Author Topic: Help me help myself  (Read 2249 times)

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Offline Idiosyncrasy

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Help me help myself
« on: October 02, 2014, 11:35:25 pm »
We all have our faults.  It's time that I expose some of my real-life areas for improvement.  Any thoughts on how I can improve myself?  These are all things that I have both self-identified and that I've been told by others.

1) I over-analyze things.  Though I am an analyst by profession, I over-analyze everything.  It's annoying, even to me.
   a) I over-complicate things.  Related to number 1, but a little different.  I almost over-complicated this point with extra detail, like you wouldn't know what I meant.
2) I take things too personally.  This used to be that I would get defensive easily, but I have since cut back on the defensiveness.  But I still take some things personally.
   a) I also care too much about what others think about me, though I've cut down on this a lot.
3) I'm routinely 5 minutes late for work.  For some reason, I just can't get my butt out of bed.

Thanks for taking the time.  Of course there are a ton of other opportunity areas where I could make myself a better person, but these stick out in my mind at the moment.  Feel free to post your own ailments that you would like to have help with improving.

inb4killmyself

Offline Infinityshock

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Re: Help me help myself
« Reply #1 on: October 02, 2014, 11:43:27 pm »
who says you have faults?  none of what you mentioned is anything negative or a personality flaw.  theyre whats called a personality trait.  what you need to do is to learn is how to not give a fuck about what anyone thinks about you...and if they have a problem with any of your personality traits they deserve a good face bashing with the bottom of a shoe.  while its attached to your foot

for #3...what kind of shit job do you have where being 5 minutes late is an issue? not that its an issue that needs to be fixed but...set all your clocks back five minutes.  problem solved

anyways...if you cant live with yourself...dont.  suicide is always an option

Offline Idiosyncrasy

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Re: Help me help myself
« Reply #2 on: October 03, 2014, 12:00:00 am »
who says you have faults?  none of what you mentioned is anything negative or a personality flaw.  theyre whats called a personality trait.  what you need to do is to learn is how to not give a fuck about what anyone thinks about you...and if they have a problem with any of your personality traits they deserve a good face bashing with the bottom of a shoe.  while its attached to your foot

for #3...what kind of shit job do you have where being 5 minutes late is an issue? not that its an issue that needs to be fixed but...set all your clocks back five minutes.  problem solved

anyways...if you cant live with yourself...dont.  suicide is always an option

Thanks.  It seems that what 'they' say is true, where you care less and less as you get older.  But I'm still not old enough to where no shits are given, or I just haven't figured it out yet.  That's probably a big contributor to number 1 too.  If I gave less shits, then I wouldn't over-analyze everything and think about how whatever it is would be perceived.

As for number 3, I work at a corporate place with a lot of politics.  My previous boss always said, "it's better to be 30 minutes early than 5 minutes late."  My current boss puts a different spin on it, being retired military, but he's cool.  The job isn't bad, but I need to figure out how to wake up and stay up.  The waking up part isn't hard, but I hit snooze on all my alarms, so I just need to get up and stay up.

Suicide... meh, I'm not depressed by any means.  Life is good - I'd just like to make it better, know what I mean?  On the topic of it, if anyone reaches the point where they feel suicidal, then let's talk about it.  If you can't talk about it here, then where can you talk about it?  I had my down moments as an early teen, but they were just cries for attention.  I didn't really like the attention I got from it, so that snapped me out of it.

I'm still intrigued by anything else that you and any others have to say.

Offline Obbe

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Re: Help me help myself
« Reply #3 on: October 03, 2014, 12:28:29 am »
We all have our faults.  It's time that I expose some of my real-life areas for improvement.  Any thoughts on how I can improve myself?  These are all things that I have both self-identified and that I've been told by others.

1) I over-analyze things.  Though I am an analyst by profession, I over-analyze everything.  It's annoying, even to me.
   a) I over-complicate things.  Related to number 1, but a little different.  I almost over-complicated this point with extra detail, like you wouldn't know what I meant.
2) I take things too personally.  This used to be that I would get defensive easily, but I have since cut back on the defensiveness.  But I still take some things personally.
   a) I also care too much about what others think about me, though I've cut down on this a lot.
3) I'm routinely 5 minutes late for work.  For some reason, I just can't get my butt out of bed.

