i stop pushing my boulder a while ago. I used to be all about the self-improvement. But goal posts (especially with women) kept getting moved further back the closer i got to them and eventually realized life is basically a treadmill that speeds up the faster you run, and just hopped off.
Not to mention, there's also diminishing returns the longer you are invested in improving a certain faculty of yourself. This hurts motivation if you don't actually enjoy the process.
Most men in RP are stuck in perpetual self improvement mode HOPING it will make them successful with wimen. Problem is goal posts have moved , bar got higher....eventually you become that hamster on treadmill.
I have dwindled down a lot myself. I haven’t stopped completely and likely won’t because I’ve always just been a life long learner type so I love learning new things and hitting the weights for the sake of it. I’m more or less outcome independent. The whole self improvement cult wave will eventually wane because you’ve basically traded one rat race for another and people will eventually see that happiness and content what have you is intrinsic.
Have you considered Jesus? He can really help you out with this sort of thing. He’ll reward his people with a kingdom and eternal life and whoever comes to him he will not turn away. He can also remove our purposelessness and give us an eternal goal to set !
One of the few things that Peterson is right about is that you need motivation from "both ends", where you have something you're running towards and something you're running away from. It's why lots of people have no motivation to workout when they are only pursuing a better physique, but will feel much more motivated when losing the weight could mean the difference between them living or dying. The problem is that there's generally far more things to run away from than things to run towards, and if all you have are things to run away from and nothing to run towards, at some point it becomes much harder to justify running away from them.
Yeah, it's good to have both. I think I outran everything I was running away from, and I recently reached the thing I was running to... so now I don't really have any running to do at all. I'm pretty content for now, but I'm wondering now what I should do with the rest of my life.
I practice a martial art instead of just working out at a gym. Certain martial arts place more emphasis on training your tendons and connective tissue rather than just your muscles. Because muscle fiber deteriorates with age, your tendons not so much.
Especially when you feel metaphorically "surrounded" by the things you want to get away from. Try running away from a circle's boundary, while being at its center. Guaranteed paralysis...
@@ChaosRUsEntand if there's no kind of real relief after death, if it's just complete erasure, then what was the point? Why would the universe develop in a way that sentient life can come into existence and lament its awareness just in time to evaporate back into uncreation? What the hell kind of sick biological joke is that? "Ha ha, enjoy your lifelong stress before terrifying obliteration! No point, you just randomly popped out of thin air, get fucked for being alive you conscious loser lolololok"
Most humans don't have the sort of meta-perspective you have Stardusk. Many of them will be shocked and emotionally reactive if you tell them a very simple factual statement such as, "All humans are animals". Most people are easily entertained and engaged dopamine slaves.
The "simple factual statement" is disputed on the grounds of semantic disagreement. If by 'animals' you mean something like 'carbon based life form' then sure. But the connotation of 'animal' in the english language exists in plain contrast to 'person' or 'human.' To refer to humans as animals is *literally* dehumanizing because we see an obvious, intrinsic, and self evident gulf between the capabilities of humans and non-humans (for one thing)
@@codyvandal2860 to act as if the statement that "all humans are animals" is more of a "simple factual statement " than it is bizarre,unusual,incredibly nihilistic,or as you said dehumanizing speaks volumes of this guy's state of mind. His entire comment is ridiculously condescending and straight up silly. Of course people are going to have shocked and emotional reactions when you say something like that,especially if you're in a charged or serious dicussion.
@@codyvandal2860 It's rather irrelevant that some combination of human conditioning and collective human subconscious makes it difficult for us to perceive the fundamental fact that we are animals or that it's "dehumanizing". Beyond just saying "we are animals", the implication of this statement is that humans, as all animals, have general, deterministic behavioral tendencies that we generally will not deviate from.
@@BOSSDONMAN What other 'animals' build rocketships? Do calculus? Create vaccines? Write symphonies? Produce nuclear weapons? Leave the atmosphere? It says a lot about your value system that you regard those as evidently irrelevant facts. To say that "humans are animals" is like saying the pyramids are rocks. Accurate only in the most narrow, obtuse, unimaginative, and autistic sense possible.
Military here. Last year I went on my first deployment and I actually liked it a lot. I disciplined myself on my diet, work, and working out and felt like a king on a hill. However, when I came back from deployment I fell into a depression living in a peaceful, civilized place. Lost all my motivation and who I was from deployment. That was the time, I felt alive in a way. Learning to find that "savage" or "glorified" side of me again.
@College email noone come and try it asshole, I have more wepons then you ever dreamed of having, I am retired army Vietnam vet and you are nothing but a little twinkle toed commie cock muncher so shut your cock holster!
With everybody trying to escape (their own) reality one way or another it seems just living and being in the moment is already a hero's journey in itself. Anything else is just bonus, really. The secret is to get to a place (doesn’t matter how) where you are content, grateful and feel true joy with whoever you are at this point in your life and whatever you have (going on) in your life, good and bad. That is the true Nirvana, in my opinion.
Accepting your own mind and reality " as it is", is the highest point of enlightenment. Most are consumed on a " spectrum" by trauma, anxiety, nihilism, narcissism. I think your argument is brilliant in it`s simplicity.
@@maxsimon36 I would actually encourage (self-)compassion, empathy and understanding instead of indifference. True healing can only occur once we allow the difficult and uncomfortable feelings to just “be” instead of trying to fight them (which is were true suffering comes from) by trying to be indifferent. When you truly empathize with someone else’s suffering you truly feel connected with yourself and the world around you, regardless of whether you feel lonely or not in your life.
