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(photo: @sir_moon)
You deserve the best. You should strive for your potential – the most fulfilled version of yourself – and that potential is virtually limitless. This is the single most important mindset to adopt, as it serves as a foundation for literally everything else. It’s not a case of arrogance or entitlement, but in the sense that you would want the best for a family member of SO that you deeply love.
Learning how to be more assertive in life and in work is a crucial step to real personal growth.
Normally, if someone feels inclined to become more assertive, it means they have been treated as a doormat sometime in the past.
They have probably suffered confidence and self-esteem issues, and have had trouble expressing what they really think to the people around them.
Have you ever wondered what makes mentally strong people so charismatic and confident? What makes them stand up and shout when everybody else sits down and looks away? Is it something special, or simply madness?
A lot of people will tell you that it is God-given – it’s in the blood. A rare combination of genetics and upbringing that evolves into something extraordinary, the likes of which ordinary people can only stand and marvel at.
This, however, is a lie. Actually, it’s worse than that. It’s a lazy lie.
Take 100% responsibility for the way your life is now. The good, the bad and the ugly. Accept that it’s all you. No one else to blame. It was your fault. And forgive yourself completely. You will see that the process of self improvement will become much easier.
If you don’t let up on yourself and instead become comfortable always operating with some level of pain, you will evolve at a faster pace. That’s just the way it is.
Every time you confront something painful, you are at a potentially important juncture in your life—you have the opportunity to choose healthy and painful truth or unhealthy but comfortable delusion. The irony is that if you choose the healthy route, the pain will soon turn into pleasure. The pain is the signal! Like switching from not exercising to exercising, developing the habit of embracing the pain and learning from it will “get you to the other side.” By “getting to the other side,” I mean that you will become hooked on:
Decades ago, Theodore Roosevelt called his fellow Americans to embrace the strenuous life. He called for them to seek struggle and to avoid ease. He saw that life, not only success, is found in a strenuous life, and that death and a life wasted is found and created in an easy life.
The more you feel sorry for yourself, the more it’ll become an excuse to run away from your problems. This can be elaborated better with the help of a story I got to share with you.
Remember this: The pain is all in your head. If you want to evolve, you need to go where the problems and the pain are. By confronting the pain, you will see more clearly the paradoxes and problems you face. Reflecting on them and resolving them will give you wisdom. The harder the pain and the challenge, the better.
(photo: @hannahrdg)
I have found that when I want to do something I shouldn’t do I think “Do I want to be the kind of person who does this?” or if there is something that I should do but am not doing I think
“Do I want to be the kind of person that doesn’t do this?”
Which reminds me of the gap between who I am and who I want to be and helps me move towards who I want to be.
Try it next time you think you shouldn’t do something but ignore that feeling, think, “Do I want to be the kind of person that does this?”
So sometimes you aren’t being better because you feel like being better, but simply because you see yourself in the future as someone who is better
Health and fitness for most men either relies on strength training and/or running. There is a good reason for this.
The benefits of lifting weights for increased self-esteem, physical and mental toughness, not to mention looking great, are well known. All men should do it, and if you aren’t why not? Get motivated and get back in the gym.
With that said, weightlifting and occasionally pounding the streets or treadmill shouldn’t be the only exercise you do. There should always be room for other things that bring something new (and awesome) to the table.