Thanks for taking the time.  Of course there are a ton of other opportunity areas where I could make myself a better person, but these stick out in my mind at the moment.  Feel free to post your own ailments that you would like to have help with improving.

inb4killmyself

Learn how to not think.  This is just as important as thinking, and is good to practice daily.   Try meditation if you need to.  But really just learn how to silence your mind.

Find yourself.   Maybe that sounds cliche to you.   But really,  take some time and figure out who and what you really are deep inside beneath the mask.

Learn how to sleep.  I used to have trouble falling asleep and waking up.   Somehow I improved it.  Try going to bed earlier and eating better and being more active during the day.  When you need to wake up, get out of bed.  Don't hit snooze.

If you need help, try listening to some Alan Watts lectures or watching The Way of the Peaceful Warrior.  PM me too if you need to.  I am always here to help you.
All of the true things I am about to tell you are shameless lies.
&T

Offline Infinityshock

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Re: Help me help myself
« Reply #4 on: October 03, 2014, 12:45:57 am »
who says you have faults?  none of what you mentioned is anything negative or a personality flaw.  theyre whats called a personality trait.  what you need to do is to learn is how to not give a fuck about what anyone thinks about you...and if they have a problem with any of your personality traits they deserve a good face bashing with the bottom of a shoe.  while its attached to your foot

for #3...what kind of shit job do you have where being 5 minutes late is an issue? not that its an issue that needs to be fixed but...set all your clocks back five minutes.  problem solved

anyways...if you cant live with yourself...dont.  suicide is always an option

Thanks.  It seems that what 'they' say is true, where you care less and less as you get older.  But I'm still not old enough to where no shits are given, or I just haven't figured it out yet.  That's probably a big contributor to number 1 too.  If I gave less shits, then I wouldn't over-analyze everything and think about how whatever it is would be perceived.

As for number 3, I work at a corporate place with a lot of politics.  My previous boss always said, "it's better to be 30 minutes early than 5 minutes late."  My current boss puts a different spin on it, being retired military, but he's cool.  The job isn't bad, but I need to figure out how to wake up and stay up.  The waking up part isn't hard, but I hit snooze on all my alarms, so I just need to get up and stay up.

Suicide... meh, I'm not depressed by any means.  Life is good - I'd just like to make it better, know what I mean?  On the topic of it, if anyone reaches the point where they feel suicidal, then let's talk about it.  If you can't talk about it here, then where can you talk about it?  I had my down moments as an early teen, but they were just cries for attention.  I didn't really like the attention I got from it, so that snapped me out of it.

I'm still intrigued by anything else that you and any others have to say.

if over analyzing is what makes your toes curl, then by all means...carry on.  anyone that doesnt like it, they can huff the business end of a blowtorch.  if you try to change your naturally inclined behavior youre only going to stress yourself.  consciously or subconsciously...the stress will have an affect.

get someone in your house to physically throw you out of bed.  get the most obnoxious alarm clock you can find and set it up in a different room where youre forced to get up to stop the pain

my view on suicide isnt particularly popular.  my outlook is, if someone is so weak willed and doesnt possess the most basic instinct present in all living organisms, i fully encourage them to remove themselves from the gene pool. they will be doing themselves and others...as well as future generations...a great service.

no one should be intrigued my anything i have to say.  no one sane, anyways

Offline mmmmmmmQuestions

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Re: Help me help myself
« Reply #5 on: October 03, 2014, 12:53:21 am »
you're gonna go ahead and need to designate a good 45 minutes for some self-reflective yogatherapy. I suggest scented candles of your choice arranged in a semi-circle near the area in which you'll be sitting, Indian style. Music of your choice but limited to folk and Western folk. Deep breaths and counting are optional but suggested. Once you get to your happy place you'll need to make a sub-adconscious decision to ingrain that place within your conscious self, and your ability to tap into that will encourage you even in your most concerning of troubles.