@@chrism8180 That is not how I meant it. What I mean is that regardless of the decisions you make in your life, you can always create a space of content, gratitude and joy within yourself where you can always go to, regardless of what is happening in your life.
As someone who is about to turn 40 soon I can absolutely agree with everything you said in this video. I've recently started doing Yoga-style stretching routines every day so that my back doesn't kill me when I'm playing the piano or doing weeding in the garden and similar stuff. There's already a noticeable difference to being 30 or even 25; and regular walking or jogging is an absolute must for me, too, just to feel normal.
We all want to think that's we're the Luke Skywalker of our own story. In reality, the vast majority of us are the Mos Eisley cantina patrons in someone else's story.
I don't see a hero's journey as anything other than overcoming adversity and failure, even if on a small level. Hey, if I succeed at something after failing at it hundreds of times, I'm gonna feel like a hero after the fact. It is what it is.
No. If I fail a hundred times and then I succeed I’ll still feel like a failure. Failing so much doesn’t happen in a hundred seconds, it can take years. And that next step may not even bring you rewards to begin with.
No. I've had trouble with bureaucracy all my life and don't feel like a hero after sending the 1001st document to the administration. It just feels shit to get bombarded by meaningless letters and demands.
The "force yourself to take baby steps" plan did help me through a year-long bout of major depression about ten years back. Ended up in a fairly fit and sporty state of anhedonia.
These depressive realistic vids are music to my ears. I love them far more than the manosphere type content. Its so relieving and soothing to hear things that will absolutely crush the average human being.
My motivations are peace, freedom, and security. To be able to live your life as well as not letting society suck you into one of its many bullshit narratives that ruins your quality of life is the best life to have.
You spoke my mind. The only thing motivating me is my personal freedom ; but society perhaps by its nature, doesn't care about any of that; and wants nothing from us except conformity, obedience and control. Any motivations I previously had that stemmed from society ; are completely gone now. If society invests nothing in me ; then I'm in no way obligated to invest anything in it.
And this is why men love video games, video games have a grand design and a conclusion whether you are naturally gifted and can pass the video game in 42 minutes while another might take 3 years, their is a finish line with a similar (digital) reward profile, NO SO IN LIFE, except death.
All that motivates men has been co-opted by a corporatist pantheon hoping to bury them in responsibility, and offer ever less incentive. The failure of said pantheon is to realize that worthwhile employees overlap almost entirely with those who would know better than to participate.
Totally why we as a species truly enjoy and are eternally enamored by the heros journey in our media and all the way from the campfire stories. A way to cope with nihilism and give ourselves even if a glimmer of existentialism. That while we know nothing matters that we do what we want or believe in for the sake of it not for what it will tangibly give us. You nailed it. 👏
I just want to play my video games, spend time outdoors, and see friends a few times a month. It's such a small dream, but it doesn't seem all that achievable
That's a lot of people's lives the key is being surrounded by good people you can trust. As cliché as it sounds, don't let people tell you can't achieve your dreams and especially don't let others walk over you
I grew up LDS (Mormon) and grew somewhat disenchanted with the religion during my overseas proselyting mission to German, at least I think that's how it occurred but, I digress. The Church inundates its memberships with a VERY grand narrative, as discussed herein, about having a heavenly inheritance (including theomorphosis, for those whose faith and actions demonstrated the greatest worthiness) and being part of an eternal cycle of familial creation which includes Elohim (God Himself). When you go from that to NO guiding narrative, it's incredibly disheartening. I don't know if I'll ever return to it but, I am glad you were able to share your insights today because, until you had articulated it, I found myself holding onto many simultaneous narratives, often that contradicted one another, like Euroethnonationalism, American Exceptionalism, Corporatism & Clerofascism, Christian Esotericism, Some Kind of Existentialism Between Camus' Absurdism and Lovecraftian Cosmicism, Freemasonry, and so forth. Countless spiritual, economic, political, and artistic schools of thought of which I took something while suffering the contradictions therebetween it and everything else I've assimilated. I don't know how but, I see now that I've got to clear to the board and build from the ground up, principle by principle, so that I can live within a hierarchy of precepts which I _KNOW_ I agree with and not just what I think "feels right". I've not the foggiest as to how I shall achieve this lofty goal and I may die before ever having reached a reconciling system of conception but, I've got to try. Thank you, sir, for helping invoke this thought...now...where the hell do I begin? That's the question I have to answer for myself, lest I reject exterior inceptions and be forever lost...
Building the discipline is the most important virtue in these routines for me. That discipline gets me then thorugh hard time, does not matter if I do not get results, the prize is mastering yourself.
Hobbies give a lot of meaning to my life. I do love weight lifting, I've been doing that consistently for the past 10 years, I recently gotten into archery, and also hanging out with my kids.
@chrism8180 its way cheaper than shooting guns. You can get all the stuff you need for less than 200. Then you just have to pay for stuff when yours breaks. Check out the black hunter recurve. They are like $100 and work great. My favorite is my H2 Tartar bow by Deerseeker.
My two primary motivations for doing things are: to relieve stress or to give me options for other things. I no longer expect anything to come from doing something just because I'm doing it, but perhaps the doing of the thing will be useful for some situation at a later date.
Running and playing football (soccer) are my copes. The walking example is exactly right and that turns into running potentially. Running chemically and physiologically is an end rather than a means!! I was a gym coper for a long time but it’s honestly a depressing and vapid cycle. Running has really helped me overcome debilitating nihilism
I love running too, it is the feeling of motion that is exhilirating. Endorphins aside. One of the most irritating gymbro cultural developments over the past decade has been a jihad against running. Especially due to the cult of a pot bellied fitness guru- Mark Rippetoe whose lord and savior is squats, squats and more squats. Some of his acolytes even ask brilliant questions such as - why do you need to run?
so video games make people feel like they accomplished something when they really didn't and they end up being losers instead of earning real life accomplishments?
