How to Beat Yourself up (The Right Way)

A lot of people beat themselves up. They self-judge. When you know what you should be doing, and you do not do what you’re supposed to do, you allow your inner voice to make you feel like shit.

Your mean inner voice comes from your childhood. The way your friends and family treated you growing up, is likely how you treat yourself. This is a problem. If you don’t shape your inner critic to be an ally, it will beat you down until you are so apathetic and nihilistic that you cannot produce action. So, take control.

If you’re telling yourself things like “I’m worthless”, you’re doing it wrong.

Repeated self-criticism when you just label yourself worthless and horrible will literally make you worthless and horrible. You need to use that inner drive to push you AWAY from being what you don’t want to be, so don’t make the mistake of labeling yourself as something undesirable. Instead, when you do something wrong, or you don’t live up to your own standards, you should feel as if you’re your own father judging you. Instead of saying “I’m worthless,” say “I should not be making this mistake.” Instead of saying “I hate myself for this”, say, “I know I have the potential to do better, so I will try again.”

Too many people are trying to get rid of their self-critic. That’s foolish. Your self-critic, I believe, is a biological mechanism that drives you toward achievement, but I think that as society has evolved, this mechanism can be either too harsh or too labeling at times. What you need to do, is to not let your self-critic label you as anything bad or undesirable. Instead, you should shape the voice of your inner critic to say things that are constructive, responsible, and action oriented.

For example, let’s say you are trying to start working out consistently. You went to the gym for a month, things were going well, but then you took a month off. Some self-help gurus would tell you to just blindly accept yourself and to go back in the gym, but with this approach, you may get caught in a loop of too much self-acceptance. If you are in a place that you don’t want to be, e.g., not working out for a month, you should use your inner voice to ignite a deep desire within you to attack your goal. It’s okay to feel angry at the fact that you just wasted a month. Use that anger. Turn it into progress. However, it’s not okay to let that anger push you into self-hatred. That will make you stagnate. If you also just tell yourself that its okay to not do the things you want to do, you will begin to become lazy, you will trust yourself less, and you will find it hard to take action. You need to find the perfect balance between self-anger and self-acceptance, so that you don’t become lazy, or apathetic.

Thank you for reading, and I hope this reshaped the way you approach self-criticism. Remember not to beat yourself up, but it’s okay to feel anger at your current situation, and to use that anger to make progress. As long as you’re not lashing out that anger unto others.

The First Self Improvement Principle

“As a man thinketh in his heart, so is he.”

Your life is determined by your thoughts and perceptions of it. Manifestation and the law of attraction are merely misinterpretations of this principle. Your life is nothing but raw sensation, and you project meaning onto it.

Therefore, if you wish to lead a good life, it is your responsibility to take control of your thoughts. As Jim Rohn, the godfather of personal development said, “If you want your life to change, you have to change yourself!”

Often people get lost in waves of sadness, anger, jealousy, or fear, and they begin to take those emotions for granted. Then, their emotions become habits, and they become depressed.

Your brain works through neural pathways.

Neurons fire, and they fire in sequences. They do this to create thoughts, emotions, feelings, and perceptions about the world. When you allow negative emotions to become habits, you’re making neural pathways for these emotions. The more a neural pathway fires, the better it gets at firing, and therefore, you can get lost in cycles of depression.

The key here is to take full responsibility for your mind. If you do not do so, then your mind will get lost in cycles, and you will be blind as to why you feel depressed. If you take it as your duty to be perspicacious of your mind, and to catch thought cycles, and to discard negative ones, and create positive ones, your life will become better.

So how does one do this?

Awareness, vigilance, and persistence. You need to be aware of how your mind works, by constantly observing it. You need to be vigilant within your mind, understanding when you’re feeding into undesirable thought cycles. And you must persist. Your mind will try to deceive you, it will come up with excuses, and will try to put an upper limit on your growth.

It is your responsibility to make your mind your ally. You must use your awareness to get your mindset on track with your goals. If you can do this, you will be the creator of your own reality.

Thank you for reading! This has been Mason; I do life coaching and I am in the process of writing eBooks. Please let me know what you’d be interested in reading, and I’d be glad to write about it. For more Blogs like this, subscribe, its free!

On Suffering, Breaking Generational Curses, Love, and Fear

This feeling isn’t happiness, it’s equanimity.

There is no such thing as badness except for the concept of it, everything is a product of its own circumstances, and all explanations are constructions to describe chance.

It’s much more meaningful, and gratitude is the logic.

There is nothing but just “here”. Only thing that exists is this creation of the universe, and you cannot blame the universe for creating itself, as that is not logical. The universe has no negative intentions, therefore the negative intentions of people are just constructs of the universe, products of chance, and aren’t wrong at an absolute level.

Everyone is messed up in their own way. That’s how it goes. I have to be the person who breaks the cycles of hatred and fear and inspires others to do the same. Nobody is wrong, they are just ignorant/ products of their environment, usually one of a lack of love.

Think about someone I look up to and revere in the world of personal development. Why would I be anxious to have a podcast with them? They’re not perfect. In fact, they have their own independent biases and traumas and reactions to the universe, and they are products of chance. Just like me, we are all the same in this sense, we are all just “here”. Products of infinite creativity, or rather infinite creativity itself.

Therefore I should fear no one, as that is an illogical reaction to infinity. At a neutral and absolute standpoint, we are the same, and therefore, I am very similar to, possibly equal to others, and I can empathize deeply with them.

We are all products of chance. “Badness” is chance. Or state of consciousness, or infinite creativity. Whatever label you put on it, “here-ness” is nothing but itself, and all labels are also just here-ness. Non duality isn’t everything being the same, it is the realization that everything actually is the same thing: being.

If you had the power to dream any dream for infinite time, you’d first likely dream about extravagant things, money, sex, fame, or maybe less ego-driven things, maybe flying, but eventually you’d start dreaming complex dreams, dreams with evil, murder, drugs, immorality, you’d dream a dream with all the evil in the world, and a dream with no evil.

