Бесплатный фрагмент - From Stress to Perfection

INTRODUCTION

This book does not claim to be the ultimate truth, a new word in psychology or some comprehensive knowledge. It is an honest book. At the same time, it is quite a self-confident book as it is going to explain your internal structure to you. Besides, it is also useful, as it contains practical tips that you can follow to improve your life.

Or at least make it more interesting.

Are you ready?

STRESS

Most often, modern people familiarize themselves with psychology when they decide to overcome their stress. And even though they most likely don’t have any stress and just suffer from the lack of vitamin B and chronic sleep deprivation, psychology happily and readily opens its doors. And it starts offering life lessons instead of helping to cope with the stress. As a result, people get disappointed in psychology and don’t get rid of their stress (if they have it). Let’s change this sad situation. Here is a whole chapter about what stress is and why it’s needed.

Find yourself a little bit of stress. It’s good for you

Recently, stress from a medical and narrow issue of a small number of people turned into a mythical monster that awaits everybody just around the corner and tries to destroy if not your life but at least the happiness of this life. Everybody has stress. Everybody is stressed.

At one point, we started getting stressed from the thought about stress. The anticipation of stress escalates stress the most, and almost everybody is afraid of stress. If you are lucky enough not to be one of those people, you can observe a great variety of «stressed people» among your relatives, acquaintances, colleagues or subordinates. It would be a funny show if it didn’t significantly deteriorate their lives. And not only theirs but yours too.

Let’s start sorting out this problem. And let’s start with the most crucial thing — stress can be different and not all stress is harmful. The opposite, there is the stress that is good for you.

Only prolonged, chronic, continuous and perpetual stress is damaging. There is a limited number of situations that can make people experience something like that. These situations are terrible and tragic, but the chances of getting into them are low. Therefore, a significant majority of the people who talk about stress know nothing about real stress. And that’s a good thing. The bad thing is that they create this constant stress by thinking about it.

One more time — if someone for a year or many years feels oppressed and it was a real tragedy and not the person’s imagination that created this state, and this situation is impossible to exit — only then a person has real stress that destroys the body.

In all the other cases stress might be healthy if you don’t exacerbate your sadness yourself. Stress is an opportunity to evolve. A chance to overcome yourself. A chance to change for the better. Stress is healthy. Healthier than fitness or whole wheat bread. If we speak seriously, there are not that many things that are healthier than stress.

But you should know how to work with it. Don’t be afraid of stress. You need it, you even require it. Look for it and learn how to use it.

Attack your stress or die

Stress is excellent and purely positive if treated the right way. You should find stress, attack it, defeat and then reap the numerous fruits of victory. Even if you didn’t find stress, but it found you, you should act the same way.

To figure out the right reaction to stress, you need to understand what reactions there are. It’s not difficult because there are only two reactions. The first one is the constriction of blood vessels. The second reaction is their dilation.

The first reaction is the reaction to danger when the body tries to reduce potential blood loss in case of an injury. The second reaction is the reaction of a challenge when the body enhances blood supply to feed the brain with oxygen to figure out what to do in an unpleasant situation.

In the first case, the body has already given up and is now only trying to minimize losses. In the second case, the body mobilizes to fight, and it is not going to give up. Pay attention that I am talking about the organism. People, of course, control their bodies, but only to a certain extent, that’s why for the way we react to stress it’s essential to have a developed skill, not just a single effort we put in the moment.

Any person needs a skill of treating stress the right way which is like a challenge and not as a threat.

Some people get this skill without much effort on their part while others have to do it with their sweat and blood. But this is the only right way to get rid of stress — not to run away from it, not to relax on the beach, not to displace it with new emotions, not to try to forget it but to walk towards it, recognize it as a challenge and try to force yourself to find a solution.

Firstly, you force your body to react to stress correctly. Then, your body helps you cope with stress, and, finally, you become a stress-resistant person. That means a person who is always ready for something new. For the new challenges. For the new life.

Why you shouldn’t envy stress-resistant people

Shortly — because you shouldn’t envy anyone. To expand on that — you shouldn’t envy stress-resistant people because it’s counterproductive.

Envy is sorrow for someone’s perfection. Don’t worry, be happy. Instead of jealousy, you should acquire others’ positive qualities so that people envy you.

We said that we should see stress as a challenge — that’s what being stress-resistant is. It’s okay if you can’t do it. That’s not your fault. Really. Such a reaction might be laid in you since birth. It could appear in your childhood when you faced difficulties that you couldn’t handle a lot of. It could emerge due to the circumstances of your adulthood over which you didn’t have any power. It doesn’t matter. And it’s not that bad, even though right now stress makes you feel scared and threatened.

In the end, the ability to be scared is a superpower. Even though they don’t film blockbusters about characters with such a talent, during primitive times your quality, your ability to predict danger in any detail could save a whole village from being eaten. And you probably saved lives many times. Sadly, those times are gone, and that’s why you feel ill at ease when reacting to stressful events too strongly.