This is why religion ultimately survives. When there's no logical reason to do a thing, religion offers that last line of motivation to pull through. And I'm not religious.
How about the post-religious Scandinavia? Most Scandinavians don't even have a concept of religion. They may be Christians, but not religious. Scandinavians find meaning and purpose in family and friends and everything they can and do. That religion has anything unique to offer is a myth. There's not even a definition of religion that covers all types of "religion." The word religion comes from religio, which has nothing to do with religion as conceptualized in Christian Europe. Religio "In classic antiquity, it meant conscientiousness, sense of right, moral obligation, or duty towards anything[3] and was used mostly in secular or mundane contexts.[4][5]"
There is this atheist philosopher named Nietzche who I think had a very similar observation. Keep in mind that this is the same guy that said, "god is dead".
I mean you can sell any old BS to a dumbed down dependant population who has nothing left. I could make a religion following anime lore, and get people on board, and it'd probably be more popular that current religion
As someone who only leaves his apartment 90% of the time to go to work I will say I am excited to try this baby step approach. I've come to realization that a great difference in comparative circumstances over too small a time span is equivalent to making a casual jogger run a marathon. The jogger's result is easy to guess: catastrophic and demoralizing failure. Thanks for this vid
I deeply resonated with this topic. As one with many afflictions, the only release resembling anything satisfactory enough to sate my need for meaningful progress is exercise. I have 8-pack abs because the pain it took to achieve the physique is the closest I feel to alive. It reminded me of a profound moment in Teen Titans (of all shows), where Cyborg lamented the limits imposed upon him post transformation, and how in his fully human form, the potential for growth was seemingly never-ending and that gave him the motivation to push himself (pun intended 😁)
"That which doesn't kill you makes you stronger!" -Nietzsche "Pain is good, a lot of pain is very good! Pain is the weakness leaving your body!" - Jesse Ventura But sometimes, as Marilyn Manson said "That which doesn't kill you... is gonna leave a scar" or worse, leave you crippled, missing a limb, etc. and of course too much pain can be a recipe for burnout. My "grand narrative" is simply this: I find meaning in progress. Sometimes though, slow progress is all you can do and it's better than nothing.
The purpose of life without getting all existential is just a one liner. Reduce suffering. Everything revolves around that whether taking care of your health to being financially responsible etc. Everything else is just an added benefit. We don’t need to make this illusion of grandeur. The kid who got drafted to war in ww2 and got head shot off the break beaching in Normandy isn’t thinking today and not even a memory in anyones mind. Just relax and live. We’re just a cog in the wheel. Enjoy it but not too much either.
Yeah, this is my mantra now whenever I question why I'm doing something like working out or eating healthy, to minimize my suffering. Of course I still lose even that drive and rot for a couple days consuming black pill shit... But eventually I realize it's not enjoyable feeling like a sack of rotting shit all stiff in bed so I go back to the gym... Have a real problem not falling off like this often though so I'm not consistent at all.
"What if you don't believe in that sort of thing?" Trust me, you will if you start seriously and earnestly practicing it. It's just like everything else; you have to put in the reps. But most people won't, unless they value the thing for its own sake. The Hermetics and Gnostics were right about a lot of things, including personal, internal transformation, and I don't know if I would quite describe it as 'self-actualization' either. I happen to place a great deal of personal value on the transformative insight one can gain through an experience of _satori_ , because, and I know you've talked about this sort of thing before, it's one of those 'realms of the archmage,' and that happens to be my realm. Understanding the purpose, the real purpose, of ceremonial magic and putting it into practice has had a profound effect on me as a person.
During the pandemic, I followed this exact advice. I started exercising for the first time in decades. My requirement was a very low bar - Put on your shoes and go outside for at least 5 minutes every day. Seriously. A year or so later, I could do 30,000 steps in a day, about 11 miles WHILE testing positive for CV-19. And, I had lost about 40 pounds. All without ever *requiring* anything more than 5 minutes outside per day. Yes, I often did more, but I never let my expectations rise. The goal was to succeed and avoid any mental feeling of failure. Side note... Weight lifting is *great* cardiovascular exercise. If you don't believe me, get a heart rate monitor and compare your average HR while walking to lifting. Walking is mostly zone 1 and 2. Lifting can hit all zones, like interval training.
Motivation comes after doing oddly enough. That’s what self discipline is. I just lift to failure and have my 5 day a week gym workout and my set diet. My goal is just to stick to the workout and diet. I don’t have a fitness goal. If you stick to a plan even if you don’t see results quickly they will happen regardless. Hitting the gym is worth it. My dad is in his early 70’s and seems like he’s 100 already. Even though we all die and it’s all lost I’d rather stay at least mobile into my old age instead of letting entropy speed up.
The thing about the gym is that the thought of it is always terrible, but the act of it really isn’t that bad, in fact i find it very satisfying, seeing some tiny improvement each time I go. And of course afterwards you feel incredible. It’s strange that the thought of it before you do it remains so bad. I think it’s just a little hero’s journey just getting yourself to the gym.
I heard Tucker Goodrich (nutrition and fitness guy on the radio) say - "If you ever feel like skipping your exercise... just think how many times have you gone for a run and thought to yourself 'man I regret doing that' after?" Also I'm half-assedly quitting chewing tobacco. (Nicotine gum but I still use the real stuff a couple times a week). Every time I'm tempted I think to myself - "The more you do it the more you're going to want to do it. Desire only begets more desire."
