well. Suddenly it became clear to one of the guys, this elderly patient was actually the writer of their handbooks. He used to be a really important figure in medicine. The next 10 minutes there were some flashbacks that made clear that a lot of the procedures the doctors were doing (like doing some emergency procedures in the hallway) was actually because of him. In his flashback you'd see other doctors mocking him for even thinking about doing procedures in the hallway. They called him a dreamer. But now, in the present, it was the normal procedure. He was right, he did it, he was a true master in his field.

The episode ends with him surrounded by the doctors. The friend of this man (who was also a big shot doctor) told the doctors that the elderly man's wife died and he didn't have any kids. At this point, he couldn't breath by himself anymore. In his will he made clear they should let him go and give him morphine. They let him slowly slip in a coma and die.

This made me so sad and happy at the same time. I saw a lot of better, more emotional movies or series. But this struck me. What a great way to die. He had a legacy, he made a change to the world. This guy didn't die, all the things he accomplished are still alive. It made me feel sad that such a great (fictional) person had to die. But it made me so happy he actually made a change in the world. Here dies the guy I want to be myself some day. And there I am, just 30 minutes earlier being worried about having enough time to relax this weekend. I was even thinking about playing a lot of video games...

Man what a great experience. I hate the emotions but I've learned so much from it. Now I think about it... it's kind of ironic. I was sitting in a couch, being lazy, watching the TV ... at least this time something good may have come out of it.


Obviously I still need my relaxation and entertainment. It's past 7pm now, so it's fine to relax. But still, I'm missing so many opportunities everyday. In my journey to becoming the best possible version of myself I should defintely learn to use my time more wisely.

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Since I couldn't edit my post anymore I'll finish it in this new one

 

On goalsetting (part 1)

Becoming the best possible version of myself is not easy. First of all it's pretty hard to know what the best possible version of myself would be. Also it keeps evolving and changing. Something that is consistent, is having to set new goal and evaluate them on a regular basis. Setting a goal is not easy, there are a lot of things to consider:

  • Specific:

    • What do you want to achieve

    • How much do you want to achieve of it

    • When do you want to achieve it

    • How will you know if you have achieved it

    • What does the outcome look like, what has changed compared to now

    • Is there any way you could use metrics or measurements to quantify your goal
 
  • Difficult but possible:

    • Gives more motivation

    • When you achieve this goal you will feel amazing

    • Don’t set the bar too low

 
  • Use ‘what’ and ‘why’:

    • Why: is motivational, the reason you set the goal in the first place. Make your why as clear as possible. One technique you could use here is ask yourself why several times in a row. Eg. Lose weight > I’m too fat > I lose  my breath too fast and I don’t look good, I’m not flexible etc. → I want to be more fit. So i can be/feel healthy. Not be limited by my weight. Be more attractive.

    • What: Get clear what you need to do to achieve your goal. Especially when it’s a hard goal or something difficult.

 
  • Imagine how your life will look like if you achieve your goal + realistically think about the sacrifices you are going to make. Also be realistic about the chances. Do you still want it?

    • Imagine 1 thing that will be different when you achieve your goal

    • Think about 1 sacrifice

    • Imagine 1 thing that will be different

    • Think about another sacrifice

    • Etc.

 
  • Even though you should be realistic, you should also be positive and believe in yourself. You can do a lot, but it will take planning, persistance, time,effort

---------

This is just the beginning of goalsetting, but it's a good start. Let's already use this first piece of knowledge. I have called this journal 'best possible version of myself'. Not obviously that isn't really specific is it? What does this mean? Being the best possible version of myself? It's so huge it can't be a goal in itself. It actually consists of hundreds maybe thousands of smaller goals.

So maybe a better question is, what are my biggest weaknesses and desires at this moment? What do I really want to change to set my first steps to becoming the best possible version of myself? What are the first things I want to achieve?

A powerful exercise is imagining your own funeral. I'm dead and I'm a ghost. I'm looking down on my grave, what do I see? Who do I see? What do they say? What do I want them to say? Who do I want to see? What part of me is still alive or what could I have build that's still alive?

-----

For me, at this point in my life, this is hard. I'm not sure who's visiting my grave. The people who are the most close right now are my parents, coworkers and best friends. I definitely want them to think of me as being a nice guy. I think they probably will, but if they are completely fair they will also know I can be very stubborn and I have quite a temperament sometimes. I'm not always a good person, my mood is swingy , but they know I'm a good person deep down. In critical situations I can actually remain pretty calm. I want to be remembered as this last guy. Someone who's objective, a good person and shows great amounts of respect towards the people most close to me (goal 1, this is why I meditate).

Maybe there's a wife and kids. I'm not sure. I want to have a legacy of some kind. This could be in the form of a wife and kids (possible goal), but it could also be that I was a go-to expert in something and I helped hundreds of people in their lives and I got great respect for it. (business goal). I was known for doing a lot of personal development and trying to be healthy and smart (goal: reading, exercise).

