OOO...
Well I didn't mean to scare you with such a medical term. However in the last month I've been in and out of bad habits like socks. When people say bad habits die hard they are not joking.
Now for those people who know me, I have numerous incredibly bad habits. I've been reading several books and other sources in order to deal with these problems or sticking points as a man once told me.
Tragically I have a tendency to fall back into these bad habits or behaviours. I have been reading Anthony Robbins book 'Awaken the Giant Within' which is making more and more sense to me the more times I keep re-reading the same chapters. So far I have read two chapters and what has become apparent to me is the misconception that I've had regarding behaviour change. My focus has been on the behaviour as opposed to the cause behind it.
Anthony Robbins advocates that people are driven by two twin forces; Pain and Pleasure. Some people are inherently driven towards causing as much pleasure in their lives as possible and others somehow always end up in pain. AHA! (corny, I know :P). All this time I had been focusing on changing my sleeping patterns, changing my diet, my fitness, my financial situation, my social life. This approach had been stalling my progress for years because despite changing the behaviour of say, my sleeping pattern (my goal being to wake up early everyday), I'd end up back where I started; waking up at unholy hours such as 4-9pm.
For years this one thing has affected numerous aspects of my life from my health to social life and financial situation. I could describe all of the problems that sleeping late has caused in my life but like my previous post I'd rather remain positive and focus on solutions instead.
A couple of things that come to mind when thinking about the whole idea of goals is commitment. Lemme explain. When focusing on achieving my goals, I have looked at my whole life and written up a bunch of goals that I'd like to achieve then went about trying to achieve those goals. WRONG! WRONG! WRONG! Firstly, I focused on too many goals, thus making me efficient at multitasking but rubbish at perfection. Secondly, as a man multi-tasking is an unnatural act as men tend to be incredibly bad at doing too many things at once, the reason why you will never see a male secretary. Enough about gender relations and back to the topic! Thirdly, my vocabulary has been incredibly detrimental to my progress. Some examples of this include:
- Try
- Want
- Like
- May
- Can
My point being, that I had been trying rather than being committed to achieving a goal. See the difference. When I try something, I leave room for laziness. However, when I am committed to achieving something, it's concrete as it speaks not only of the present but the future also. There is simply no room for laziness or relapsing into bad habits. So as this is a solutions based blog, I will be posting ONLY solutions to problems I am having rather than dwelling on how the problems are affecting my day to day life.
What I have gained from the two chapters I have read from Tony Robbins is that I must focus on fewer goals, find a method of achieving these goals and change my method until I find one that works. I must also be very specific about the details of these goals i.e. the when, the why and the what. In summary, it is not the 'how' but the 'what' and 'why' that is important. As one of my fav authors stated 'you must begin with the end in mind'.
I took heed of this and adopted it to my life. I am committed to obtaining my driver's license by March 31st 2009. I am also committed to moving out of my mother's house once I have achieved my driver's license. I realise the second goal is not concrete, however, they are linked by finance. I must first raise the capital required in order to take driving lessons, pay for relative material, pay for provisional license, pay for theory and practical tests. So finance is the link.
I will not achieve any of these goals if I do not get some form of continually based capital. I am committed to achieving these goals. A good metaphor is that I am like an onion constantly peeling my outer layers (achieving my goals) until I am dead. Pretty dramatic I know.
The point of this post is this: Until recently I have been constantly looking at the symptoms rather than the actual cause behind the symptoms. In other words: why the hell do I do what I do?
Tony Robbins identified two twin forces that drive every human being to do what they do; Pain and Pleasure. He also identifies that the reason why things you know you should do are constantly procrastinated is because you associate a certain level of pain to them. This pain is held up by limiting beliefs that have been conditioned into me over the years and taken the form of 'bad habits'.
So........by re-framing those actual tasks as Pleasure they will eventually become ingrained into my day to day life.
This realisation had a profound effect on me because I now truly understand the reason why I do what I do; comfort which equals happiness. I brush my teeth really slow and deliberate not because I am retarded and have a slow neurotic system but because I hate bad breath and the effect it has on people's perception of me. This leads me to the fact that I actually care what people think of me which is not the preferred method of thinking for an aspiring PUA.
So all this is down to the fact that I care what people think about me. I have associated bad breath with pain which is good but the long process I take every morning in order to avoid bad breath is really bad as it is TIME CONSUMING. It also gives me red eyes which I hate as it makes it look like I've been deprived of sleep. Another bad look for an aspiring PUA.
So to combat this ;caring about what others think', I will take up improv classes. From what I've read improv classes can be pretty, ehm, adventurous, something ideal for my sticking point. All of the solutions to the problems I have stated in previous posts were valid but I have not remained committed to them because of this underlying belief that I care what people think.
There is a difference between being socially aware of yourself and caring what others think of you. By caring about what others think I am investing my self-esteem based upon what others think of me. BAD! This is an incredible realisation as after all these years in the community the one underlying message is that in order to be good with women or comfortable in female company you must be detached from social conditioning. You can't give a fuck about social norms if you wish to have a lot of casual sex with several females. There is no other option.
I am committed to attending improv classes in order to break off some of the social conditioning I have been subjected to over the years.
That's it. Until I achieve those goals I will not make any new ones. I am changing only the approach to achieving these goals such as researching new job vacancies on a daily basis, not wanking, improving my diet and fitness regime, improving my overall lifestyle. All of the content in the previous post are still relative and valid. I will continue to blog whenever I feel like it and also to take notes on a daily basis on my findings.
James
