Motivation (MDC #1), DeYtH Banger [to read list .TXT] 📗

of everyday expectations you’re aware of. It’s also not like we’re literally saying to ourselves, “I expect this” or “I expected that” in a conscious way. It’s something that’s happening just below the surface, where you’ll only see it if you take the time to look closely.

No, I’m talking about the ugly, undermining, hidden and treacherous expectations that dwell in the wings and under the stage of your Broadway blockbuster. The kind of expectations you didn’t even know you had until they came out of nowhere and blindsided you and sucked the air from your lungs.

When you and I take on a life-changing project, we prepare for it from what we know. That includes items from our own experience, what we’ve read, heard and imagined. We start to picture it in our minds. We research, we ask others for their opinions, and consume reams of information. We begin to assemble an idea of what this will look like and how we’re going to get there. That image in our heads becomes the template from which we work and plan."

"This isn’t what you signed up for, is it? Maybe this whole thing was a mistake. You’re starting to feel a little darker and more depressed while you start to confront the gut-churning possibility that you might lose all that investment and wind up having to crawl back to your old boss to ask if you can return to your old job.

 

WHOOOAAAAA!!!!!

 

Easy tiger! Before we get ahead of ourselves, let’s take a step back."

"“Stop doing all that shit you know you shouldn’t be doing and start doing all the shit you know you should be doing.”"

Chapter 12 - Condition of Fear

 

"THE SOCIAL CONDITIONING OF FEAR

Why are some people more driven by fear than freedom?
It can only be because in the past they were conditioned to be fearful, either by those around them or by their poor application of mental faculties. There is no genetic curse or personality trait that permanently condemns one person to fear more than another—even a genetic predisposition for anxiety can ultimately be flipped on or off by mental conditioning. We are not slave to our history; we can be freed by our conscious thoughts and disciplined habits.

Let us begin with understanding how fear is socially conditioned. Fearful people tend to be shaped by past interactions. They were pushed and molded into being timid, weak, and afraid by the critical parents, bullying peers, or small-minded teachers and bosses. The people around them were always cautioning or

harming them, and so they became habituated to the impulse of fear—it came up so often they got used to it. From a fearful past they have generated a fear-driven present.

This is not to blame our past or excuse our fears. When people choose fear as an adult, they are choosing not to manage or overcome it. This is difficult work for many because fear has become their default impulse. The thoughts ruling their minds and their self-talk replay the cutting barbs of the critics and misguided caretakers who once demeaned them. The good news is we can change this conditioning. When we awaken to responsibility, we realize that nothing can be done about our past but to see it from a new perspective. We can release ourselves from its grip. We cannot control how others treated us yesterday, so let us work instead on understanding how we are currently dealing with those who stoke our fear today. The great efforts to move our lives forward always come down to a new moment when we interrupt our fear and activate our freedom by choosing how to feel, interpret, and direct our lives.

Part of the mastery of life comes from anticipating that the same kinds of characters that sought to instill fear yesterday shall be met again today or tomorrow. Knowing this, we become wary of people who chip away at our freedom. These are the worriers, weaklings, and, in rare cases, the wicked."

"If you are thinking of something that may happen in the future, like what
youʼre gonna say, then stop that as well. It kills your spontaneity and delivery.
Donʼt pre-plan what you are going to say. You have to start trusting that what you
are going to say will come to you naturally when, and only when, you need it. All
you need to do is to keep your focus in the present moment as it unfolds.
How do you do this? Practice mindfulness as I explained above. Practice
being very alert and aware, but not thinking. Observe your thoughts instead of
being controlled by them. Widen the gaps between your thoughts. This is the way
to become incredibly responsive in social situations."

"Presence Is Not Thought Suppression

One of the comments I often get when I teach this is: “So youʼre basically
saying to suppress my anxious thoughts?” The answer is no. Thought
suppression is not something I teach.

In order to stop thinking and become present, you should not try to suppress
or fight your thoughts. In fact, you should do quite the opposite. Allow your
thoughts to wander wherever they like. All you must do is become the observer of
your thoughts. Watch your train of thoughts as it passes by, but do not try to stop,
control, judge or interpret them in any way whatsoever. Simply observe.
This practice of observing your thoughts in a detached manner will naturally
lead to gaps in between your thoughts. The gaps will happen naturally, do not try
to force them. Just pay attention.