They will also know me as an ambitious guy. Someone who's always trying to improve himself. Someone who doesn't just believe what they tell him, but who can think about his own idea's. I was good at my job, but I kept a healthy balance. Not just for myself, but also for the people that I have to lead. I was strict, but I was also correct and there was room for fun. I showed great potential and I did a lot of stuff to make my workplace a better place. I get great respect from these people and they missed me when I got my new position at my workplace OR when I quit my job to grow my own business (Carreer goal)

Next to this ambitious guy I was also this guy who was fun, good at talking to strangers (goal) and meeting new people. I definitely had a lot of fun and made sure my friends also had a lot of fun. Fun is definitely not the first thing they thought about, I'm still the more ambitious guy, but the fun-side was definitely a side of me as well (goal). Even though I seemed pretty professional I also had a creative outlet (Guitar goal).

----

The goals I'm pursuing right now are:

- Business and carreer (doing both and exploring) --> Waking up early and tracking PC

- Get more willpower to be this person --> Meditation, Waking up early and tracking PC

- Being more healthy (which improves everything) --> Exercising

- Learning: Reading and applying knowledge (like I'm doing right now)

-----

Business and carreer (&learning)

WHY  ?

Well that's easy. I found out money plays a part but it's not the main factor. I'm someone who needs ambitious goals in life. When gaming got in the way of having ambitious goals I became unhappy. I got the feeling of 'same shit, different day'. I need something to work towards, I'm pretty competitive as well. I want to be someone who's able to help people with difficult things. When I got my bachelors and masters degree, I didn't go to the graduation ceremony. I found it very weird all these people around me were so proud like they did the impossible, while in reality a lot of people get a degree.

Now this may seem very pessimistic, but it's not. I would rather be the person who was happy with their degree. Statistically people who get a degree are a minority so it's something you should be proud of. It's not a guarantee for succces though. There are a lot of people without a degree who are very succesful and a lot of people with a degree who I consider to be unsuccesful. Anyways I'm getting sidetracked. My point was, getting a degree was not a goal, being a go-to expert or someone who can help people with something complex is! To be completely honest it's not just about helping people but also about my own ego.

Like I said, money is also a side-factor. It can make life easier or make things more comfortable so there's more time for uncomfortable things I choose myself (achieving better mastery in things I'm interested in, instead of putting time in cleaning my house). Money provides a new sort of freedom in a way. For me being rich is being free from having to worry about money.

WHAT ?

Hard question. I'm exploring both building a carreer and starting a business. Building a carreer comes more intuively to me. I already made several promotions without really knowing what I was doing. At this moment I'm trying to master things like being a good coach, being a powerful  but also likeable leader, working on projects, ... By actually doing my job and by setting more challenging and higher goals each time I'm achieving all these things. I'm making great progress.

Business is harder. At this moment I'm doing something called 'immersion'. I'm trying to understand my field (productivity), get a better view of possible audiences, understand the audience I want to pick better by actually talking to them.

So what am I doing right now?

- Work 7h/week on my business

- Read forums, reddit, quora, facebook groups,... on a consistent basis

- Connect with fellow business starters to keep myself accountable

- Try to pick a niche and understand the niche as good as possible

- Learn about interesting topics (reading) in my free time

------

Willpower

WHY

Sometimes you want to do things, but you actually feel you don't want to do them right now (procrastinating). I want to wake up early, work on my business, exercise, spend less time on the internet, ... but somehow it's not always working. In the past I used to have tremendous amounts of willpower. I had a very strict diet, workout regime and I had really good effort at the gym. I was disciplined when it came to school work etc. Now I'm struggling a bit and I don't really like to be that person.

To make it more specific: I want to be able to set a certain timeframe like 6 am - 6 pm and be productive throughout that entire period without giving in to tempations.

WHAT

I'm reading this book on Willpower, pretty sure someone on this forum suggested it to me.

I'm doing meditation as science seem to confirm that it helps. At the moment I'm doing 10 minutes each day and I really like it. I don't use an app for it anymore because the app kinda started annoying me.

Everyday I do some small habits that also help with being disciplined. These are small things like doing 10 pushups, 10 minutes of meditation, 10 minutes of reading,... even when I don't feel like doing them I will do them. They are easy enough to do and by not allowing myself to avoid them I'm building my willpower muscle.

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Be more healthy

WHY

This is something I feel I have to do. I'm not healthy at the moment. My breakfast this morning was 4 scrambled eggs (which is fine) and some brown bread (which is fine) and a Twix + 5 cookies (which is definitely not fine at all for breakfast .. :D ). I also used to have great endurance and look pretty athletic, but now everytime I put on a dressed shirt or pants my conclusion is I should be careful about my weight. I'm definitely not fat, but if I continue like this I will be. I'm also tired faster and have a lot of headaches almost on a daily basis.