Can you make yourself treat stress differently? Is it possible to develop a reaction of a challenge instead of a reaction of a threat? Is it possible to change yourself not on the level of knowledge but the level of the psyche? No, it’s not possible. It’s a joke and a cruel one, sorry. Of course, it’s possible. Many people have managed to do that, and you will do that too.

Why emotions rule us and not the other way around

How do you imagine your body reacts to different situations? Most likely, you think like this: I faced this event, my brain analyzed what’s going on and realized that I should expect something bad to happen and only after that it turned on the defence mechanism (for example, fear) and, according to this reaction, my body started running for the hills to get away as far as possible.

It’s logical. While leaving a café I see an upcoming tornado (or an investor surrounded by a dozen of bodyguards whose money I’ve spent on an unsuccessful project), I immediately realize that things aren’t going well for me and run away. It’s logical. But wrong. The idea is that our brain tries to be way too careful. It likes to anticipate events instead of just reacting to them.

When it seems to us that we’re thinking about nothing — that’s true (sadly), but our brain keeps thinking no matter what. It’s constantly thinking no matter if we use it for our needs or not. The brain is always analyzing previous experience, current situation and predicts the future. Whether we want it or not. Besides, it does it rapidly. And after having processed everything and formulating the prediction, our brain treacherously pumps us with emotion.

Do you understand what the catch is? Nothing has happened yet, but we already have an emotion based on our previous experience. The brain has anticipated the event and gave us an emotion beforehand. Of course, it can’t foresee something extraordinary like a tornado from an example above. But it can easily predict an investor dissatisfied with an unsuccessful project, and you can be sure that it will do that in advance. And it will ruin your mood.

You came to your favourite café to have breakfast, but your mood is no good. You got amazing pancakes with sour cream, but you have no appetite. You’re looking out of the window at beautiful spring in Moscow (or Vienna), but you’re not feeling joyful at all. And all that because after having analyzed a massive amount of information, your brain suspected that you might run into the investor and considered it to be extremely unpleasant. And it ruins your mood in advance, making you feel sad and gloom. Or it even stresses you out if the situation is too bad from its point of view.

Sneaky brain!

Fortunately, it’s our brain. And no matter how smart we are, we are in charge here, not the brain. It means that with an effort of the will, we can distance ourselves from its predictions and emotions. Or we can change emotions in the necessary direction.

Are you sad? Not, it’s not you who is sad — that just your brain created something of its own. Your emotions aren’t an objective response to what’s going on around you. Your emotions depend on the previous experience — it is the previous experience that the brain takes as a basis for the analysis and predictions. Overcome yourself, force yourself to obtain new, positive experience, and next time your brain will award you with the feeling of excitement, drive and challenge instead of the sense of threat.

If you know how emotions arise, you can manage them.

When rest can help to get rid of stress

After you have started a crusade against the wrong attitude towards stress, the most important thing is not to go too far. Explaining that stress is good, the main thing is not to get carried away. Not to get carried away by stress. Even though short-term stress is good for you, it doesn’t mean you should cultivate the addiction.

You are surprised that there could be stress-addiction? But aren’t those people addicted to adrenaline who do base-jumping, street-racing and sky-diving an example of being addicted to stress? And isn’t a young IT startupper, who’s working 20 hours a day and whose diet is mainly coke-cola and energy drinks addicted to stress?

As we have already said, stress itself isn’t bad or good. It’s our attitude that makes it so. If we’re feeling threatened — stress will be destructive. If we’re feeling challenged — stress will help us become better and stronger. Now imagine that a person faces with beneficial stress. It means that something has been achieved, even with a super effort which means that a person is happily excited. And the situation is repeated in a week. And then again. And again. Yes — it’s stress, but it was good every time, and every time it gave a feeling of euphoria and superpower. That’s where the addiction comes from.

Stress can be right for you, but even such stress is harmful if there is too much of it.

Being able to overcome critical situations is one thing. Another is when you’re deliberately looking for something to overcome. In the first case, you don’t need to prove anything to anyone, you are a formed holistic personality, and in the second case you are just in the process, you’re proving something to yourself and the people around you. And it’s good if your goal is becoming a harmonious person and not the process of proving something itself.

It’s beneficial for the cardiovascular system to work more actively than usual sometimes. But not all the time. Stress is good in small doses but only in small doses. If you feel that you’re addicted to stress — learn how to relax and rest.

It’s important to relax, and rest is necessary for those who like being stressed. Rest won’t help those for whom stress is hard.

It is so essential that we will repeat it one more time!

When someone is in uncontrolled stress, feels worn down and descends into the gloom, when the colours of life fade away, and the person just wants to give up — there is no point in resting. It won’t help. It’s necessary to work with stress, learn how to perceive it in the right way, gain positive experience which will help to control stress and make it beneficial. And when someone enjoys stress because the person beats the odds in any stressful situation, and there are more and more such situations in life, that’s when it’s time to take a break and have some rest.

To sum up, we can say that the hard truth is that you shouldn’t try to get rid of stress by resting. You should relax when you like being stressed too much.

The best way to deal with stress

Stress can be beneficial if it’s short-term, under control and, most importantly, if it’s seen as a challenge. Stress is bad in all the other cases — when it’s long-term, uncontrolled and is seen as a threat. But even harmful stress can be made less harmful. There are only two methods that allow lessening the negative impact of stress (neither of them includes chilling on a beach). And today we will talk about the best way to overcome stress.