This, here, now, is nothing but one of those possible dreams. All of your childhood struggles are a part of the dream, an expression of a script, if you will. If you were an infinite playwright, then you’d eventually write a play exactly like this, where you’d struggle just as much, where evil would be just as abundant as goodness, where people would hate, love, fear, and be grateful. There are infinite dreams, infinite plays, and all happenings are nothing but expressions of the dream’s rules, or the play’s script.

Your parents are hurt by the harshness of the dream, and so were their parents. Trauma is a cycle of fear and hatred caused by ignorance and insecurity. If people understood empathy and love at the deepest level, the curses would be broken much more often. No longer would a person be hurt, then pass that hurt onto others, such as their own children. Then their children would be less likely to pass hatred unto others, and so on.

Some people are simply born without empathy. People with antisocial personality disorder, for example. They cannot control the fact that their genes made them that way, nor can you. They are merely a possibility in the expression of the infinite playwright, and any harm they cause in the world is a product of chance, of the infinite capabilities of creation.

So it should be your responsibility to cease judgement of the world and to inspire others to do the same. Understand empathy at the deepest level by recognizing that everything has a reason, and also that all meaning and reasoning is a construction, and in reality, the only thing that “is” is here-ness.

In order to inspire others, you must be the one strong enough to break everyone’s generational curses, to not hold hatred in your heart which has been put into you, so that you do not pass it unto others and continue the cycle. Radical forgiveness driven by a deep understanding of the truth behind circumstances is the way to heal. If you understand that everyone is merely a product of infinite chance, you can forgive them, be equanimous to them, and make reality more deeply empathetic.

You can only control your own action, perception, and will. If you focus on changing others, you will find that you become cynical and depressed. If you focus on healing yourself using radical forgiveness and empathy, realizing that reality is merely chance, or a dream, then you will begin to see others around you inspired, and the world a better place. Only when you focus on what you can control, by leading yourself in your healing journey, can you inspire others to do the same.

What You Can Control in Stoicism and How to Control it

In life there are things that we can’t and can control. The stoics argue that if we focus on what we control, we will live a good life.

What can we control in stoicism?

In stoicism, we can control what we say, think, and do. The stoics claimed that if we discipline our action, our perception, and our will, we can live a better and more virtuous life.

Controlling Your Action

You can control your actions, not other’s actions. You should make it a habit not to focus on what other people are doing, because you can’t control them. Instead, you should focus your efforts on doing what you think is right. When you control your own actions, you take control of the direction of your life. When you focus on other’s actions, you become miserable, because you can’t change them. Your priority should be yourself. Prioritizing your own actions is not selfish, it is actually selfless. If you’re always trying to get others to do what you think is right and you’re not doing what you think is right, you’re a mere preacher, and a hypocrite. Don’t be a coward and spend all your time trying to get others to do what is right, instead, do what is right.

Marcus Aurelius said in his journal Meditations,

“Waste no more time arguing what a good man should be. Be one.”

Aurelius understood that philosophizing and arguing with others about what they should do is a waste of time. He also understood that if he simply becomes the man he sees as good, others who wish to be good will follow his example. This is called leading by example, and psychology has proved that it is the most effective leadership strategy. Thus, focusing on being the best version of yourself, not trying to preach to others, actually helps you lead others, and of course, this is not selfish whatsoever.

Why do I write, then? Why try to help you? Because I focus on being the man I should be, and I believe that part of being good is to spread positivity and truth. I do not go around to people and tell them that they’re wrong, or they should be like me, I simply put this information out there for people to find it. The people searching for this information are not being preached at, they are being guided. I am doing work to help those on a similar path to me, not to try and drag people onto my path without their personal interest.

So to control your actions, focus on how you can be good, and be good. Make a list of habits that you will commit to doing everyday, and do them, no questions asked. My list is:meditation, gratitude journaling, journaling, reading, and exercise. Feel free to copy it if you want. I suggest making a paper sheet with days on the left side and your habits on the top, forming a grid that you can cross off daily to see your progress and consistency with your habits.

Disciplining your actions also means living by some sort of code. For example, your code could be:

Do not harm others, mentally or physically.
Tell the truth, or at least don’t lie.
Do not cheat or steal.
Do not indulge in excess pleasure without a purpose.
Commit to self-betterment, even on your worst days.

A code like this could seriously change your life. Telling the truth, not lying, not harming others, not indulging in pleasures, will turn you into a more peaceful, grateful, and positive human being overall.

Controlling Your Perception

How you perceive the world will determine how you live your life. If you learn to effectively control your perception, you will see the world in a better light, and you will behave more positively.

There is a psychological concept called reciprocal determinism. It states that a person’s environment impacts their behaviors, and then their behaviors shape their environment. Your environment, i.e. what is around you, will make you adapt to it. You will develop thinking patterns and perceptions that make you better or worse suited to your environment. Likewise, your behaviors shape your environment. What you do determines where you go, who you surround yourself with, and what you will do in the future.

Taking in this concept, you can control your behavior through disciplining your perception, and likewise control your environment. If you see the world more positively, you tend to act more positively, then you tend to land yourself in a better environment.

If you purposefully try to see the world in a better light, you will become a better person.

Take for example a nihilistic, pessimistic person. They view reality as meaningless, they see people as objects, and they see themselves as an insignificant person. This person will, as a result of their perception of reality, have low self-esteem, hatred toward others, and resentment towards life. They will suffer, and blame outside forces for making their life so horrible and sad. They will land themselves with toxic friends like them, in a toxic workplace, and in a toxic mindset. Their new toxic environment will further spiral them into their toxicity, because as we learned above with reciprocal determinism, a person’s environment shapes their behavior.

Contrastingly, consider in your consciousness a positive, responsible, and sociable person. This person will be able to take action under stress, guide themselves toward a solution, and have positive outcomes. This person will guide themselves toward positive relationships, and will find themself spiraling upward in positivity. This person will have high self-esteem, but will be aware enough not to let it become narcissism. This person will trust in the value of close, loving, and kind relationships, and will serve themselves first and thus be able to effectively serve the community. A positive person creates a positive environment, and the positive environment reinforces their positive personality.