Offline Infinityshock

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Re: Help me help myself
« Reply #6 on: October 03, 2014, 01:02:15 am »
you're gonna go ahead and need to designate a good 45 minutes for some self-reflective yogatherapy. I suggest scented candles of your choice arranged in a semi-circle near the area in which you'll be sitting, Indian style. Music of your choice but limited to folk and Western folk. Deep breaths and counting are optional but suggested. Once you get to your happy place you'll need to make a sub-adconscious decision to ingrain that place within your conscious self, and your ability to tap into that will encourage you even in your most concerning of troubles.

he wasnt asking how to become a homo

Offline mmmmmmmQuestions

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Re: Help me help myself
« Reply #7 on: October 03, 2014, 01:26:16 am »
you're gonna go ahead and need to designate a good 45 minutes for some self-reflective yogatherapy. I suggest scented candles of your choice arranged in a semi-circle near the area in which you'll be sitting, Indian style. Music of your choice but limited to folk and Western folk. Deep breaths and counting are optional but suggested. Once you get to your happy place you'll need to make a sub-adconscious decision to ingrain that place within your conscious self, and your ability to tap into that will encourage you even in your most concerning of troubles.

he wasnt asking how to become a homo


god damn it I always get those two mixed up

Offline equanimity

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Re: Help me help myself
« Reply #8 on: October 03, 2014, 01:58:42 am »
We all have our faults.  It's time that I expose some of my real-life areas for improvement.  Any thoughts on how I can improve myself?  These are all things that I have both self-identified and that I've been told by others.

1) I over-analyze things.  Though I am an analyst by profession, I over-analyze everything.  It's annoying, even to me.
   a) I over-complicate things.  Related to number 1, but a little different.  I almost over-complicated this point with extra detail, like you wouldn't know what I meant.
2) I take things too personally.  This used to be that I would get defensive easily, but I have since cut back on the defensiveness.  But I still take some things personally.
   a) I also care too much about what others think about me, though I've cut down on this a lot.
3) I'm routinely 5 minutes late for work.  For some reason, I just can't get my butt out of bed.

Thanks for taking the time.  Of course there are a ton of other opportunity areas where I could make myself a better person, but these stick out in my mind at the moment.  Feel free to post your own ailments that you would like to have help with improving.

inb4killmyself

Over-analyzers and over-thinkers generally seem to be more left-brained, in my experience.  And I see no reason not to play to your strengths when trying to improve neurotic behavior, so why not work at considering your behavior logically?  But keep a sense of humor about it, because when you find yourself over-analyzing your over-analytic behavior it will be absurd lol.  If it makes you angry when you realize it your progress will be that much harder.  Heavy hearts weigh us down, and the cure is simply a light-hearted attitude!

Pay attention to your thought processes.  It can be difficult to manage at first, but keep at it and you'll improve over time.  It's a skill to be developed.  When you do catch yourself doing one of those things in your list, don't react immediately and be like, "Stop that you dumb jerkface!"

Be gentle, calm, and patient.  These are qualities that most people prefer to see in their friends, family, lovers, etc.  And with your non-judgmental, attentive, light-hearted self, carefully consider your actions.  Thoughts are willful and thus a type of action.

"Is what I'm doing helpful?"

"Oh, no, it doesn't seem to be.  I can be productive and all that good stuff without being quite so obsessive about it.  It's good that I noticed this, but important to remember that everyone is imperfect and there's no reason to beat myself up for making these minor mistakes.  I know I'd like to stop that behavior, and this is a small but important step toward making that a reality.  Now..."

"How can I better approach this?"

Brevity is the soul of wit, right?  Simplicity is often a means out of delusion.

"Is this actually something complicated, or is all of that just in my head?"

If you want us to say more about this stuff, it'd be nice to have some specific examples of what goes on in your head.  What are you over-complicating and over-analyzing, exactly?

Obbe was onto something with the meditation thing, and trying to clear your mind of thought is maybe what he's after.  To me that seems a little... difficult.  It's hard to put these things into words, but in my meditation practice I let thoughts happen as they will (can't seem to 100% turn them off no matter what) but make the conscious decision not to chase them.  Let go.  Let go.