"Your purpose" should only be to become the best person You can be in whatever situations that you are in and that it! Never waste time trying to change or "save humanity".
There's no "best version" of anyone on this dirty planet. It's all about human ego, you don't "break boundaries", you don't " conquering your failure " and someday you and your ego will die. All you doing right now just, quote, "mental mastrbtion".
Self-improvement is based around branding. It has been this way for years. There is no self-help book that will awaken your desire. These books and other media may influence your thoughts and emotions but, you have to decide (either on a conscious or subconscious level) to do it yourself. It matters not what you believe in if it isn't powerful enough to cultivate a strong enough sense of purpose to make you want to live. Believe what you will to do what you must.
Heroes are not setting out on a long journey anymore to slay the dragon. They are cleaning their rooms for yet another only fans meeting with princess.
Can resonate with this. I like running, lifting weights, playing guitar, pursuing career and academic goals even though I know all these activities are ultimately futile they make life slightly better/more interesting. I just do them.
It's true: up to a certain stage in the life cycle, people need to believe that there's a grand narrative. A Point to It All. But I've found it a huge relief, as I approach fifty, to finally wrap my head around the fact that there's no master plan. Existence is still fundamentally bleak but I'm no longer swimming against the tide, which was pointless and exhausting. I get a little more sleep these days, and I'm not straining feverishly to reach out and touch a happy ending like Gatsby on his dock.
@Razvan I think that the grand narrative worldview happens involuntarily. It's something our brains do to allow us to cope--not just with tragic events, but also with day-to-day boredom and discomfort. If we felt that difficulty had no meaning, many of us might not survive the first arduous thirty-five or forty years of our lives. But if we make it that far, we gradually come to an understanding of what existence really is. With kids, it's hard to say what position a parent should take. I definitely wouldn't want to discourage a child, but I wouldn't want to foster unrealistic expectations, either. I think that by the age of twelve or thirteen, most kids know--more or less consciously--what their roles are, and whether those roles come with advantages or limitations. That's when the involuntary mechanism kicks in: if severe limitations are imposed on us, we still must believe on some level that life has a greater purpose. It's necessary to go on functioning.
It's Not. Nihilism just serves as a comfort zone for You. You don't Want to accept your suffering was probably designed. You are part of the Western problem
There is nothing for people who don't have faith. Faith means believing in that which you can't see. The future where you achieve whatever goal through hard work literally doesn't exist. It can't exist without your faith in it forming first. This extends to all things. Materialism is dumb.
There is no reason a person ought to be totally demotivated. There is no objective measure of good and bad, so you can assert anything to be good that you want, and if you believe it, it will be true (at least to you). The only dangers are in asserting things to be good which are factually untrue or which are internally inconsistent. But you can, for instance, assert, "My life is worth it just because I have tried to be me." or "Doing my best is enough," or "The sky is pretty today, and seeing that alone has made the day worth it," and nobody can effectively argue with you to say that you are wrong. You just have find values that you can honestly believe in, and then act outwardly as if you really did believe. Acting is the same as believing the idea behind the action. If you find that any particular goal you have was delusional or has become impossible, just move through your despair and find another thing to motivate you.
@@trickytrack00 My experience with despair is that doing random stuff that you don't even think will work is better than doing nothing. Despair can also be like a tunnel, rather than a pit, if you are willing to let go of the thing you can't have. And it is easier to have self respect if you try to be your best, even in difficult circumstances, than to settle for less. I am not ashamed of telling people these things.
Baby steps to getting in shape, it can be as simple as, the first thing you do when you wake up is drop and do some pushups. Even if you can only do 5, if you do that every day, you'll be shocked at how fast your body and attitude change. When you start to see changes, start to be able to do more, you'll start making better choices with food, sleep habits, everything starts to snowball in the right direction. If you're having trouble getting to the gym, get a workout partner who is motivated and stronger than you. Stay healthy guys, you deserve it.
One of the few things that really interest me in life is handbalancing. The grace and beauty of those movements. People like Yann Simyan are idols to me. I have been doing them for about 2 years and I still cannot even one arm handstand, but wow it is peaceful and fun. Go to some river, or just in my garage with the local homeless cat who pretty much lives in my garage now, and just doing handstands listening to music petting the cat. It has been a major coping mechanism for me for this life.
This advice "baby steps" has been the most useful and effective advice I have ever gotten. Last year I was 270 pounds and now I weigh 195 all I did was stop eating junk. All that other advice from gurus didn't do jack for me.
Good video essay. Lifting weights is also very important to preserve the muscles and bone density. I do agree that gurus take it over the top. But do not dismiss the importance of resistance training for people who are older
Going to the gym is a torture for me, but every single time, I leave the gym a happy man. Sternious physical activity just does wonders for your state of mind.
This was a great video. I go to the gym as a habit it makes me feel physically and mentally better. I also look better. I started learning Russian about 18 months ago. The reason at the time was because I had a Ukrainian girlfriend. She is no longer in my life but I still study Russian language from 20 mins to 2 hours, 7 days a week. I won't be going to Ukraine or Russia in the near future, for obvious reasons but it's a habit and I actually enjoy it, unlike the gym.