Of course, you can go too far in both directions, especially the negative one. Too nihilistic and pessimistic, you may become hopeless and possibly desire not to exist. Too positive, you may become an annoyance or a narcissist. Find the point on the spectrum from negativity to positivity that you can thrive in. Somewhere around 80% positive 20% negative seems to be the sweet spot, the negativity being used only to effectively cope with life, and likewise the positivity being used responsibly.

The dichotomy of a positive or negative life is determined by the antithesis of perception. If you view life in a positive way, you will become more positive. The cliché phrase: “what you focus on grows” couldn’t be more than true.

Controlling Your Will

Building on the “what you focus on grows” idea, your will, defined by Oxford languages as: “the faculty by which a person decides on and initiates action,” is slightly different than just action. The stoics were not necessarily believers in free will, nor determinism, it seems as if they believed more that your intent was the decider of your fate. Your will is your ability to effectively manage and allocate your intent. What you intend is what to do, and what you do decides your future, as we learned above. Your intent also is rooted in who you are as a person. A positive person tends to have positive intent, and likewise, negative people tend to have slightly more negative or pessimistic intent.

To help you understand why you cannot control what you do, but only what you intend to do, let’s do an exercise.

Hold out your hand. Move it to the left. Move it to the right. Were you moving your hand?

The naive answer would be, “yes of course I was moving my hand!” but someone more aware of how the mind works would understand that it is not necessarily “you” who is moving your hand.

You intended to move your hand.

You intended for your hand to move, then your motor functions received the signal and moved your hand for you. You did not move your hand, you simply sent the message to your subconscious to do the work for you.

“You” aren’t in control of yourself as much as you think. “You” are merely in control of your intent, a.k.a. your will. Your thoughts, your habits, how you talk, how you act, every word you read in this article is all being done not by you, but by subconscious mechanisms. It is you, however, who is intending to read. It is you, however, who intends to speak, to think, to act.

I hope this thought exercise helped you understand what you are REALLY in control of. It’s not much. Your intent is a force which can change your life. Master your intent, master your thoughts. Master your intent, master your words, your actions, and you can shape your environment to your liking. Your intent is the precursor to all behavior, and as we learned before, your behavior determines your environment. To not get caught in a loop, you can willfully and strategically guide your intent to make you act how you want, think how you want, and thus, create the environment you want. You will get in the loop of reciprocal determinism, but that loop will be one of your choosing.

To effectively manage and guide your intent requires skill. And that is a good thing. It is a skill, like skills in video games, that you can level up. As you level up your ability to pilot your intent, you will level up your life. To become better at guiding your will, you must become aware of it. Start meditating and journaling to increase your self-awareness. Pay attention to your thoughts and where they come from. Understand what intentions lead you to desirable outcomes, and repeat those intentions. The more awareness you gain, the more intent you will be able to generate, and the better you will be able to determine the outcome of your life.

In stoicism, we can control our actions, our perceptions, and our will. Master these and you will become the captain of the ship in your life, and you will live a better life as a consequence.

Remember not to try to control others, because you can’t. Good luck on your journey!

-Mason

Recommended Resources

(Affiliate links, if you buy through these you support me with no added cost to you. Buy through here to help me keep writing these blogs for free)

Meditations by Marcus Aurelius

https://amzn.to/3NoMPWk

(One of the greatest philosophical works of all time, a great primer to stoicism and way to get you thinking like a stoic)

Enchiridion by Epictetus

https://amzn.to/3DsdU6B

(life changing, short manual to practicing stoicism)

Discourses and Selected Writings by Seneca

https://amzn.to/3DsdU6B

(Various writings on stoicism, very valuable.)

All three of these were written thousands of years ago. There’s a reason they’re still around today.

The Most Important Virtue in Stoicism and How to Practice it

Stoicism is a fantastic philosophy to lead a greater life and to better manage negative emotions. Stoicism has a sort of “honor code” with many principles and virtues that lead you in the right direction. Virtues are marks of excellence, character traits that lead to a better life.

The four virtues in stoicism are wisdom, justice, courage, and moderation.

What is the most important virtue?

Courage is the most important virtue because it is the precursor to all other virtues. Courage is the ability to face one’s fear, and fear is the obstacle of progress. Thus, courage is the most important virtue because it allows you to face your fears, make progress, and cultivate more virtue.

What is Courage?

Courage, put simply, is the ability to face your fears. However, the true definition is much more complex than that. Courage is the ability to understand fear, to understand the workings of the mind, and to navigate the mind effectively.

Understanding Fear

Fear is the drive to avoid something so that you can limit pain. Our fear instincts are complex and work to help us survive and avoid negative situations. However, the way that the brain computes fear is often too instinctual, leading us to do things that we shouldn’t, or not do things that we should.

We eat processed food because our bodies have learned to maximize sugar, fat, and salt, and we subconsciously fear more healthful foods because we are afraid they may cause us starvation.

We don’t talk to that guy or girl because we’ve been programmed by nature to fear strangers, as in the past a stranger could have killed us. However, nowadays we need to get more “loose ties” friendships to thrive in our society.

We become mean, angry, impulsive, and selfish because we fear that if we do not fend for ourselves, we will die or be betrayed.

The Fear of Progress

The most prevalent fear in our daily lives, however, is not just a survival instinct. It is a maladaptive trait that often leads us down the wrong path. This trait is the fear of progress. The fear of progress is the killer of man, the provider of comfort, and the mind’s betrayal of itself. We fear progress for a multitude of reasons, many of which also being fears. We fear progress because we fear the unknown, social situations, healthy choices, death, and even social isolation.

Progress brings new environments, new relationships and new responsibilities; in today’s abundant and comfortable society, these new things are uncomfortable, not necessary for survival, and thus, feared. We fear these things because we already have our survival necessities, and we don’t want to be uncomfortable or take on increased responsibility.