Other people don't care about you.  Especially strangers.  You could be the weirdest mother fucker around, and they wouldn't really give you a second glance.  Or if they did, they might comment about your weirdness to their friends and then be on their way.  Either way it doesn't really affect you in any real way.  What does affect you is your own mind, and what you think they might have said.  I'm not saying you shouldn't give a fuck what anyone cares, but thinking logically you should know that whatever they do think of you isn't really important.

They're probably worried you think about them, too.  And what are you thinking about them?  People are nice :)

Sleep.  How are you eating?  How much sleep are you getting?  Any problems sleeping?  I suggest a very regular schedule.  Be in bed the same time each night no matter what.  Drink some magnesium before bedtime:

http://www.amazon.com/Natural-Calm-Raspberry-Lemon-16/dp/B00BPUY3W0/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1412305026&sr=8-1&keywords=natural+calm

If you're not wanting to get out of bed, it's entirely possible that you need more sleep :P

Don't sleep in the daytime.  Don't use blue-spectrum lights after a certain time (8pm for me).  Download f.lux or similar for your computers and cell phones.

mhm


typicallyequanimity@gmail.com

Offline Idiosyncrasy

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Re: Help me help myself
« Reply #9 on: October 03, 2014, 04:04:54 am »
Wow, awesome posts! I'll have to further analyze some of these points later (see what I did there). Those are actually all very helpful.

I don't really have a great example right now because I try to actively "let go" of things when I realize I'm over-thinking it. I probably read too much into body language and nonverbal cues, though I'm usually pretty accurate. I tell my wife that I can read her like a book and I know when something is bothering her, though that might just be from being with her for so long. I'll see if I can think of some good examples.

I've been told that I'm a pretty calm and patient person (still working on road rage), so hopefully that will carry over to being aware of my thought processes.

The bit you said about strangers is good too. My family has a history of anxiety issues, so maybe that's where I get some of the feelings of constant judgment.

My eating habits aren't that great. I eat a lot of processed foods and fried stuff, bleh. I think I'm of fairly good health, but I could eat better. Sleep: I could use more. I'm a night owl and I never go to bed before midnight, often after 1. I set my first set of alarms for 6:30, so it's not horrible, but more sleep would definitely help. And less caffeine throughout the day.

More to ponder.

Offline equanimity

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Re: Help me help myself
« Reply #10 on: October 04, 2014, 04:17:31 am »
I really recommend getting off of all processed foods.  It made a world of difference in my life.

Beyond that, it really sounds like you're doing pretty well with this :)

Just keep it up!  Patiently perceiving is always better than hurriedly judging.


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Offline Bart the General

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Re: Help me help myself
« Reply #11 on: October 04, 2014, 04:20:35 am »
As soon as you wake up, start doing pushups

Offline Rocklin

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Re: Help me help myself
« Reply #12 on: October 04, 2014, 04:29:36 am »
I had the same problems.

I got out of that circle by thinking about working in the oil patch in alberta,   you live in a tent with your crew (lucky ones get a trailer),  you work out in the middle of nowhere in a forested area sometimes 100's of miles from town,  you eat the camp food 3 times a day cause that's all there is (you pay for the meals too),  the camps are DRY (no alcohol or drugs) and your tent/trailer are searched and tests done randomly.   you work 12 hour days with mandatory overtime on weekends.  and everyone is an asshole.

I got it made and I think you do too.
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Offline Bart the General

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Re: Help me help myself
« Reply #13 on: October 04, 2014, 04:31:42 am »
I had the same problems.

I got out of that circle by thinking about working in the oil patch in alberta,   you live in a tent with your crew (lucky ones get a trailer),  you work out in the middle of nowhere in a forested area sometimes 100's of miles from town,  you eat the camp food 3 times a day cause that's all there is (you pay for the meals too),  the camps are DRY (no alcohol or drugs) and your tent/trailer are searched and tests done randomly.   you work 12 hour days with mandatory overtime on weekends.  and everyone is an asshole.

I got it made and I think you do too.

newfie detected

Offline Rocklin

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Re: Help me help myself
« Reply #14 on: October 04, 2014, 04:36:00 am »
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