Let’s assume that you’re a great artist or you consider yourself so. But the situation which you can’t escape emerges. You can’t ignore it, and it means that you’re not a fantastic artist, but you have no talent. Is it stressful? Of course! And now imagine that your name is Silvester Stallone and you are that Silvester Stallone with his Hollywood fame, three charming daughters and a pile of money. Yes, you do create pictures (abstract expressionism), you exhibit them, and you can even provide for your family by selling them. And you get shown that you are not a good artist. Is it stressful? Come on. It’s not stress. Not at all.

The thing is that stress is the most effective when you see it as a threat to your identity. If you feel that your identity might suffer, you are in awful stress. Ego is in danger! From the example above, it’s clear that if a person considers themselves only as an artist, in case if their talent isn’t accepted, they will grieve, mourn and suffer. But if in the same situation the person remembers that he is Silvester Stallone, this stressful situation won’t threaten his whole identity, only a little part of it. Therefore, it won’t be so destructive.

Our identity is the most valuable thing for us, so we experience stress if something threatens it. However, our identity is a very complicated and diverse structure. We can identify ourselves with many things and think of them to be the centre of our ego. Or, on the contrary, not to think so.

Here comes a piece of practical advice on how to fight hard and uncontrolled stress — you need to make yourself understand that your whole identity isn’t threatened, only a small part of it. Not the entire thing, only a part.

To do that, you should take a piece of paper and a pen (or a phone, or canvas and paints, you’re an artist, just don’t do it in your head) and describe all the most valuable things of your life in detail. Everything you identify yourself with. Who are you? An outstanding boss, a great friend, a loving husband, a prominent philatelist, a novice hunter, a member of an unregistered religious community, a municipal deputy, a forum moderator on the second period of Scriabin’s work? Yes, you probably won’t be an artist, so what? It’s disappointing. But there is no reason for stress because there is no threat to your identity.

It’s not as easy as it looks, but it’s more efficient than it seems. Try it. Try it right now even if you don’t have any stress — as preventative measures. It’s not just the best method to overcome stress but also the most effective preventative way of fighting it.

The second-best way to deal with stress

Stress can be beneficial when you see it as a challenge, and stress is harmful when you see it as a threat. You should turn harmful stress into beneficial. The first step is to combat its negative consequences. We can afford not to be able to benefit from stress, but we should be able to deal with its adverse effects.

We have already looked at the best way of dealing with stress. Now we’ll have a look at the second-best.

Stress always means emotions. If we remove emotions from the stressful situation, there will be only one thing left — the problem itself, which can’t scare anyone with its insolubility. A schoolgirl reads a physics problem about two flying photons, doesn’t understand a word but she’s not nervous because she wants to be a clothing designer who doesn’t need to know about photons. No emotions — no stress. That’s what antidepressants are based on. But we’ll go another way setting the pills aside.

We will be learning how to separate our thoughts from our feelings.

Technique number one — talk through the situation out loud describing yourself in the third person. No «I, me, mine» only «he» or «she». Why is he worried? What makes her nervous? What does he think? What is she afraid of?

Technique number two — describe the current situation like you will see it in five years. Or ten. Consider eternity. Not right now, right this moment but later, much later.

Technique number three — imagine yourself and make yourself watch a «movie» starring yourself with your stressful situation as a prop. Be honest and don’t try to be a hero. But also, don’t get carried away with extremely negative vision. Just look at the documentary chronicle about yourself in stress.

All these techniques make our brain distance from the problem. Instead of diving into it, you start looking at the problem from the outside. You separate the emotions, which are always very immediate, from the essence of a critical situation helping your brain to think about the solution instead of being consumed by grieve.

The problem should be separate from emotions. And there will be no stress for the simple reason that it is just an unhealthy combination of a problem with an emotional reaction to this problem.

Divide and conquer!

OUR BRAIN AND US

This chapter will make you lose any trust that you had in your brain, and that’s a good thing. You are the only person you can trust and not even always. It’s necessary to learn how to work with your brain, figure out how it’s structured, see its weaknesses, take control over it and, finally, set free from its dark dictatorship. You should learn how to be mindful as there is no possibility for growth and internal development without it.

How to save yourself from permanent anger

Permanent anger (don’t confuse with intense outbreaks of hatred or rage) is the consequence of chronic stress. It happens when a person has been living for a long time feeling threatened, doesn’t see any solution to the situation and can’t change anything. That’s where impatience, distrust of others, cynicism and anger come from. But the problem is that they are not just the consequences but also the reason for chronic stress.

A vicious circle.

I hate everybody, everybody hates me back, and, hence, I hate them back. I am angry, people are angry at my anger, and I get angry at them. I throw tantrums all the time, the people around reciprocate, and I flip out more and more often.

It’s naïve to think that I will get rid of my anger by going on two weeks holidays in India. No, during the holidays I will be calm as a millpond even when I see that the food in my five-star hotel is cooked in the backyard in suspicious cauldrons by grimy people who don’t look like cooks at all. But I will be calm only because I haven’t had the time to adapt to the people and the situation. Give me some time, and I will begin to hate them, and they will hate me back and so on.