How Courage Creates an Excellent Life

The fear of progress can only be overcome with courage. As stated above, we fear progress because we naturally fear the unknown. If we do not come equipped to the journey of life with the courage necessary to face the unknown, we will not progress. Discomfort builds courage and also challenges it. When you’re uncomfortable, you need to be courageous enough not to break down, to learn, to grow, and to progress. Facing fear is the key to progress, and the key to facing fear is courage. Thus, courage equals progress.

Courage is Necessary for Other Virtues

Without courage, you will never be able to achieve other virtues because you need to face the fear of progress.

Courage=Moderation

Imagine that you want to start implementing moderation in your life, say, cutting back on caffeine, but you don’t have the courage to face the withdrawals. You will never be able to implement moderation if you can’t face your impulses. Impulses bring with them anxiety, and courage is needed to effectively counter that anxiety.

Courage=Justice

Imagine that you want to implement justice into your life. You want to discipline your mind, your morals, and become honest. Without courage, you will not have the ability to speak nor think the truth. With courage, you can accept the possible consequences of truth and reap the benefits of it.

Implementing justice can and will be a hard and anxiety-provoking task, but it is possible to live the truth through courage.

Courage=Wisdom

The pursuit of wisdom is also impossible without the cultivation of courage. Wisdom is the ability to love, understand, and embody truth, and in order to uncover the truth, you must have humility. Humility is the ability to accept that you are wrong, or you may be biased. Bias is the tendency that we all have to think untruthfully and wrongly.

For example, consider a political extremist that believes that harming another country is serving a god in some way. These people obviously are wrong from many people’s perspectives, but to themselves, they’re right 100%. They are biased toward themselves, and we are biased against them.

The person with humility would question bias on both sides and try to understand the matter without trying to take a side, and it takes courage to do this within such a two-sided world.

The person who values wisdom would likely conclude that the political extremist is relatively wrong through the questioning of their biases, but would more deeply understand the inner workings of that type of person’s mind.

Not having humility, being closed-minded, and being biased is a symptom of cowardice. It takes courage to face the mind’s tendency to be biased, and thus, it takes courage to acquire wisdom.

To attain wisdom, justice, and moderation, one must be courageous enough to face the fear of progress, and the complications of the mind. In order to become profoundly virtuous, you must become plentifully courageous.

How to Cultivate Courage

Your Ability to Practice it. Courage=Courage

Cultivating courage boils down mostly to your ability to practice it. If you do not put yourself in situations that require courage, you will never find it.

The truth is, we all have a hero inside us. We have a holy grail of confidence and bravery just waiting to be brought to the surface. We are often just too afraid to let it express itself or are too afraid to put ourselves in demanding situations. The hero inside of us is there, we just can’t see it, although; it’s waiting to be expressed at every moment.

Courage requires a great deal of courage. In order to let the hero shine, we need to put ourselves in tough situations. Often, uncomfortable situations bring out the best in us. In Cal Newport’s Deep work, he brings up an anecdote that I found fascinating.

Cal Newport’s Anecdote

Newport describes that there was once a science writer who developed a severe form of cancer. She said that the cancer was trying to “monopolize” her attention and steal her life from her. However, she focused hard on not letting the disease do so, and she instead focused on living her life well, and doing things she enjoyed.

This same person concluded that in order to live a meaningful life, you must effectively manage and guide your attention. When you use your attention deeply, you find meaning, responsibility, flow, and unmistakably, courage.

The same argument can be made about courage as well. When she was at her peak, dealing with her own mortality, she needed courage to be able to guide her attention so effortfully yet gracefully. She needed courage to wake up and be able to sleep the following night. She needed courage to let herself be happy.

Let The Hero Out

Cultivating courage takes courage. If you want to be courageous, you have to take responsibility for your courage and let the hero out. You need to let it flow from you, because it is inside all of us, just waiting to be expressed. You need to put your inner hero in demanding situations that call to action the courage necessary to thrive, and you will reap the rewards.

When you apply courage, and you apply voluntary discomfort, your courage gains will skyrocket. Your hero will no longer be a subconscious, unexpressed entity in your mind, your hero will merge with yourself. Courage will turn you into a hero so long as you are brave enough to let the hero shine.

Voluntary discomfort

A practical way to cultivate courage is to put yourself in situations that are uncomfortable, stressful, and anxiety provoking.

This is an ancient practice in which Seneca the stoic popularized through his writing. He wrote,

“Set aside a certain number of days, during which you shall be content with the scantiest and cheapest fare, with course and rough dress, saying to yourself the while: ‘Is this the condition that I feared?” (Letter to Lucillius)

Seneca would go out in his worst clothing, often just dirty robes in order to practice courage. He understood that through continual exposure to a stimulus, you adapt to it. Put in simple terms, when you practice being uncomfortable, you become comfortable being uncomfortable.

And what happens when you become comfortable being uncomfortable? Your hero shines. You become courageous and your self merges with confidence and bravery.

It is worth mentioning that modern psychology has put this concept into psychological terms. Cognitive behavioral therapy, exposure therapy, and the behaviorist perspective in general uses the concept of voluntary discomfort to get patients over their fears and live better lives. Taking a mild example, if one is afraid of spiders, increasing exposure to spiders over time will lead to adapting to spiders, and thus, the fear will extinguish.

The reason why this technique is used in psychology is because it works. The stoics were right about putting yourself in uncomfortable situations, because they understood that it brought out our innate bravery.

Practice voluntary discomfort, become virtuous, and let your hero shine.

Thanks for reading,

Mason.

Recommended Resources (Courage)

Courage is Calling by Ryan Holiday

https://amzn.to/3wCHvZq

A Guide to the Good Life by William B. Irvine

https://amzn.to/3LjOIBY

How to Create a Meditation Habit- Guide to Consistent Meditation

Creating a meditation habit is no joke. I’ve been trying to maintain a consistent practice for over 3 years and I still have yet to be perfectly consistent. However, over the years I’ve seen why establishing a meditation practice is so hard, and I’ve found the techniques and tips to creating a lasting meditation habit.

