It is fascinating and scary just how unconscious we are. What we think, how we make decisions and connections are all learned. Nothing is inherent in the world. And it is liberating that we can change everything. Always. It’s not true that people can’t change after a certain age. You can always change. You just have to want it. The desire to change has to become greater than the desire to remain the same.
We are choosing the world we live in. The world is as we see it just for us, every other being is seeing it in a different way. If we see corruption and ugliness everywhere, we are choosing this world. And most likely we are not seeing many beautiful things in our current life and don’t appreciate them, because we are so engrossed in the “bad things”. Everything changes by changing the outlook. The circumstances don’t have to change and most likely won’t change until we change our viewpoint.
If we feel a lack of money, It won’t feel any different when we have more money (like 10000 % more let’s say). We will still feel lacking and we won’t have enough. We will want more. One way how I tried to please my parents was through school. I thought when I did my degree, I would be able to let go of the pressures I felt from having to be good at school. I finished my undergraduate thesis, and nothing changed. I finished my master’s thesis, and nothing changed. I still felt I had to prove my worth. My feeling of lack didn’t change with the change in the outside circumstances. It didn’t make any difference because my lack was internal.
The only possibility to finish this never-ending cycle was to go to the source of my feelings. Why do I feel what I feel? What do I hope to gain from my striving?
I was hoping to be someone in my parents’ eyes. I was trying to be who I thought I needed to be, to become somebody so they will be proud of me. I didn’t listen to myself. And only when I recognized how I was living, when I started seeing the patterns and the behaviours more objectively, when they came out from my self-reflection, therapy and coaching sessions, I was able to break the spell I was under. Before this, I was constantly sacrificing my current enjoyment for some delusional future reward that never came.
ASK YOURSELF WHY ARE YOU DOING WHAT YOU ARE DOING? EXPLORE. BE HONEST AND AUTHENTIC WITH YOURSELF.
You want to start questioning your behaviours, thoughts and motivations. There is most likely something guiding you that you don’t even know about.
PS. You can always focus on the pleasant things you have in your life, whatever they are. Photo from a beautiful bay where we took a rest during spearfishing.
