Breaking Out Of Old Patterns and Accepting That We're Pieces of Shit

At the core of my life is this feeling of lack. This feeling that something is missing and it’s so hard to sit with for long periods of time. I’m unsure why it’s so difficult to resolve this lack, or if the nature of my attempts at resolution are utterly looking in the wrong directions.

Joy is something I have a really hard time experiencing. I convince myself that being happy is not a good thing and only through pain and suffering can I get myself in a position with my life that I’m happy with. In my daily journaling session this morning I wrote to myself “joy can be warrior-like too” which stemmed from this realization that everyone has different temperaments and what is easy to one person is hard for another.

For someone that is highly ambitious and always serious, cultivating joy may be the most difficult growth edge, whereas for someone that loves to have fun 24/7, buckling down, cultivating ambition and seriousness may be the most difficult edge. It’s entirely dependent on the person.

As Pema Chodron says, begin with hopelessness. Accept that you’re a piece of shit and then get curious about the nature of that piece of shit. Instead of instantly falling into our piece of shit patterns, we can stop enough to notice how we react. That loneliness is the highest of virtues. Being lonely IS the work. We must sit with the feeling long enough until it has taught us the lessons that we need to learn. Being mindful and present with the pain will be more generative in the long run then finding that which makes us comfortable.

Self-respect means not judging our experience. It means being with the depths of pain and realizing that this means nothing about our core wholeness as a human being. No matter how hard the pain gets, we’re never incomplete. Wholeness is our birthright. Feeling suffering doesn’t mean that something is wrong. This is what I’ve been trying to internalize these days.

Then there’s this frustration. The constant frustration that I’m not showing up in the ways that I want to show up. That I’m not courageous enough or that I’m not living the life that I want to live.

I’m seeing so many jawdroppingly inspiring forms of content online and I compare that with my newsletters and podcasts and get frustrated with myself. Despite this frustration, I’ve made a commitment to myself to continue to suck until I learn what I need to learn. Yet as I write this commitment the doubt comes rushing back in and conjuring up narratives that say that I’m doing it wrong. Thinking that I’m committing to the wrong thing. That maybe I’m not supposed to be doing this.

Then the annoyance and anger comes piling on top when I’m not only mad at myself but also mad at those in my life because I know deep down that we could all be showing up in more healthy and wise ways.

Then I remind myself that I’m only human after all. Anger and annoyance are natural parts of the human experience and there is no way around it. The courage to share these thoughts is something that I’m mustering with every ounce of my being right now.

As I continue writing these newsletters and recording podcasts, I am increasingly aware of how many of us, including myself, are trapped in echo chambers. It has become evident to me that relying solely on platforms like TikTok, Instagram, and YouTube for information makes it nearly impossible to avoid falling into an echo chamber. I stand firmly by this belief.

Nevertheless, it is crucial for us to actively break free from these echo chambers. Just as you can go to the gym to shape your body, you can also engage with weightier and more substantial forms of information, such as books and dense lectures, to diversify your information intake. Whether you choose to watch TikToks or immerse yourself in profound lectures is entirely up to you, but transitioning from consuming 90% TikToks to 90% lectures may require some effort and gradual adjustment.

You can consistently challenge yourself with more demanding information reps so that the quality of your thinking also improves.

Do I live what I preach? Hell no. The quality of my information consumptions goes in phases. When I’m feeling good I’ll be watching lectures in my zzzzzzzzzzzz. Other times I’ll feel darker than a cave and will watch Tik Tok and IG reels for hours every single day. A true downward spiral, or as Vervaeke more academically called it — parasitic processing.

A fundamental motivation behind crafting these newsletters is to gain clarity regarding what wise decision making looks like. Through articulating in simple language the ways in which I become ensnared within echo chambers, I aspire that in my future when I find myself mindlessly scrolling through Instagram reels, I am able to swiftly recognize the pattern and have enough courage to alter course in that moment.

As I’m consistently attempting to break my patterns I’m noticing the guilt that comes with it. The internal signals of my body that I used to listen to, I now have to ignore. When I feel guilt, I choose to remind myself that what’s underneath it is fear and that needs to be let go of. Because of this, growth is a maddeningly complicated process. It’s near impossible to have certainty around our decisions. We’re all just feeling in the dark (or at least that’s how I’m experiencing it these days.)

My entire existence feels like a constant battle against familiar patterns, driven by the anticipation of eventually encountering a fresh and enriching experience of life. Albeit the change is slower than drying paint.