No Day Without A Thought

Read this today and don't see, how I could illustrate Negative Visualization any better then Mr. Money Mustache (https://www.mrmoneymustache.com/2011/10/02/what-is-stoicism-and-how-can-it-turn-your-life-to-solid-gold/):

"For example, suppose that you currently have a good working set of eyes. Imagine carefully what it would be like to live your life as a blind person. You would have to work very hard to rearrange your life to remain functional — learn braille, take special precautions when walking around town and when cooking eggs at home, etc. — but in the end, you could surely survive and even become happy again if you were blind. But now open your eyes. SURPRISE!! YOU HAVE THIS BONUS OF SIGHT!!!. Wow, you were already doing just fine in your blind life, but now you have working eyes too? What an incredible life – you are truly blessed with more than you even need.

It turns out that if you practice negative visualization on a regular basis, you learn to both appreciate your current life much more, and to be mentally prepared in the event of any changes in your life as well – loss of health, fortune, a loved one, etc. You have replaced negative emotions with satisfaction and even joy.

Let's face it, lots of self-improvement articles are out there or a quick 7-steps-to-be-happier.

I guess, well, this is one too. However, it is based on conversations I have with people who tell me one can't always be happy and that the whole happiness glorification is bs.

Well, true and not true. As usual, it's not black and white.

I think always pushing for a happier life makes sense. But happiness is kind of the freedom to chose, when to suffer and when not to.

If you notice there are a lot of things that make you unhappy, you shouldn't dismiss or even suppress them and tell yourself it's not so bad and you are still happy.

If there is an emotion, explore it. There might be or not be a valid emotion for it. But don't pretend it is not there. It's more how you engage with it. Eventually, it is on you to tackle it and create more environments that make you happy.

Or, not small scale speaking, but thinking about the bigger picture. You might not like working on one or multiple Friday nights, but if that brings you to your ultimate goal, you purposely chose to do that because it will make you happy.

So, don't dismiss your emotions and pretend always is great all the time. There is likely things that are not giving you happiness. Sure, in perspective, they might not be that bad after all, but if they are there, well, then they are there.

It's rather about not judging, learning over time and changing, if things need to be changed.

As mentioned, I recently joined a new company. It is fascinating to see what market pull and product market fit actually looks like.

Things actually feel "easier". There is still tons of stuff to do and the goals are outright ludicrously big. However, you are somehow riding on a wave and it's on you to make the most out of it. It can be a big wave, but it's up to you what you do with it.

So it is still a lot about goal setting, priorization what will have the biggest impact, but it feels like with a little bit of a tailwind.

Let's see how long we can ride the wave.

As a child of a non academic family, let me tell you that there certainly are some prejudices against ppl going to university and the "smart people". Obviously, hardly anyone is free of any prejudices, but will stay continue using that for this one:)

Over the years I have heard plenty of comments, ranging from "what do you guys actually do all day", "when will you start earning money", "what is what you can do in the end", "the guys coming out of university and then run teams have no idea how things are actually being done", "we started working when we were 16", ... you get the point.

And I agree with the concept of that university is a privilege. It's the main time in your life where you basically "only" need to figure yourself out/who you are and learn what you want to learn (ideally). The comparison when starting working at 16 - to what I've experienced - you are more likely to stick with the same company, are with someone in the same education/working setup, hence the person is also around from the area and you likely won't move anywhere else, continuing being roughly with the same people, not being exposed to a lot of new things giving and responsibilities like salary/paying for your own stuff/bills, family and a fixed time schedule with 8hrs of work start earlier.

There is a sense of "duty" that everyone needs to work. Granted, I am speaking about Germany, mainly Nuremberg which is a traditional German city in the south.

I feel massively grateful that my parents supported - well - pushed me to study and wanted me to have "something better". Whatever that means. They wanted doors to be open for me. Ok, they rather viewed it from a job market perspective which obviously is right. However, university and the associated experiences with studying abroad, meeting people from all educational/financial/status levels as well as culturally, having the time to wonder and try out multiple jobs and side projects is an amazing gift. 

It helps so much to have the years to fall and not needing to perform, besides learning - which ideally should be in your best interest, since one is pushing you too (sometimes different, but usually it's your decision). 

I am still having an inner fight when coming home and hearing some statements about education, politics or general view of the world of some of my family members. But on the other side, they didn't have the experience. I would still wish for some more balanced world views and openess, they might have never learned that or experienced that this is accepted/how things can work too.

This one has been in the pipes for a while. Actually, since May 2014 when I first tried a 30 day paleo challenge and my identity changed from someone not caring about food, to someone caring and healthy, putting long term health and clearer mind over (false) short term satisfaction. Today I got reminded about it again by Helen Tran here.

Basically, how you see yourself comes with certain behaviors and believes that you don't really need to influence/actively need to decide. Or as Helen phrased it "identity already defines a certain set of habits."

So, let's assume you consider yourself a healthy person? Guess you aren't smoking a package a day.

Consider yourself an athlete? I would assume you do sports a couple of times a week.

The great thing about it is, it also works the other way. Just like when you are happy, you are likely to smile. However, when you smile, it is pretty hard to have negative thoughts. The loop works both ways.

So, you can actually change your identity/how you see yourself. Taking smoking as an example. Over years, every time there was the decision "should I have a cigarette" you most often opted for "yes", making another mark on the "yes" side of the balance sheet. Once you start adding some "no's" to the balance sheet and actually outnumbering the "yesses" (obviously in a more recent time frame not in the history of time scale), you could make the argument "I am a non-smoker". And what do non-smokers do? Well, for starters, they don't smoke.

Let me even take it a step further. You are not making most of your decisions. I assume you understand that humans think they are rational, because we have consciousness, but obviously we are not rational and sth like 80% of the decision is already done once it hits your consciousness. 

What I mean with that, imagine you have a judge in your head who is basically on auto pilot and only looking at the most recent balance sheet. If you help the judge (yourself) and show her that you are a non-smoker, the judge will vote for the non-smoker and make the decision of "no" for you. 

Technically, by showing good faith, you are helping yourself, because you are helping the judge who makes the decision for you.

Over time, it is not only the judge temporarily, but your new identity or perceived identity (I mean, what is 'identity' after all) and you will behave a certain way by default, i.e. it's not hard to say "no" to going out, because the new "you" is not interested in it or more interested in things that don't align with that.

Copying from Helen to finish it:

"Changing your identity changes your mindset changing your habits which changes your results."