Meditation
I reached a milestone. 10 consecutive days of meditation.
I still don’t see or feel its benefits. Probably due to my lack of awareness.
But regardless, this goes to show I’m improving (at building this habit).
Important lessons I noticed while learning how to meditate were:
- Accept things (or thoughts) as they are with no judgment.
- If you mess something up, don’t be too harsh on yourself. Start over.
- The point is not to find perfection, it is to notice when you’re doing something wrong. Use self-awareness to avoid further damage.
Exercise for 2-minutes
I was able to keep up with the new set for 6-days, except Saturday. Why? I got up late. Why? I went swimming the day before and I was tired as f*ck.
I replaced my 2-minute exercise with swimming (for about 30-minutes).
I’m thinking about turning swimming into a “weekend thing”.
There is this technique called “Total Immersion” I wanted to learn. Why? My weak stamina only allows me to swim 2 continuous laps without struggling to catch my breath.
The technique is also known as “effortless swimming” (heard it from Tim Ferriss). It’s the kind of swimming where you use your arms more than your legs.
Dealing with Anxiety
A recent discussion with a close family member reminded me of the debilitating effects of anxiety.
Fear exists to help us avoid danger. But failing to control fear could bring us closer to danger.
What do I mean? We tend to come up with gazillion worst-case scenarios in our head. That puts a shitload of mental work to our brain which steals our focus away from the present moment.
The downward spiral starts when:
Step 1) You start to worry (or get anxious) about something.
Step 2) You come up with what-if worst-case scenarios that could happen (if you can’t properly deal with that something).
Step 3) You start to get more worried because you don’t know how to handle the worst-case scenarios (you came up with).
Step 4) Overwhelmed, now you’re more anxious/worried. Then you start all over from Step-1.
The loop will keep going until you’re unable to do anything, basically disabled…in your own head.
I also read about this from The Subtle Art of Not Giving a F*ck. It’s called “The Feedback Loop from Hell” (pg. 5).
I talked to others about this to check if they’ve been through the same experience before. Most of them couldn’t quite understand why I let my thoughts screw me over. It’s funny and weird on the surface but it’s also scary as shit when you’re going through it.
Puzzled, I got myself checked by the doctor thinking that there was something (physiologically) wrong with me. But I came out “normal”. That said if I’m physiologically normal, perhaps the anxiety is triggered psychologically? Maybe I’m a little kookoo in my head BUT not in a way where I needed to talk to a psychiatrist, a psychologist or a mental health professional. It hasn’t gone that far yet LOL. I was able to deal with the issue eventually but it never went away, I just got better at dealing with it 😉
How? I started by addressing it, by acknowledging the thoughts and by realizing that the thoughts I come up with only exists in my head (not in reality). It’s a little complex to explain. But all I did basically was to increase my focus on reality (the present moment) and not focusing too much on the worst-case scenarios in my head.
Don’t get me wrong, the worst case scenarios you come up with are totally valid. Therefore, ACCEPT all that bad shit that could happen BUT come up with solutions (instead of coming up with more worst case scenarios). Close the ‘loop’ by addressing the problem with a solution. This is how I train my brain to shut the f*ck up.
I dealt with my anxiety (towards driving) by acknowledging that I could get into an accident. I told myself that if I ever got into an accident, someone would call an ambulance to take me to the hospital. Done. Problem and solution were addressed. Move on to the next problem. Dealing with a “whiny and fearful reptilian brain” is exhausting. But the thought of not doing anything (about the problem) is worse than suffering from the problem. “Life happens at the end of your comfort zone”...right?
I still feel that anxiety. It never left. But whenever the feeling of anxiety creeps up, I remind myself of the past gazillion times I was able to get through it. The anxiety eventually dies down then Life is A-Ok again.
The video below shows I deal with anxiety: I run towards it, trip and then get back up again.