How do you start Meditating?

The answer is simple- start very small. Meditate for 5 to 10 minutes a day. At the start, use guided meditations and make sure that you meditate every single day, no matter what. Make your goal to meditate consistently, and don’t try to be perfect. Progress will come with consistency.

Why Establishing a Meditation Practice is Difficult

Meditation works against the mind. Most of the things we do help us to survive, however, meditation does not. Meditation is not necessary for survival, so our human drives work against it.

Meditation actually goes against our survival instincts. It fights our knee-jerk reactions, explores the mind, and makes us still. While our mind wants us to maximize stimulation, feast on food, and reproduce, meditation makes us still.

So why is meditation so hard? It opposes our survival.

Another reason meditation is so difficult is that our minds are constantly racing. School, work, family, life in general is stressful, and often overstimulating. Our minds are always thinking, planning, filled with anxiety, and we get used to it. We adapt to this anxiety, and it becomes habituated in our minds.

The natural cure to this stress and anxiety is meditation. However, because our minds are so used to stress, they tend to latch onto that stress. The mind strives for homeostasis– maintaining itself as best as possible, not going too far one way or another. Since our minds are so used to stress, anxiety, and overthinking, our point of homeostasis is that stress, anxiety, and overthinking.

When you try to disrupt this balance through meditation, the mind resists. Although you may want to be calmer, less stressed, and more mindful, the mind is more used to being the opposite, so it is resistant to change. Because of this, establishing a meditation practice goes against our habituated thinking patterns, and thus, is very difficult.

Consider also this reason: meditation is difficult because not many people do it. We are social creatures, so we tend to do what others around us are doing. Unless you were raised in a meditation community, it’s highly unlikely that you grew up around avid meditators. Because people around us aren’t meditating, we don’t feel motivated to do so. However, when people around us are constantly eating bad food, scrolling social media, or subscribing to toxic beliefs, we tend to copy those behaviors.

Taking in these biopsychosocial factors, establishing a meditation practice is difficult because it goes against our survival instincts, thinking patterns, and social norms. To establish a meditation practice, we have to learn to effectively counter these obstacles.

How to Establish a Practice

As stated above, creating a meditation habit is as simple as starting small. If you need to, you can start very small, even with just one minute of meditation per day. If you do not start small, you won’t be able to create a habit because you’ll be pushing too hard against your mind, your drives, and your social environment.

I also recommend that you use guided meditations for your first few months of meditation. This is because it makes creating the habit more effortless. Guided meditations will tell you what to do, teach you how to meditate, and provide a timer for how long you will be meditating. Guided meditations are easy to access and free. There are many on youtube, and many on various meditation apps.

Another way to make establishing a practice easier is to count your days in a strategic way, either using a habit tracker, day counter, or tallies on a piece of paper. If you have a way to track your meditation streak, it will aid you by keeping you accountable and motivating you to maintain your streak. Having a to-do list with meditation on it everyday is also helpful as a reminder that that is a daily task that you need to do.

There are many meditation apps out there, and a lot of them are good, a lot of them are just okay. I personally dislike the more mainstream meditation apps, because they often have misconceptions and generalizations about meditation that can be misleading. My favorite meditation apps are Insight Timer and Medito.

Insight timer has a huge range of guided meditations, a built in timer and streak tracker; and premium courses if you pay a subscription. I’ve used it on and off for the past 2 years, mostly for the timer and a few guided meditations. This app has a lot to choose from and alot to explore.

My favorite meditation app out of all of them is the volunteer-run “medito” which features daily meditations that are different every day, a huge range of free courses, a timer, and a built-in streak tracker. It has a minimalistic and easy to use design, a broad range of meditations, and provides a great way to learn and deepen meditation practice. I am not sponsored by either of these apps, I genuinely like and use them.

If you use all these tips, get a useful meditation app, and start small with your practice, you can be sure to become consistent in no time. Make sure that you also set a dedicated daily time that you meditate if you can, as that will also accelerate the process of forming a habit.

If you struggle to remember to meditate or struggle with consistency, then try your best to make it a priority. Remember that a decision is a commitment with no wiggle room, so if you want to meditate, it is your responsibility to do it every day, no matter what.

Common Obstacles and Traps

If you think you’re the special case that can’t meditate, you’re not. Everyone can meditate, and this is the first trap that people fall into. Out of everyone I’ve tried to get to start meditating, I’d say 80% of them make the excuse that “I just can’t meditate” or “I can’t clear my thoughts”. Of course I say back “that is not the goal of meditation, the goal is to meditate with diligence, not to clear your mind.” I understand that they don’t understand what I mean when I say that, but they don’t want to know anyways. They’re already set on not meditating, so why teach them if they don’t want to start anyways? If they really wanted it, they’d find out how.

Anyways, everyone can meditate, because the ultimate goal of meditation is not some clear mind, an enlightenment, or any special meditative state. The goal of meditation is to meditate, and to do so with diligence and excellence. So you may ask, what is meditation, then? Meditation is the process of examining and exploring awareness without trying to judge it. Therefore, there are many ways to meditate, and many ways to mess it up.

Let’s take for example mindfulness meditation, or “focusing on the breath”. This type of meditation focuses and examines the awareness of the breath, and when thoughts or sensations arise, the meditator is supposed to not judge them. This is the process of meditation. Awareness and non-judgement.

So when one says “I can’t meditate, I can’t clear my head” they should understand that that is okay. The goal of meditation is not to clear your mind, it is to focus on whatever awareness is focusing on, for example, the breath, and to not judge other thoughts or sensations. Furthermore, it is not enough just to do that process once, meditation is the diligent, in other words persistent and focused process of practicing non-judgement and focused awareness.

That new definition of meditation applied properly will aid you in avoiding most of the traps; however, there are some other traps to beware of.