I think people fundamentally misunderstand what the hero's journey is. Its not about god, religions, spiritual things, self improvement, doing heroic things, going to the gym, or any of those things adjacent to those concepts. The heros journey is a pattern one lives without even knowing it. Its a pattern that can manifest in the smallest of things. The heros journey, like all other archetypes, live unseen from those expressing them. You cant decide to "go on the heros journey", you cant decide anything in that matter. If you dupe yourself into thinking this is stuff that leads to glory, boy, you are in a for a rude awakening. In real life, the heros journey is the opposite of glorious. There is suffering, doubt, darkness, hopelessness, pain and most of all, fear. Its the human condition talking to you about the dirt you came from, and the dirt you will return. The hero makes peace with it, stops to seek glory, stops to seek magic and starts to be just a man that uses what he was given. Do not seek the heros journey for when it finds you, you will complain to your god to take away this burden that seeks to eat your soul. And if you complete the cycle, you will end up where you started without even realizing what happened to you because you are unable to understand what you did and why you did it in the first place. Such is the nature of all archetypes.
And just in case TA reads this, topics like that are what I follow for the last 20 years or so. Those things go far deeper and are far more mysterious than we can imagine. I would love to talk about that with Thinking Ape on a podcast or so because this directly touches so many things he himself talks about. Just in case he wants to venture a bit deeper into it, away from all the guru nonsense and into our own psyche and the lies we tell us, you know where to find me.
@@hansfrankfurter2903buddy this isnt a college essay. Im willing to bet most of this is his interpretation, and probably has drawn from a compilation of sources over time. Do you really think hes going to be able to drum them all up?
As someone who probably has ADHD, I do get motivated but it burns up real quick. I can't really grind, nor are my interests consistent. I have so many uncompleted projects I do want to complete but I'm exhausted or start a new project.
i used to go through a hero's journey every week just about... nowadays, it's almost every day. this has been most of my life's obsession as well, i used to save an old lover often when we were in school together, i was very protective over her. if something happened to her in front of me, i would become unable to control my actions, i'd be on autopilot and help her.
I'm fairly certain I'm specifically mentioned in the Book of Revelation. Meaning, I'm fairly certain I'm in a grand narrative. That doesn't motivate me at all. I would argue it's the opposite: it demotivates me. This is why I'm not entirely sure people like Lobster Boy know what they're talking about.
I went from a grand religious/spiritual narrative that I was 100% dedicated to, to an existential vacuum when it became evident that it wasn't real. That was some years ago. Now I just forge ahead with a personal narrative. Borderline solipsistic at times, but it is something I can hold on to. On a more practical level, my daily motivation is to work and position myself to be as unreliant as possible on the world around me. I want a coastal cottage where I can raise my family a good distance away from the madness. And I work as much as I need to, also prioritizing personal time for the hobbies and interests I'm passionate about. If there's any prevailing message of this decade, it is that "it" really isn't worth it. "It" meaning the rat race that we all deluded ourselves into thinking we had a measure of agency in, meanwhile it can be every man for himself at the drop of a hat, and we could all be annihilated at any moment. So yeah, it's about finding the balance that works for you, and caring for yourself, whether or not anyone else does.
The heroes journey is paralleled to ancient Mythologies. And mythologies are just true enough to it’s core of story and intent. It’s just a small exaggeration So yes it is real. This UA-cam audience is just miserable and pathetic who doesn’t derive pleasure from suffering to become great at any craft.
The david goggins motivation worked for me. I think you need to come back from hell to start it though. Haven't told anyone what I do or boast just challenge myself because the alternative is worse. If I sit around I start thinking about things. Today was shit but at least I pushed myself physically.
If I may ask, who do I cite for the term "Crisis of motivation"? Stardusk? The framing is great. Anyway, I'd argue motivation is a feeling more than anything... and all feelings are fickle. Something like a grand narrative is meant to inspire feelings of motivation, but there is a sort of tolerance built up after hearing the track played over and over-it's like an opiate. So even the things meant to give rise to a particular feeling are also fickle in the same way even if they're mechanistically different. When it comes to things like staying in the gym, I try to find multiple reasons to go. Admittedly, I started going as part of a looksmaxxing journey, but when I discovered how much better I felt, and most of all, how much more mobile I am, these things became the reason, and it's these things that keep me going. I'm getting a result, so my brain registers as worth while, thus I keep going.
In recent months i have become blackpilled because I was a formed "chad" as you would say but i got acne and became fat. This in turn lead me down this rabbithole and now im here. I know i can go back with 100% cetrtainty but even I struggle with motivation. You see, success is something certain for me but i still struggle. I just imagine all the men that are partaking in an endless jounrey with a chance, a minor chance to make it. Sadly its not the same output for everyone. You can still put in the effort but in the end not everyone is gonna make it. Im not urging anyone to give up but if you arent successful in the end, dont be sad instead try to find peace in one way or another because in the end it doesnt really matter.
Ascetic pain and denialism. If you are sufficiently paranoid in correctly believing that humans around you will profit and manipulate your many weaknesses, the only recourse is learning from pain, deprivation and suffering. Choose your own pain so that others don’t choose it for you!
I recently got a treadmill for my basement gym setup. I'll be catching up on the anime while getting some cardio in. That will be really nice now that the weather is getting colder and I have a harder time rolling out of bed and going for a walk 1st thing in the morning when I feel cold.
Just continue to learn, not necessarily to better yourself for any goal. But moreso because, fuck it. You don’t need a reason. But a reason could be because fuck life. Fuck your situation and the people that would have you rot. Just keep at it to spite them, the cosmos, whatever the fuck ‘it’ is.
With 8 billion souls on this little blue pearl and most of them with a mobile device in hand, the ego screams out for significance, yearns to be noticed, wants desperately to mean something, hopefully famous.
People want instant gratification, or at worst guaranteed results if they apply themselves for more than a few minutes at a time. You can be the type who quits the gym 3 weeks into your new year's resolution because you haven't lost 20 pounds, or you can be satisfied with being a little bit better than you were yesterday and have it be sufficient motivation to carry on.