Hereʼs your homework assignment: Follow the instructions on
mindfulness and being present in this chapter. Sit down for 20 minutes a day
across from a blank wall, set up a timer so you do not constantly need to check
the time, and observe your stream of thoughts. Review this chapter regularly to
make sure you are practicing correctly. Once you get the hang of being present
by yourself, start to become more and more present in every area of your life.
Learn to do it when you are hesitant about facing an anxiety-provoking situation.
108"

 

"The Worriers

The worriers around us today are often the biggest threat to enflaming our fear. They are the most likely to steal our motivation and destiny because they often seem to be our friends. We are so close to them that their anxiety can bleed onto us. We must learn to control our reactions around them

Most worriers are not unkind people. They have no clue of the fear they impose on our lives, or the way their incessant voices of doubt oppress our potential. They don’t see that they cause treachery by arguing for us to play it safe. It’s the loving mother who says, “Careful, honey,” at every turn as her child goes about the normal activities of childhood; the coworker who gives ten reasons why we might get in trouble and not a single word about how we might change the world; the lover who incessantly fears we as a couple are going to fail and keeps imploring us to back down from a fight or from the edge of any risk.
These people believe they are thoughtful, loving, and protective. Their cautious words are most often delivered from a loving place. They want good for us. They feel a duty to protect us from hurt, and so they try to direct us toward the well-worn paths that they understand. These are our parents, friends, peers, lovers, neighbors, and leaders

It’s an awkward social reality: We must protect ourselves from being limited by those who care for us as much as by those who blatantly oppose us.
What can be done? We must learn to hear doubt, worry, and anxiety with great acuity, and we must not integrate other people’s fears into our own decision making. Developing this kind of acuity is easy for the conscious person, since almost all worriers use the same language and arguments—they favor cautioned reason as their shield of choice in “protecting” us. Their matter-of-fact tones and phrases all sound the same:

 

“Be careful; you might get hurt.”
“Be careful; you don’t know what could happen.”
“Be careful; they might fire you, forget you, reject you, hate you, spurn you, despise you, pick on you.

“Are you sure you want to do that?”
“You wouldn’t like that.”
“That’s not who you are.”
“You can’t do this.”
“That’s not really your thing.”

 

Have we not heard all this before? Surely we all know someone adept at crafting eloquent arguments for why we mustn’t be too loud, too crazy, too intent on pursuing our passion or taking too many leaps into the unknown. These are the calm and convincing ones in our lives—those who present clear-eyed explanations about how we could be hurt, embarrassed, or exhausted if we take risks or try to be different, creative, alive, bold.

These people are clearly not callous. They believe they are doing their duty. They seem motherly and judicious, working with great care to protect us. But let us beware the saboteur of dreams cloaked in the goodwilled friend. How many souls have failed to soar because they were suffocated in a loved one’s worry?

If we are not vigilant, being around constant worry can quickly limit who we are and what we might be capable of. What can we do, then, with our caring families and friends who unintentionally limit our vision or striving?
We should be generous in our interpretations of their concern, as they are likely unaware of their insidious effect, which is to teach us to at first consider risk or harm before all else. We must harbor no ill feelings toward these worriers; they deserve patience and understanding because they may be trapped in a mindset that favors aversion over ascension. Let them be governed by fear if they must, but do not join them.

All we can do is listen intently to those we trust, and be sober in our estimates of any real danger. But to those who we do not know, and who do not know us, to those who want us to stay put in their bubble of belief about who we are and how far we can go in life, we must close our minds. We must forgive their small thinking and we must look beyond it to see a vaster horizon for ourselves. We must not worry what could go wrong but rather wonder what magnificence could enter our lives when we are consistently expressing our genuine selves and pursuing our true passions.

Let us obsess about freedom, not fear.
And so a deep line must be cut into the sand: There can be no tolerance for worriers in life. All great men and women come to this same determined conclusion. No matter how kindhearted the deliverer, we cannot give prolonged consideration to those who repeatedly instill fear in us. It demotivates and demoralizes.

When our dreams become vivid and enliven us, we must venture forth, with or without worried family and friends, even if it brings some sorrow and sacrifice. To allow other people’s anxieties to defeat our drive is to succumb to oppression."

"The Weaklings

The next category of people we must anticipate are the weak and slothful, those who speak out against the efforts and hardships required to be remarkable.

 

 

It would be too simple to say, “Do not give your ear to a lazy person, as he will surely pour fear and apathy into your soul.” But it is nonetheless a powerful