The grass is always greener on the other side because it’s impossible to run away from yourself.

So, what’s the deal? The thing is that in 9 cases out of 10, our brain thinks the same thing that it has thought before. It doesn’t want anything new. It continues to quote itself, copy itself and repeat itself. It’s okay with it. Only 10% of its activity is something new. If anger used to be its main essence, it would remain the same even if impressions from India temporarily come to the fore.

Here comes a piece of practical advice to those who decided to get rid of anger: look carefully into the thoughts that fill in your brain. Stop looking around or into your smartphone’s screen. Look at what’s going on in your head. If necessary — get some alone time, calm down, take the lotus pose or relax in our favourite chair, do some breathing exercises or just close your eyes. And reflect on what you’re thinking about right now. At least for a minute (it’s a lot).

You’ll be surprised that you don’t control your thinking process. Not at all.

And when you get surprised (and this surprise may be shocking) start to just peek at the way your brain works but also to correct its work.

It’s easier than it seems. The hardest and the most important thing is to track what’s going on in your head. Noticed a thought filled with anger — strangle it. Notice another one — strangle it too, one more — do the same thing. The problem is that there are a lot of them and they are hard to track. But fighting them is not harder than gardening. Nothing pleasant, but it’s not titanic work either.

Just three months of such efforts will turn you into a different person.

Without any unnecessary anger.

How to get rid of pessimism

Pessimism is the ability to predict the negative consequences of any event that got out of control. The skill itself isn’t bad. It’s even necessary as it’s the natural preventative reaction of our organism to different dangers.

I went outside in the morning, saw that the road was icy, got upset, started walking to work making small steps, slipped, fell and got even more upset. But there is no pessimism here, only bad work of utility companies and my bad luck. Pessimism is when in the evening while planning the next day, I will spoil my mood in advance by thinking about that the road will be icy in the morning but I have to go somewhere and I will fall again, and all the useless janitors don’t clean anything, and what is the city budget is spent on, and for how long things will be like this, aaaaah

Pessimism is quite widespread, and not everybody understands that it’s a dangerous state of the brain because it takes away any joy. And only a few people understand the internal structure of pessimism.

It’s structured very simply. And the thing is not pessimism but the structure of the brain itself.

We are used to thinking that our brain is the source of everything creative and new. A smart person is a person who can make something new, who can create. But actually, our brain is very reactionary. When left alone, it will focus on itself. It will be thinking about what it has thought before and in such a way that it has done before. It’s more comfortable for it, that’s how it functions. And if pessimism has become its main content, it will stay the same even if the road isn’t icy and slippery anymore.

Here comes a piece of practical advice to those who decided to get rid of pessimism — look into your thoughts and realize that even when it seems to you that you are not thinking — your brain is thinking and in a very pessimistic way. Your brain has absorbed pessimism like a sponge absorbs water. Don’t hope that your brain will make up something optimistic — a wet sponge will stay wet until you squeeze it.

And the only way to squeeze it is to do it slowly and gradually, consequently, carefully tracking and getting rid of all the depressing by-products of your brain activity. To do that, you should learn how to see thoughts in your head. Not to let them lead you but to understand that they are created not by you but by your brain. And it’s not necessary to believe every thought and to solidarize with it. Especially, pessimistic thoughts.

Why you should deal with absent-mindedness

If you think that right now you’re focused on this text, you should know that you overestimate yourself. More specifically, not yourself but your brain and its ability to concentrate. Even in the most intense situations, for example, during an emotional conversation or sex, our brain spends up to a third of the time on the thoughts unrelated to what’s going on.

The human brain is a distracted brain.

The thing is not the gadgets or an enormous flow of information. The human brain has always been distracted. Although, maybe, the new generation suffers from having a head in the clouds a little bit more. But a little bit more is not that significant. The idea of the way our brain works doesn’t imply our constant control of its activity. The head thinks by itself. We live by ourselves. Let our brain think sixty-five thousand thoughts a day. We don’t have to track them all. That’s not the problem.

The problem appears when we get consumed by some thought which is not at all related to our current activity. When sitting at a presentation of our colleague’s new project, we’re thinking about the calm summer dawn at Lago-Majore. This situation takes away the opportunity to be happy even if we have a ticket to Lago-Majore for tomorrow.

That’s why you should fight such absent-mindedness. A person can’t feel happy if not focused on what they are doing right now. This is just impossible. And no one has ever managed to do that.

Someone who picks mushrooms and does puzzles can enjoy it only if focused on it. But a person can be tired and annoyed if they were thinking about something else and wanted to be in a different place. That’s the benefit of the hobby — to have something that allows focusing only on it and nothing else. Focusing our attention on what’s going on fills us with energy and happiness.

If you sat down to think about a problem — you should think about the problem. If you’re writing a text — you need to write the text. If you’re playing basketball — play basketball. If you’re talking to your parents — talk to your parents. Force yourself to focus on one task. Bring your brain back from the clouds. Having just one task should become our credo. Concentration should become our goal.