Fantastic advice stardusk; motivation shouldn't be relied upon to take action as at the very most it is a temporary feeling but as you say important reasons for why this certain action will benefit you in the short and long term are paramount to getting as close to living a life of positive distraction away from the impending and realistic bout of nihilism! As a recommendation I like to do weekly notes on what I prioritise in life and how I've progressed it's a good way of maintaining structure and progress :)
I see the Hero’s Journey more through the lens of a modernised existentialism (one that doesn’t rely on free will anymore, but still works with determinism): I don’t think anyone is part of an actual “great narrative”. However, the presence of functional narratives in society can show people possible directions to go in, like road signs. These can influence human decisions like any other outside stimulus. There’s plenty of such narratives to chose from today - thanks to the internet, access to any given one of them is easier than ever before. And there are countless senses of meaning, secular and religious / spiritual ones alike. The problem is therefore less with an absence of meaning (nihilism), but with an abundance / excess of it (pluralism): Finding the sense of purposes that works for you personally from among the countless options is the search for a needle in a haystack. Added to that, because it’s easier than ever to publish creative works (music, books, movies, videogames etc.), we’re also getting swamped with all the mediocre stuff we wouldn’t have gotten to see otherwise. Conversely, we’re also exposed to great but fringe ideas, which in former times wouldn’t have made it past the industry gatekeepers. In fact, it seems to be the industry gatekeepers (such as in Hollywood) who produce a majority of the trash right now - proving that not even the “professionals” always know the answers about what constitutes a “good narrative”. Thus, a lot of the road signs for potential life trajectories that are out there may actually lead to a dead end.
David goggins is a full blown narc, giving bs, low grade advice to needy people taking advanatge of people in need, for fame and adoration to stroke his fuckin ego and be this guru like figure while barely addressign the issue. Flexing on his audiance on social media to validate his massively inflated ego. Hes a joke in my opinion, I cant stand him.
"Baby steps" follows sound psychological research. Most attempts to change life, habits, etc fail. Research shows that the small % that succeed starts with something small and builds from there.
@11:55 to 12:20 While I do appreciate that Welsh saying... I think the following old Finnish Proverb addresses that paticular life dilemma a bit better: "Happiness is found some where between too much and too little". Expanding upon that... I would dare say that real life success is also found there, as well. If you are getting too little in the way of stimulation... you will experience no growth or improvement at all and are just defeating the purpose. However, if you bite off more than what you can chew... you will just overwhelm and burn yourself out and will soon get sick of doing it. Said another way... Moderation is the key in all things.
What it all comes down to, is this......Every man has to come up with a practical reason to do what they do. And this practical reason has to be something other than BOX!
When you swallow the black pill, there is no going back, even if there are moments when you feel a bit more optimistic about life. And when i see all this motivational videos it made me feel sick how naive people are. And i really don't understand why so many men watch guys like that bathrobe man. Also hope that Pete do not go that way because he already speak about improving yourself and bullsheet.
Regarding the "going (back) to gym" situation . I had similar experiences but I started a way shorter self weight training at home and made the best progress without any real hassle except the "my instincts ar programmed for energy conservation and therefore hates training" issue.
Stardusk, I encourage you to learn about holistic fitness and ballistic weight training for longevity. Superficiality and aesthetics are not primary. Rather strength and resiliency from injury are. We train human movement patterns so that we become better at them. Kettlebells, steel clubs, steel maces and gymnastics rings.
I lift weights as I take pride in myself. Yeah I'm also hoping it appeals to women, it can't hurt, but I'm certainly not holding my breath!! 😆 Lifting weights is good for my mental health, pushing myself abit & staying healthy. I don't even make that much gains anymore if at all, just maintenance of my muscle at this point. People would say I'm in shape but I'm no muscle man, but I don't care, I enjoy it 👍
My motivation is very simple, and it works. It's trying to make the world a little better than it was for me, and leaving it for the next generation. This way, I will always be motivated. There are many ways to try to improve the world. Notice that I didn't say "my motivation is to improve the world". I am aware that I may not make any difference, or even make things worse. But I will keep trying.
You nailed it! People dont stick to beneficial routines, that dont feel good. What did the trick to me: 1) Get up early (7.00h), expose to bright indirect light (e.g. lamp shining on wall). This spikes cortisone and triggers the circadian rythm so that you feel tired approx. 16h later and have improved sleep. 2) Directly after the light, go outside, jogging for 3-4 minutes. If possible, end it with a sprint. (spikes cortisone, increases circulation, and increased circulation improves cognitive function, reduces anxiety and depression). 3) Directly after jogging, expose yourself to a cold shower for 20 seconds. (the body overcompensates the cold-expose during the day by heat production. A higher body temperature during the day improves the circadian rythm and the cognitive function, reducing anxiety and depression) 4) this can be combined with fasting until noon. If you have coffee, have it after step 3. (fasting increases the "drive" and can reduce anxiety and depression) all of these steps increase dopamin, which is responsible for motivation (and motivation is responsible for pleasure). You will feel fresh and motivated throughout a large amout of the day. And feeling good increases the likelyhood to continue with other beneficial activities, - avoiding the need of discipline.
I'm a simple man. My passions are tax evasion and weapon procurement.
You are not alone in these pursuits 😊
Amen brother
A man after my own heart!
Finally. Someone i can relate to.
I see your a man of culture
i stop pushing my boulder a while ago. I used to be all about the self-improvement. But goal posts (especially with women) kept getting moved further back the closer i got to them and eventually realized life is basically a treadmill that speeds up the faster you run, and just hopped off.