Listed below:

The trap of “progress”- trying to progress, achieve states, or to force your meditation practice will actually lessen your progress. Trying too hard makes you judge things unnecessarily.
The trap of “not enough time”- everyone has 1-20 minutes every single day to meditate. This is a lazy excuse and should be disregarded.
The trap of “being bored”- Not everything in life is supposed to be fun. If meditation is so boring for you that you can’t do it, you likely have some sort of overstimulating addictions or activities in your daily life that you should let go of. Learn to be bored, it’s a necessity for living a good life.
The trap of “being a bad person”- In buddhist teachings, they teach morality before they teach meditation. If you’re mean to others, unfair, or have a lot of unresolved unconscious issues, meditation will be very hard/ scary for you.
The trap of overthinking. Quit trying to find out how to meditate, quit looking for a quick-fix solution to your problems. Everything you need to start meditating is in this article, so use this as a tool and start your habit today. Trust yourself that you can take responsibility to create a meditation practice.

My Recommended Resources

I recommend these two books (affiliate links) to deepen your practice and to understand meditation. If you buy through these links, you support me with no added cost to you. Thank you!

The Mind Illuminated

https://amzn.to/37MYbDh

Mastering the Core Teachings of the Buddha

https://amzn.to/3qkqnDE

Thank you for reading and good luck on your journey,

Mason

How to Generate Ideas Fast

Generating ideas can be tough. You may be asking the question; how can I generate ideas fast? The answer is simpler than you think.

How do you generate ideas fast?

Generating ideas boils down to three thigs: time, focus, and values. You need to have enough time to brainstorm the ideas you want to create; you also must dedicate blocks of time to generate ideas. You need focus to generate ideas in order to squeeze the best juice out of your mind, and you need values to generate ideas quickly so that your mind knows what it needs to create, and so it is not focused on other things.

Time

Time is the number one asset in idea generation. When you dedicate time and energy into generating ideas, many good ideas will come.

To properly generate ideas (and to do it quickly) You need to set aside blocks of time, around 30 minutes to an hour, of dedicated idea generation. To generate good ideas, set aside a time with just you, a pen, and a journal. To begin the process, relax your body and mind, and get ready to write. When you are ready, begin to think and write down ideas. The first ideas you write down will suck. They will suck a lot. But after you push through and dedicate more time to writing these ideas down, you will notice that they start to get good. The ideas become more complex, nuanced, and valuable. Setting aside this time allows your mind to push through the barrier of bad ideas and start generating good ones.

The reason this works is because your mind works in such a way that when it is given a destination, it will move toward that destination the best it can. Imagine your mind is like a homing missile. The missile makes corrections until it gets a clear path to its target. To make these corrections, the missile fails repeatedly. Another example of this is searching for a pen in a dark room. You have an objective, the pen, but the task is hard. You will repeatedly fail, but eventually, you will arrive at the objective. Without the target, without the objective in mind, your mind cannot fail forward and get where you want it to go. Setting aside time, with the goal in mind of idea generation, your mind will fail at first, generating bad ideas. Over time, however, your mind will correct the course it’s going on and arrive at the objective: valuable ideas.

Focus

Focus is the primary driver of idea generation. Without focus, your ideas will lack what is necessary to make them good ideas. With focus, ideas become more beautiful and valuable.

How do you focus?

To focus better on ideas, you must understand the concept of deep work and apply it in the process of idea generation.

To put it simply, you must of course set aside blocks of time, but these blocks of time must be distraction free, ruthlessly focused blocks of time. You must set aside all distractions and only have you and the paper, or you and whatever medium you’re expressing your ideas. At first, you’ll be in what I call the “mud”, which is essentially brain fog that you need to push through in order to get the best ideas. Once you begin to focus, you need to focus deeper, write down every idea, and focus deeper on every idea that follows. Eventually you will cultivate flow, and that flow will produce many profound and beautiful ideas.

I cannot describe it as the creator of the phrase himself, read Deep Work by Cal Newport to get this concept fully. Buy through this link (affiliate) if you’d like to support me with no added cost to you.

Values

Values are like a hidden secret in idea generation.

What are values, even? It’s like this word gets thrown around constantly and no one ever describes simply what values are.

Values are your priorities.

Values are what you love about life.

Values are your desired traits.

Values are what you consume, what media you partake in, what opinions you have, what arguments you get in. In short, values are what you stand for.

Values; however, are fluid and ever-changing. This means whatever you desire to be, you can shift your values to serve these desires.

The problem is your values are likely being thrown off by today’s society. Instead of valuing virtue, creativity, wisdom, and duty, you might value Mcdonalds and Netflix. It’s a sad truth, but it is the truth. You have values that you probably don’t want, but they’ve been imprinted into you by your animalistic self.

The good news is that you are the controller of your values. You choose what you stand for. What you stand for is what you do, and therefore you decide your course of action through your values. Don’t have motivation? Fix your values. Are you not getting any good ideas? Fix your values. Lost in life? Find some values.

Basically, values decide the course of your life, and similarly, your ideas. If you want x ideas but have y values, your concern should be to get x values so that you can get x ideas.

Discipline your values, you gain control over your ideas, and generate even more fruitful ones. I’d suggest taking a values assessment to understand you values and see where you’d like to change.

And changing your values is simple, it’s a matter of keeping your desired values in mind. Write them down, act on them, think with them, and be them until they become you.

What fast idea generation will look like:

You sit down. You’ve dedicated a 30-minute block of time to generate ideas. You have a notebook and pen in front of you, and your phone is put to the side, no screens around you, no music to interfere, no books, no people, no distractions around you. You recite your top values in your mind. You breathe deeply and calm your mind and let your values overcome you. You begin to write whatever ideas come to mind. You know the first few aren’t very good, but you keep writing. There are times where you blank and you cannot think of any ideas, but you focus deeply through these and fight through the mud. You cultivate flow, and fantastic ideas begin pouring out of you, you write them all down, so many ideas that you fill multiple pages. Your 30 minutes end and you’re happy with the result, and ready to act on some of these ideas.