That’s because it’s the best and the easiest way to happiness.

Obsessive thoughts and what to do with them

How does the right solution to the problem look like? A problem appeared. A person thought about it and found a solution. Implemented it in real life. The problem disappeared.

How does an ordinary solution to the problem look like? A problem appeared. A person thought about it and got upset. Then thought about the solution and found it. Then thought about the problem and got upset. Implemented the solution in real life while thinking about the problem and getting upset. The problem disappeared. In a while, a person recalled how awful the problem was and got upset yet again.

Now imagine that the problem wasn’t solved from the first attempt. And from the second one as well. Or that it’s comprehensive and just can’t be resolved quickly. In that case, the person will constantly be thinking about the problem and will be getting upset. That’s precisely what happens. Obsessive thoughts mean a continuous internal return to your issues without any external changes in the situation.

Sometimes it seems that it’s right because if you’re constantly thinking about the problem, the solution will be found soon. But actually, the solution to the problem and obsessive thoughts about it are unrelated. Moreover, obsessive thoughts will hinder the process of finding the solution because they will make a person sad and gloom. Obsessive thoughts are evil — let’s look at where they come from.

They come from being unable to keep the distance from your thoughts.

You are you, and your thoughts aren’t you, they are yours. You have a degree, clothes, money, family, a bruise on your left ankle and a bottle of good red wine which you will open tonight — this is all yours but not you. The same thing with thoughts. They are yours, but you shouldn’t think that you are the same. Not necessarily.

The brain is thinking regardless of if you want it or not. It’s thinking just because it’s a brain and it should be doing so. You can use your brain, or you can let it lead you. It can be your instrument or you can be its slave. Obsessive thoughts mean that are you being enslaved by your own brain when you take its technical work on analyzing the problem as the essence of your whole life.

Show your brain its place. Learn how to distinguish yourself and your thoughts. Learn how to distance yourself. Unfortunately, you won’t be able to do it in a problematic situation without any training. So, train in advance, in your ordinary life. Right now pull away from the text and try to realize what you’re thinking about. Oh, you have a lot of thoughts and they are various and it seemed to you that you were deep in reading.

When you learn, your obsessive thoughts will disappear. More specifically, they won’t be obsessive but will be just thoughts that you can pay as much attention to as necessary.

The only way to get read of obsessive thoughts and a bunch of other problems at the same time imply paying attention to your thoughts, being able to focus on them and distance yourself from them.

Why you shouldn’t suppress unwanted thoughts

The most widespread of the most incorrect practices of tackling unwanted thoughts implies their suppression. People force themselves not to think about the unpleasant. By all means. But, of course, they continue thinking. You decided to lose weight, and you force yourself not to think about food, but you’re thinking about food. You’re trying to survive an unpleasant event, and you force yourself not to think about it, but you’re thinking about it. There is no way you can tackle your negative thoughts like this.

The desire to get rid of unnecessary thoughts is understandable — they do destroy life. And that’s why you should liberate yourself from them but not only by thoughts. Just keep in mind that the thoughts are the product of your brain activity. Your brain is constantly thinking, it can’t stop thinking. Undesirable thoughts are the result of its work. For you, these thoughts are unwanted. But there is no good or bad for it, it just thinks. And it can’t be forced not to think. The brain can’t be stopped.

When you’re trying not to think your brain is thinking, even if about how not to think. When you’re trying not to think about the problem, your brain is thinking about the problem. See your brain as a food processer that is always on. This is where all your new experiences fall and get ground into your world view. Everything you brought your attention to gets into this food processer. If you brought your attention to a sandwich — your brain thinks about the sandwich. If you brought your attention to some music band — your brain thinks about where to look up the schedule of their concerts. If you brought your attention to the methods of literary hermeneutic — your brain thinks about the Schleiermacher theory of understanding.

It’s all very simple — I am what I eat. It’s the same thing in terms of information — my inner world is defined by what I am looking at. And I am thinking about the things on which my attention is focused. That’s why suppressing the thoughts doesn’t make any sense. They are impossible to suppress.

Possible — and that’s the most available out of all the unprofessional methods — just shift your attention. Not to follow your brain’s lead but to turn away from the unwanted thoughts. Suggest an interesting material or an interesting task to it. It will want to go back to the unpleasant thoughts anyways, but every time you should force yourself to think about something else.

I won’t be thinking about it is the wrong way. The rights way is– I will be thinking about something else.

Awareness of your thoughts and freedom

You are your own worst enemy. No one can harm us as seriously, so subtly and so deeply like ourselves. That’s why the worst advice that the psychologist can give sounds like this: accept yourself as you are. This is an awful recommendation. But, fortunately, it’s impossible to implement.

There is constant chaos in people’s heads. One thought goes after another, there are dozens of thousands of them, and it looks like a storm in the desert where every grain of sand represents a thought. If we could accept all these thoughts, we wouldn’t survive a day. Fortunately for us, we are unable to track them all. Our brain works independently while we are living a parallel life.