Not to mention, there's also diminishing returns the longer you are invested in improving a certain faculty of yourself. This hurts motivation if you don't actually enjoy the process.
You are a wise man. Most people never see this in their lifetime.
Most men in RP are stuck in perpetual self improvement mode HOPING it will make them successful with wimen. Problem is goal posts have moved , bar got higher....eventually you become that hamster on treadmill.
I have dwindled down a lot myself. I haven’t stopped completely and likely won’t because I’ve always just been a life long learner type so I love learning new things and hitting the weights for the sake of it. I’m more or less outcome independent. The whole self improvement cult wave will eventually wane because you’ve basically traded one rat race for another and people will eventually see that happiness and content what have you is intrinsic.
Have you considered Jesus? He can really help you out with this sort of thing. He’ll reward his people with a kingdom and eternal life and whoever comes to him he will not turn away. He can also remove our purposelessness and give us an eternal goal to set !
One of the few things that Peterson is right about is that you need motivation from "both ends", where you have something you're running towards and something you're running away from. It's why lots of people have no motivation to workout when they are only pursuing a better physique, but will feel much more motivated when losing the weight could mean the difference between them living or dying. The problem is that there's generally far more things to run away from than things to run towards, and if all you have are things to run away from and nothing to run towards, at some point it becomes much harder to justify running away from them.
Imma save this comment real quick. This is excellent advice.
Yeah, it's good to have both. I think I outran everything I was running away from, and I recently reached the thing I was running to... so now I don't really have any running to do at all.
I'm pretty content for now, but I'm wondering now what I should do with the rest of my life.
I practice a martial art instead of just working out at a gym. Certain martial arts place more emphasis on training your tendons and connective tissue rather than just your muscles. Because muscle fiber deteriorates with age, your tendons not so much.
Can only run so much before exhaustion sets in.
Especially when you feel metaphorically "surrounded" by the things you want to get away from. Try running away from a circle's boundary, while being at its center. Guaranteed paralysis...
My motivation is to figure out how to escape this hellhole of a realm and not get reincarnated back here.
Agreed, man
I fear reincarnation. It isn't fair, we were all forced to exist.
It was a much worse hellhole just a few centuries ago
eightfold path g
@@ChaosRUsEntand if there's no kind of real relief after death, if it's just complete erasure, then what was the point? Why would the universe develop in a way that sentient life can come into existence and lament its awareness just in time to evaporate back into uncreation? What the hell kind of sick biological joke is that? "Ha ha, enjoy your lifelong stress before terrifying obliteration! No point, you just randomly popped out of thin air, get fucked for being alive you conscious loser lolololok"
Women used to motivate but thats gone
Most humans don't have the sort of meta-perspective you have Stardusk. Many of them will be shocked and emotionally reactive if you tell them a very simple factual statement such as, "All humans are animals".
Most people are easily entertained and engaged dopamine slaves.
The "simple factual statement" is disputed on the grounds of semantic disagreement. If by 'animals' you mean something like 'carbon based life form' then sure. But the connotation of 'animal' in the english language exists in plain contrast to 'person' or 'human.'
To refer to humans as animals is *literally* dehumanizing because we see an obvious, intrinsic, and self evident gulf between the capabilities of humans and non-humans (for one thing)
This comment feels like it was made by a mustache twirling,wine sipping pseudo intellectual elitist who forgets context in order to sound smart
@@codyvandal2860 to act as if the statement that "all humans are animals" is more of a "simple factual statement " than it is bizarre,unusual,incredibly nihilistic,or as you said dehumanizing speaks volumes of this guy's state of mind. His entire comment is ridiculously condescending and straight up silly. Of course people are going to have shocked and emotional reactions when you say something like that,especially if you're in a charged or serious dicussion.
@@codyvandal2860 It's rather irrelevant that some combination of human conditioning and collective human subconscious makes it difficult for us to perceive the fundamental fact that we are animals or that it's "dehumanizing". Beyond just saying "we are animals", the implication of this statement is that humans, as all animals, have general, deterministic behavioral tendencies that we generally will not deviate from.
@@BOSSDONMAN What other 'animals' build rocketships? Do calculus? Create vaccines? Write symphonies? Produce nuclear weapons? Leave the atmosphere? It says a lot about your value system that you regard those as evidently irrelevant facts.
To say that "humans are animals" is like saying the pyramids are rocks. Accurate only in the most narrow, obtuse, unimaginative, and autistic sense possible.
Military here. Last year I went on my first deployment and I actually liked it a lot. I disciplined myself on my diet, work, and working out and felt like a king on a hill. However, when I came back from deployment I fell into a depression living in a peaceful, civilized place. Lost all my motivation and who I was from deployment. That was the time, I felt alive in a way. Learning to find that "savage" or "glorified" side of me again.
The military wouldn't even have me because of my dissability, unless I filled out a waiver of some sort.
Sebastian Junger explores this idea in his book "Tribe." I recommend it, not too long so you can knock it over in a couple of days.
WAR MONGER!
It's a lot of fun to rape and pillage isn't it!
@College email noone come and try it asshole, I have more wepons then you ever dreamed of having, I am retired army Vietnam vet and you are nothing but a little twinkle toed commie cock muncher so shut your cock holster!
With everybody trying to escape (their own) reality one way or another it seems just living and being in the moment is already a hero's journey in itself. Anything else is just bonus, really. The secret is to get to a place (doesn’t matter how) where you are content, grateful and feel true joy with whoever you are at this point in your life and whatever you have (going on) in your life, good and bad. That is the true Nirvana, in my opinion.