Thank you for reading!

This has been Mason; I appreciate your read. Feel free to message me with ideas or questions!

Mason’s Minimalist 4-day Workout Routine

UPPER/LOWER

You will be working out 4 days a week on this routine. Do 2 days in a row, take a rest day, 2 more days in a row, and then two more rest days, then start again.

MTWTFSS (The week)

ULRULRR (The routine) Upper=U Lower=L Rest=R

You can change this around to fit your schedule better but keep the layout the same.

The Routine

Stick to this and you’ll achieve your goals. If you’re not making progress, you need to either stay consistent for longer, add more weight over time (make every workout a little bit harder) or eat less (if you’re not losing weight) or eat more (if you’re not gaining weight).

Upper

Bench- 4 sets of 5 (push yourself to add weight every week)
Deadlift- 2 sets of 8 (push yourself to add weight every week)
Barbell Shoulder Press- 2 sets of 10 (push yourself to add weight every week)
Optional: 2×15 face pulls, 2×10 lateral raises, 2×8 pullups (can add weight)

Lower

Squat- 4 sets of 5 (push yourself to add more weight every week)
Leg Raises- 2 sets of 10
Leg Curls- 2 sets of 10 (optional)
Calf Raises- 2 sets of 12

Rest

Stretch.
If you’d like to be more active on rest days, you can do cardio/ab training.

With this routine, you will build muscle and get stronger. Thats all you need from a routine. Eventually, you may need to switch things up (if your body gets too used to this routine or if you get too advanced) but this routine should work well for your first year or few years of progress. Stay consistent, you will see results. And don’t forget to increase the weight whenever you can. That’s the key here. You have to push yourself.

This is all you need. If you have any questions, comment on this blog post and I’ll do my best to answer.

Mason

The Biggest Lie Ever Told to Creative People

“CREATIVITY CANNOT BE FORCED”

Short YouTube Version

I was in psychology class a few days ago and we were going around saying the worst things about our break. An art student raised her hand, she said to the class, “the worst thing about my break was that I turned in a project 4 months late.” she then went on to say “because you can’t force it.”

My psychology teacher kind of just went, “yeah…” and we moved on, but myself—having read The War of Art by Steven Pressfield—was taken aback at the absurdity of this statement.

In the book stated above, the creative process is laid out in such a way that reveals that “creative blocks” are complete bullshit excuses caused by our lazy monkey brains.

It goes like this:

Resistance/Monkey Mind: “I don’t feel like creating today, let’s take a day off.”

Higher self: *laughs at monkey mind “Quiet down. Let’s get the muse flowing.”

Resistance/Monkey Mind: “But we are tired, we already worked today, we aren’t even inspired!”

Higher self: *Recognizing it’s just resistance trying to stop creation, as it’s a force with no goal but to stop creation: “Time to sit down and begin despite all the lies you like to tell me.”

Basically, the process of creation, The War of Art, is a process in which resistance and the higher self continuously fight over one thing- beginning the act of creation.

What is required to conquer this resistance is a simple mindset shift- inspiration is not something outside of our control.

Random, spontaneous bouts of inspiration may come to us, but due to the fact that inspiration is perishable, we cannot rely on this spontaneity. We must take responsibility into our own hands to create inspiration. Every day, we must meet the conditions required to begin the process of inspiration, of flow.

We must have the strength to tell resistance to shut its mouth and begin.

We need to have the ability to brute force through this negative inner voice, because without this discipline, we will never create anything substantial.

Creativity Can be Forced Through Starting

The process of creativity is truly begun when one begins to create. The mind must be drained of self-doubt with a simple act of telling resistance to “fuck off.” Then, the next step is to sit down, to stand up, to open the laptop, to turn on the camera, to write that script, to open that PSD file, to brainstorm, to turn on the microphone. You must START the process of creativity, then the muse of creativity will guide you along.

Creativity begins with effort.

It is true that creativity can’t necessarily be forced, but the conditions that are required to cultivate creativity CAN be forced.

The truth is, you’re not creative because you’re lazy. Admit it. You just don’t have enough brainpower to get out of your monkey mind; and therefore, tell the monkey mind to “fuck off.”

Shutting the door on resistance is a skill, and that skill must be leveled up. Every day, the only thing you can do to start creating is to start creating despite the massive mental fog in your way. Once you start, once you push through the initial phase where you feel slow and uncreative, you will notice magic beginning to happen. What happens is, once you climb up the steep part of the mountain, to begin creating, you reach the top, where you no longer have to climb. You enter an effortless, magical flow of creativity, almost as a muse has possessed your mind and blessed it with the insights to create.

Again, this is a skill, one that must be leveled up. In order to reach bigger and greater flow states, you must practice breaking through resistance. You must learn to love and treat the magical flow as a friend. Get to know it. Get to know resistance too, but just politely (or impolitely) tell it to move aside each day. As you go through this process, you will move past resistance more and more until the amount of resistance in your way is minimal.

Let’s take the example of a writer in the process of conquering resistance.

The writer wakes up with resistance in mind. He understands that resistance will face him today, and he will do his best to conquer it. He completes his morning routine of meditation, gratitude journaling and a cup of chai tea. The thoughts begin to pour in. “You’re not good enough” “let’s take a day off” “Just quit this writing thing” The writer laughs in the face of these thoughts as he recognizes it as resistance, a familiar foe. He opens up his document and starts to type. The voice gets stronger, he messes up some words, his concision is off, but again, he pushed the self-doubt to the side. The writer keeps writing, and it all starts to click again. He is effortlessly typing every word, from mind to keyboard, he is like a stream of insight pouring into the document. The writer now smiles, because this is also familiar. This is the magical flow, the deep work, the muse, the friend who he relies upon to write what he loves to write. He writes for a few hours until he recognizes it’s a good time to stop and start again the next day. He finishes his day with healthy habits and routines to optimize his health and to win the battle against resistance the next day. As the writer falls asleep, he understands that he will face the enemy once again when he rises in the morning. And the next day, he understands that he will face it again. The writer goes on to create masterpieces due to his awareness, recognition, and constant strategic victory against resistance.