But the good news end here and the bad ones appear. It’s great that thoughts don’t bury people. However, sometimes it’s beneficial to understand what our head is thinking about. At least in order not to be led by it. To control your life and not just to go with the flow. If we don’t understand what we’re thinking about it’s not us who controls the situation but our brain. Do you trust it? Not a good idea. It wants primitive things. Besides, it’s lazy and 90% of the time it thinks about something it has already thought before. It’s very sad to be a slave of your thoughts, especially when they push you into depression.

To avoid that, it’s necessary to learn how to be aware of your thoughts.

Find a room that won’t be destructing you with noise, weird temperature, shaking, smells, etc. Simply put — lock yourself in your bedroom. Get comfortable and close your eyes. Relax. Breath normally. Concentrate on your thoughts, look at your consciousness and see endlessly appearing and disappearing images. Don’t think too much about them, don’t give them too much attention — the opposite, take a step back and have a look at them.

A thought appeared — a thought disappeared. Two appeared and disappeared. Another one appeared, pulled another one, disappeared. You are an observer. Your brain isn’t you. Your thoughts aren’t you. All of that is yours but you are more than just your thoughts and your brain. A thought appeared — let it go its way. And you should sit on a curb and look. Don’t look at it go but look in front of you waiting for the new thoughts. They will appear, they will go too, and you will stay in your place. And you will be free of your thoughts. Why would you let them lead you? No need.

Don’t forget to breathe. Focus on the present moment. Calm yourself down — distance from your brain which is continuously uneased.

Even short minute or three minutes exercises (but they should be done on a daily basis) will help you liberate yourself from the dictatorship of your thoughts. And you will finally be making a decision being in the state of freedom. The most desirable freedom is freedom from yourself.

The way of thinking that brings pleasure

There are only two types of thinking processes if we look at this activity in terms of the satisfaction that we get as a result. More specifically, there are not two types of thinking but two ways of using your brain, two ways of existing together with your brain. Two types — the right one and the wrong one. The one that brings satisfaction and the one that doesn’t.

If you don’t notice what you’re doing right at this moment, your thoughts are far away — that’s the wrong way. If your attention is focused on what’s going on — that’s the right way.

If you’re dreaming about the future and the past — that’s the wrong way. If you’re thinking about the present — that’s the right way.

If you’re thinking about where you would like to be — that’s the wrong way. If you’re thinking about where you are right now — that’s the right way.

If you trust your thoughts to the point of completely identifying yourself with them — that’s the wrong way. If you are free from the dictatorship of your thoughts and you can distance yourself from them — that’s the right way.

If the instantaneous emotions overpower you — that’s the wrong way. If you resonate only with the things that you choose yourself — that’s the right way.

Aware thinking is necessary not only to improve the process of thinking but its result too. If you learn how to concentrate on what’s going on, don’t let your thoughts fly away, don’t let yourself get destructed by unrelated ideas and random thoughts by applying the effort of your will — you won’t become smarter. But you will get satisfaction from the thinking process.

And it will be so strong that you won’t be able to deny yourself from continuing to do that.

MEANINGS

If you’re reading this book chapter after chapter, you might notice some logic in their order. First, we have dealt with the stress because life with it isn’t life. Then we have learnt how to be aware because it’s the technical basis for any development. Now it’s time to figure out the meanings of our life. They are also the basis, however, not instrumental but ontological. It’s hard for people to live without meanings even if they are trying to convince themselves that it’s not true.

Happiness and the meaning of life

Everybody wants to be happy. Even happy people want to be happy. That’s why psychology in its highest manifestation should help people find happiness. Otherwise, it’s simply not needed. Psychiatrists cure pathologies, therapists cure people with disorders, psychologists help healthy people become happy.

The worst advice about happiness sounds like this: if you want to be happy — just be! And the best one sounds like this: if you want to be happy you should find the meaning of your life.

It’s so easy (though everything is easy at the level of giving advice). The feeling of happiness appears when people see the meaning of their lives. And as more meanings they see, as happier they get. Delicious breakfast in bed gives a sense of pleasure but the feeling of meaningful existence in the morning gives happiness.

If you want to be in a stably raised emotional state, you should find a goal which will be good enough to fill your life with meaning. And move towards this goal, don’t just stand around, don’t put things off. Check for yourself and you’ll see that meaning is a great foundation for coping with problems, adversity and inevitable mood swings. Not to mention the fact that the meaning in life gives a natural and stable motivation.

But don’t try to trick yourself because only being well aware of your values and goals can give you the meaning of life and then happiness. Surrogates like making a billion dollars won’t help. A creature so primitive that such a goal could fill it with the meaning of life hasn’t been born yet.

And don’t try to borrow somebody else’s goal because it doesn’t work either. There is no need to live someone else’s life whether it is imposed by your environment, your education or talent, propaganda or a sense of duty. Everything that comes from the outside will remain introduced. The meaning of your life is very personal, found by you within yourself, even though it is something external to you.

If you want to be happy you should know that the meaning of life isn’t to be happy. But having the meaning makes people so.