Basically I want to go back to the old me.

WHAT

Exercising is something I'm building right now. I'm just doing 10 pushups per day. I'm also considering a smart trainer for my racing bike. It allows me to actually gamify my workouts. Zwift (https://zwift.com/) definitely seems really appealing to me! It also has a community so that seems great as well. The investment would be around $500 to get what I would want and I'm really considering it. But for now I'm building up my pushups. I will probably add 10 pull-ups soon.

Diet is for the future. I will wait with dieting untill my house is finished and I moved. It's easier to buy your own food and not have 100 temptations each day.

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Contrasting

If I want to achieve all these things a lot of things will happen

Positive:

If I manage to push through on my goals I will have a satisfying carreer. I can control myself very well and achieve a lot of my goals. Also I will be fairly healthy. In the long run I will really respect myself and I'm sure if I manage to push through a lot of people will respect me for my achievements. If I play my cards right I may even be very succesfull and get a following (but not toooo big, the right kind of people, not just anyone). My life wil be fairly comfortable financially and hopefully also on every other aspect.

Negative:

If I push through I will have to live a lot more strictly than I already am. This will be a day-to-day struggle, especially the first months. The short-term entertainment and fun will decrease tremendously. I will probably have more stress (even though I'll try to counter that with meditation) and my life will definitely not be easier, not at all. A lot of people will not understand and I think it's better not to tell a bunch of people. I won't get a lot of satisfaction in the first few months of years from my plans. Even when I succeed I will definitely also get a lot of negative responses from people who just want to hate. It will be hard to ignore them in the beginning but I'm sure I can handle it. Increasing willpower is definitely a pain in the ass since it's saying 'no' to a whole lot of stuff you want to say 'yes' too, like playing more video games, watching more twitch, watching more youtube, going to certain parties,...

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it seems you are set up!

do you keep a game-free day counter?

Hey Reno,

I'm actually not game free anymore. I'm trying to balance it with my life. I must admit it takes a lot of energy. At this moment for example, I'm not having a good day, at all. I feel a bit mentally drained. So now I have this huge urge to game or watch Twitch. But I can't, not untill 6pm. It will take me 2 hours untill I can watch Twitch or game. Untill them I'm trying to be productive.

For the moment, the problem is not gaming too much or watching too much Twitch. But I have to admit, it's really hard and I'm not sure if it's worth it. In the following weeks I may decide to quit again so I can compare it. If I quit again and my life gets easier again, that's a clear sign that gaming is not for me. On the other hand I'm on track with several of my habits so that's why I still want to see if it gets easier in the next weeks.

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Awesome thoughts on that!

I think you'll manage to have awesome career, because once you fail something, you instantly stand up and fight like a gladiator on the arena.

That's why you have your third journal here! Keep it up!

Greetings, Mad Pharmacist

Thanks man!

I'm not having a great day today. I feel really uninspired, unmotivated and I don't want to do anything. It's really nice to read a message like this!

I'll get off my lazy but and play some guitar + work on my goal setting stuff further (I want to completely finish it this week)

 

Edit: 45 minutes of guitar playing, turned it so loud I could actually smell the tubes of my amp. Not good for the ears, but it was a good outlet for my frustration today I feel a lot better now :D

Edited by UndRt0w
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Weekly update

I'm crushing my habits. Now I'm doing:

- 15 minutes of meditation

- 15 minutes of reading

- 30 minutes of playing guitar at least

- 10 push-ups + 10 pull-ups

I bought recording equipment, so I can start recording my guitar playing.

Business

I'm so confused .. My motivation is below zero. When i got motivated I was thrilled about learning other people stuff. But now I don't have this feeling anymore. I think I may have been too money oriented. I still love productivity stuff, but thinking about journalling here excites me way more than thinking about all the things I need to do to build my business. I think it's because in the beginning you don't really have a following. Nobody can see your work and often it doesn't lead to anything. You can actually work for weeks before you get any results and suddenly BOOM everything falls into place.

Getting a following is probably not the real problem. Validating my idea's and finding people who may want to pay to learn stuff from me is pretty hard.

This week my goal is figuring out how I want to proceed. Am I going to set very clear goals on this or find another project? If I find another project the goal is actually to learn something incredibly fast and use that as something to build my business on. Learning something fast is probably a good way to get a following and people who want to pay to learn how to do the same.

I actually got a degree in educational studies so I'm really interested in learning and education and stuff. Also when I see a blog like https://www.scotthyoung.com/blog/ or http://calnewport.com/ I get really excited! It's a bit like the old guy in the series. Mastery is so exciting. Being really good at something .. I want to be a master of mastery .. is that a thing? I hope it is! Maybe a good first step is actually figuring out what people really like to learn and if it's really interesting I may try to learn it really possible, just to show I can do it very fast. That sounds like an exciting idea actually... I think I'll try that out.

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