Your Masterpiece

Visualize your greatest work. Your dream project, your creative vision that will change the world. For me, this could be a fantastic photoshop manipulation, or a 300-page book chock full of fresh insights, or a YouTube video that will change millions of lives.

Now what I want you to do is to visualize the amount of time it will take to create this masterpiece.

Inspiration is perishable, and if you rely on spontaneous inspiration, this masterpiece will never be created, and its impact on the world will never occur.

THE SOLUTION

You must commit to creating inspiration.

To create inspiration, you must, like the writer, sit down every day and conquer resistance. You must begin, and you must work deeply without distraction.

You must trust in the principle to “do the hard work, especially when you don’t feel like it.”

Sit down and begin to create every single day. Fight through the mud. Conquer resistance. The magical flow will appear. It will possess your mind. Let it flow through you, let creation occur. Let the muse share her most beautiful work through you. Once she is done, (usually 1-5 hours of creativity) rest, and recharge.

Create the conditions to create creativity every day. If you’re a writer, begin writing, and don’t stop until you’ve been in the flow for at least an hour.

Read The War of Art by Steven Pressfield for a deeper exploration of this topic.

The War of Art (amazon affiliate link, support me by buying through here)

Stop starting, start finishing. Thanks for reading,

Mason

Building in public.

Hey friends,

If you can’t tell, I’ve been watching Ali Abdaal lately.

I recently watched his video called “How Writing Online Made me a Millionaire” And one thing he mentioned about blogging was to build in public. To document the process.

My name is Mason Pomeroy. I’ve been very into self-development for 5 years now. You can find my oldest work online by looking up “962lifestyle”. 962lifestyle was a “business” that wasn’t actually a business that me and my buddy Jesse made. It never took off, probably because our content sucked and we gave up, but there’s content there if you want to go see it. It was very basic, wide stuff. Like “how to achieve your goals” style posts. We didn’t understand that that type of stuff doesn’t take off, but the whole reason we made broad stuff like that was because we thought appealing to a larger audience is the way to success.

The biggest lesson I’m learning right now about building online traffic is that we as people are unique, but not that unique. What we desire to make in our hearts is usually great content, because although we may think the niche is too small, that’s how you build a brand. You’ve got a bunch of specialized knowledge that perfectly fits these little, tiny niches. I’m realizing that trying to appeal to a large audience is actually what stunts my growth, and the niche topics that I want to cover aren’t to save for when I gain a following-They’re the means to the following.

Right now, the biggest problem I face is the massive (what feels like) pile of sand I have to dig through in order to build a following.

I do my work for its own sake, but I can’t not build a following. This is what I want to do.

What I’ve realized in this journey is that making friends is the key to get the ball rolling. The more into the community I get, joining discords, direct messaging people, etc., the more I realize how powerful one person is. When I meet someone new, have a genuine conversation with them, we share our socials, we communicate, we bounce ideas off of each other, it’s awesome. And the best thing about making these friends? They’re free engagement. Every single new friend you make will be liking your posts consistently. Commenting, sharing, etc. Having a friend in your niche is like having an extra advertisement running for you at all times. It’s great.

Right now, I don’t have many friends in my niche. Maybe 5 or 6, but only 2 or 3 of them are consistently engaging. The others are people to talk to. What I’m realizing, and what I will share with you, is that I need to stop focusing on the first 1000 subscribers but start focusing on the first 100 friends.

Every friend I make is an extra like, comment, and share. If with every post I make, let’s say 50% of my 100 friends do this, Thats 50 likes (plus whatever the algorithm brings) 50 comments, and 50 shares! So that means with every post, I’m getting massive engagement which is driving my growth through the roof.

I’m not exactly sure how to make these friends, but I’m in the process of doing so. Maybe I will make a group, a tribe, lead an engagement group for content creators in the self-development niche. Even if it’s just 20 people to start, imagine the compound growth I can achieve there.

As I am writing this, I’m getting a beautiful idea on how to get the ball rolling. I will post a video titled “I’m starting a small group of self-improvement content creators.” If I do this, and just 5 people find me through there, say I get 5 from networking on Instagram, 5 that I already have, and 5 friends of the new friends. Thats 20 people, that’s a strong engagement group, that can really help our growth. The best thing about this is that I not only will be helping myself, but I also will be helping other people like me get the ball rolling.

So, there is my current plan for growth. If you have any advice, would like to join this group, etc., reach out to me on discord (Mason#6599) or Instagram @expandmason.

The other problem I’m dealing with is impostor syndrome. I’m only 17, so who’s going to want my advice? Well, I think I am successfully curing my impostor syndrome, and I’m doing it well. Basically, I shifted my identity from “self-help guru/teacher” to “self-help mentor/friend.” I realized no matter how young I am, I can help the people that are one step behind me. I can help the younger version of myself. I can be that productive friend you never had, that friend who’s good at talking and giving advice, and getting people to take action. I can do this, and I’m confident in it. Just that change in self-image changed everything. My motivation skyrocketed. For people to watch me as a friend they never had, that’s beautiful.

The second way that I cured the impostor syndrome is shifting the mentality to “I must be a perfect teacher who knows the most and only teaches” to “I will teach as I learn, I will share my highlights and what I found interesting, all while building in public and documenting my journey.” This mindset shift is also changing everything, as I am not perfect, I can be humble. I can teach as I learn without posing as some sort of God. I can be that friend to bounce ideas off of, to learn from, to grow with. That means everything to me, because younger me always wanted more friends like that. My most meaningful friendship, Jesse, his website here, is one just like this. We bounce ideas off of each other, we grow together, we share our content on each other’s platforms.

So, in short, my goal is no longer to build an audience. That will come. Right now, I must take the first step, and make friends.

If you want to befriend me on this journey, message me on discord (Mason#6599) or on Instagram @expandmason. Thank you for reading,

Mason