The meaning of life is somewhere near

Biotechnologists promise us eternal youth in about thirty-fifty years. Eternal youth and eternal life. Talk to practising psychotherapists, they will unanimously say that impending eternal life doesn’t make people feel euphoric, joyful or hopeful. People begin to suffer when they understand, feel, assume or even suppose that they will live forever.

That’s because they lose the meaning of their life.

As shorter the life is as more understandable is its meaning. However, as soon as the lifespan expands, the problems appear. I understand clearly the meaning of life if I am hunted by a pre-historic boar and I haven’t even invented fire yet. I understand the meaning of life if I am planning to live in my medieval village up until I am thirty and then die of the plague. I even understand what the meaning of my life is if I will retire at 60 to hang out in my summer house. But what will I be doing if I live for 200 years? And for 500 years? And for 3 000?

People can’t live without meaning. And people always see the meaning of their lives somewhere beyond them and not within themselves. When the meaning is close — it’s clear, just reach out and take it. When the horizons of planning drift away, when this meaning is extremely far away, it gets lost and disappears. And people lose themselves with it.

The eternity that’s promised to us by the biotechnologies will force everybody to answer the question «what for». And those who won’t find the answer to this question will feel the burden of eternity and will be afraid of every day. And they will be saved by a very simple thought that has been saving people from meaningless existence for a long time. It is this thought: you shouldn’t confuse plans with meanings.

Plans can stretch out far into the future but the meaning should be here with me right now.

To run away from a pre-historic boar, to survive a medieval plague, to retire — these are plans and not meanings. Short-term, plans can compensate for the lack of meaning. But the plans go far, we understand that these are two different things. The meaning is more important. And simpler. Closer and more fundamental. Plans should be made based on it and not the other way around. If you’ve lost the meaning of life, don’t search far away because it’s somewhere near. But search for it because life will be tough without it as the eternity is close. It wants to test your meaning of life.

Types of the meanings of life

Meaninglessness is the people’s worst enemy. Suffering, bad luck, grieve — all of that can be dealt with if life has a meaning. Success, acceptance, wealth, talent — all of that is devaluated when there is no meaning. Each one of us feels it. But to manage your life, just a feeling is not enough. It’s necessary to realize it.

Have you ever tried to understand the meaning of your life not at the level of the feelings but at the intellectual level? It’s necessary in order to track how you’re changing with time. And in order to align your life with your basic values. And in order not to let the environment impose on you the ideas about the world and yourself that aren’t inherent to you. It’s necessary in order to live consciously and not just go with the flow.

Of course, the meaning of human life is some kind of a complex of meanings and, moreover, it’s personal. But if we make it simpler and more schematic, all people share the following values which form every individual meaning of human life when they add up in the different proportions: Altruistic, Existential, Hedonistic, Values of self-realization, Status, Communicative, Family, Cognitive.

Altruistic values are about how to improve the world, do good and help people. Sounds familiar? Hurray, you’re an altruist. And if these values don’t resonate with you that much, that means that there aren’t much of them in your meaning of life or there are none at all. It’s not good or bad, it’s just how it is. But if there is nothing altruistic in you and you decided (or you were forced to) help homeless people, you have a clear conflict between the meaning of your life and your activity and this conflict will break your psyche at some point.

Existential values mean being free, living and loving. To be free in the highest meaning of this word. To live not for the pleasures but for the life itself. To love not for pleasure but because it’s great. In order not to put yourself in this group, you should know that it contains such people as, for example, monks who consider themselves to be free of sin, who live Life and love thy neighbour.

Hedonistic — to enjoy, to feel happy, to live guided by emotions. The things that you thought about when you read the description of existential values. But these are very different values that create very different meanings of life. The advertisement and mass culture, in general, like to exploit hedonism because we are all hedonists, at least, a little bit. However, it doesn’t mean that these are the core values for us.

The values of fulfilment — to improve, to fulfil one’s potential and to embody one’s abilities. People with a pronounced talent even if this talent isn’t so significant. Keep in mind, that if someone wants to «find oneself» it doesn’t mean that the values of fulfilment prevail in this person. It means that they have lost the meaning of life. People whose primary goal is fulfilling their potential don’t want to find themselves — they have already found if they have lost at all, and now they want to fully express themselves.

Status values — success, career, position in society. It seems that it’s always been unacceptable to love people for whom these values form the meaning of their life. But you know what’s funny — such people are unliked only when there are going towards their goal. But as soon as they have achieved it, people start to curry favour and grovel. Yes, it will take a while to get rid of the Soviet inheritance.

Communicative values are about how great it is to be with someone close, to be happy to communicate, to understand that others need you. It’s not about the communication itself because you can be very good at conducting small talk, but, at the same time, be an introvert and a misanthrope. Communication skills differ from communicative values quite strongly — to «be able» and «to love» are two different things.

Family values — to help your relatives, to live for your family, to give all the best to the children. Usually, these values are assigned to women but that is completely wrong. Both men and women can fill in their meaning of life with these values. Or the opposite — they might not feel them at all. A special remark for new moms who love their children very much but are horrified of the fact that they are disgusted by other children — don’t worry, everything is fine with you. The family values are called so because they imply loving only those who are in your family circle.

Cognitive values — the values of learning. To get to know yourself, the world, to understand people, to understand everything. For example, scientists fill their life with such values. Chasing a discovery, they leave no stone unturned. It’s not because they are bad people but because it’s their meaning of life. So, you shouldn’t expect a nuclear physicist to love humanity which, however, doesn’t mean that it never happens.

Have a look at these values one more time. Try to understand, which of them dominate in you and constitute the meaning of your life. Probably, not all of them at the same time and to the same extent. Most likely there is a dominant group and the rest of them are distributed on a residual basis. Be honest and reflect on whether your life complies with this meaning.

Heal your time, it may be sick

If you feel confused, generally unsatisfied and probably lonely or you’re haunted by the unanswered questions about the meaning, purposes and goals, you should know that everything is fine with you. And if that has never happened to you… Well, be sure that it will happen and at the worst moment. People are made to have existential crises, they are essential.

To deal with them without unnecessary anxiety and in a more productive way (and to help others), think about what part of your life you’re doubting. It’s known that there are three parts — the past, the present and the future. But you’re doubting only one while the other two are suffering in solidarity.

You may be doubting your past. Even if it was bright and full of events, much brighter and richer than your current present and your expected future. That happens because people are used to devaluating significant things. And even more so, they can’t avoid regretting about the past if it has failed. Anyways, you lose stability, you ask yourself why you’ve done what you’ve done and how you’ve done it.

You may be doubting your present. It’s when the past is fine, the future is fine, but they have no connection, no present. You have to postpone the right course of events because of some very wrong but very topical things that are happening right now.

Finally, you may be doubting your future. You have no prospects because they have been destroyed, devaluated and have become unreachable. It doesn’t matter. You just have no future. And it doesn’t matter if it comes because even if it does, there is no place for you there.

After you have localized the problem, make yourself see that its scale isn’t as massive as it seemed. It is in the past, in the present or the future. Just in one of them. And as you have already realized, you should repair one of them leaning on the other ones that remain intact.

If the problem is in the past, you have the present and your plans which you will use to create a new past. If the problem is in the present, you have the past and your plans, hence, you should just survive the present. It will be over soon because the present can’t last for a long time. If the problem is in the future, let your past and your present give you a hint where to go, what goals to set and with what meaning to fill your life.

Time heals, it’s true. But you should heal your time if there is a wormhole in one of its parts.

Signs that the meaning of life is lost

Everybody has felt bored or apathetic at least for some short periods. That probably was unpleasant but not deadly. Another thing is when boredom and apathy turn into a complete loss of the meaning of life. To save yourself from it and to help your close ones when it happens to them, let’s figure out the main signs of an upcoming existential crisis.

— The simplest and most obvious is an empty life. But you shouldn’t assume that the only thing that the person thinks about is this emptiness. Not at all. This feeling might not occur in all life situations. But boredom is a broader though not always bright and engrossing feeling.

— Life goals. There are problems with them which are often very subjective when it seems to others that someone has achieved success and recognition but this person doesn’t feel that their activity and their plans are significant. The direction of movement might be the same but the goals don’t line up in a consequent order and an attractive prospect.

— The absence of the goals is closely related to motivation and its variety. People on the verge of a serious crisis don’t lose the motivation itself but focus on a narrow range of motives. And that leads to living life like it’s a set of unrelated actions and pieces.

— The values pale into insignificance, the needs come to the fore. To be more specific, the values become even less important because compliance with the social norms takes precedence over it. Needs, norms, values. In such hierarchy the values don’t play any role, begin to fade and degrade.

— A person starts to create such an image of the world in the head that the absence of goals, meaning and motivation, the dominance of the needs and the constant boredom seem logical. That’s the last stage when instead of fighting there is a restructuring of all beliefs to justify the current state of affairs.

Knowing these signs, it’s possible to tackle the crisis. You should do it gradually, thoroughly, to work out every point as there are only five of them. There are no other ways: a person can’t live with the meanings of others, it’s necessary to develop your own.

Feel like you don’t fit in

A high-quality and rich life is inclined to being holistic and connected. It’s connected both internally into a logical system and externally to the lives of other people and not through communication on Social Media but meaningful connections. A flawed life is always closed, separated from others and fragmented within itself.

Realizing something means integrating it into some big context. A meaningful life is integrated into a big context and connected with it. Life is always meaningless when it falls out of the whole context. As more connections someone has with the world as more flexible this person can go about their life rejecting some old connections and acquiring some new ones. As fewer connections, there are, as harder this process is.

A person may lose touch with relatives, and if they have not created their own family, this emptiness will always be with them. A person may lose touch with work, and they will have to suffer for eight hours with a lunch break daily. A person may lose touch with things, and they will turn into a shopaholic buying up everything to fill in with quantity the missing experience of quality. A person may lose touch with society and begin to feel like an outcast or a slave to the established foundations. A person may lose touch with themselves, and they will stop seeing their value, the value of other people, start treating everyone and themselves with cynical consumerism.

It all might lead to depression, loss of the meaning of life and even pathology.

So, you may ask, why the headline of this part calls for being alone, breaking all the rules and experiencing being abandoned? You will like the answer.