You hit something there. Immunity or indifference to the current insanity reveals something special in a person.
Accepting your own mind and reality " as it is", is the highest point of enlightenment. Most are consumed on a " spectrum" by trauma, anxiety, nihilism, narcissism.
I think your argument is brilliant in it`s simplicity.
@@maxsimon36 I would actually encourage (self-)compassion, empathy and understanding instead of indifference. True healing can only occur once we allow the difficult and uncomfortable feelings to just “be” instead of trying to fight them (which is were true suffering comes from) by trying to be indifferent. When you truly empathize with someone else’s suffering you truly feel connected with yourself and the world around you, regardless of whether you feel lonely or not in your life.
You're basically saying to just let life happen. That removes amy independent decision making
@@chrism8180 That is not how I meant it. What I mean is that regardless of the decisions you make in your life, you can always create a space of content, gratitude and joy within yourself where you can always go to, regardless of what is happening in your life.
The Buddha was upfront that there is nothing to gain in Enlightenment
Yes
Such based old wisdom sometimes when u find it
As someone who is about to turn 40 soon I can absolutely agree with everything you said in this video. I've recently started doing Yoga-style stretching routines every day so that my back doesn't kill me when I'm playing the piano or doing weeding in the garden and similar stuff. There's already a noticeable difference to being 30 or even 25; and regular walking or jogging is an absolute must for me, too, just to feel normal.
We all want to think that's we're the Luke Skywalker of our own story. In reality, the vast majority of us are the Mos Eisley cantina patrons in someone else's story.
Honestly I'm feeling a little both lol.
This!...
Unless u look like the hero u can act however u want nobody gonna buy it
Even litteraly
I don't see a hero's journey as anything other than overcoming adversity and failure, even if on a small level. Hey, if I succeed at something after failing at it hundreds of times, I'm gonna feel like a hero after the fact. It is what it is.
No. If I fail a hundred times and then I succeed I’ll still feel like a failure. Failing so much doesn’t happen in a hundred seconds, it can take years. And that next step may not even bring you rewards to begin with.
@@Reiman33 Why go my sentiments have yo be in alignment with others? 🤔
@@ronmaest I play music and reference it accordingly.
@@easter_sunday right, it’s subjective.
No. I've had trouble with bureaucracy all my life and don't feel like a hero after sending the 1001st document to the administration. It just feels shit to get bombarded by meaningless letters and demands.
I'm on the anti hero arc.
The "force yourself to take baby steps" plan did help me through a year-long bout of major depression about ten years back. Ended up in a fairly fit and sporty state of anhedonia.
These depressive realistic vids are music to my ears. I love them far more than the manosphere type content.
Its so relieving and soothing to hear things that will absolutely crush the average human being.
Lol why is that accurately describing my subconscious feelings on this channel
@@deadlyninja112 😆 kindred souls mate
This is some atheist soy shit
Agree
My motivations are peace, freedom, and security. To be able to live your life as well as not letting society suck you into one of its many bullshit narratives that ruins your quality of life is the best life to have.
You spoke my mind. The only thing motivating me is my personal freedom ; but society perhaps by its nature, doesn't care about any of that; and wants nothing from us except conformity, obedience and control. Any motivations I previously had that stemmed from society ; are completely gone now. If society invests nothing in me ; then I'm in no way obligated to invest anything in it.
Narratives are more important than you think. And your mindset on them, I’d argue, is big reason we are in the mess we are in
And this is why men love video games, video games have a grand design and a conclusion whether you are naturally gifted and can pass the video game in 42 minutes while another might take 3 years, their is a finish line with a similar (digital) reward profile, NO SO IN LIFE, except death.
And best part is we get to tinker with the ideas (mods) and discuss the endings, abilities, experiences and characters we enjoyed along the way
6 years of waiting for Peterson to tell girls to 'grow the hell up and start taking responsibility'. Am I not patient enough?
Excuse me, that would be mansplaining. 😠
Why would he do that?
@@Pedro_Le_Chef Why did he tell boys that?
@@bleachdiet559 because good men lead
All that motivates men has been co-opted by a corporatist pantheon hoping to bury them in responsibility, and offer ever less incentive.
The failure of said pantheon is to realize that worthwhile employees overlap almost entirely with those who would know better than to participate.
I want to die knowing I did my best. No one else's opinion matters.
Lot of respect for this mentality
Nah, this world isn't worthy of my contribution 😊
Love you brother
Totally why we as a species truly enjoy and are eternally enamored by the heros journey in our media and all the way from the campfire stories. A way to cope with nihilism and give ourselves even if a glimmer of existentialism. That while we know nothing matters that we do what we want or believe in for the sake of it not for what it will tangibly give us. You nailed it. 👏
You all done with 2008 edgy amerifat atheism soy?
Playing video games seems like a pretty enjoyable way of living life
I just want to play my video games, spend time outdoors, and see friends a few times a month. It's such a small dream, but it doesn't seem all that achievable
That's a lot of people's lives the key is being surrounded by good people you can trust. As cliché as it sounds, don't let people tell you can't achieve your dreams and especially don't let others walk over you
I grew up LDS (Mormon) and grew somewhat disenchanted with the religion during my overseas proselyting mission to German, at least I think that's how it occurred but, I digress. The Church inundates its memberships with a VERY grand narrative, as discussed herein, about having a heavenly inheritance (including theomorphosis, for those whose faith and actions demonstrated the greatest worthiness) and being part of an eternal cycle of familial creation which includes Elohim (God Himself). When you go from that to NO guiding narrative, it's incredibly disheartening.
I don't know if I'll ever return to it but, I am glad you were able to share your insights today because, until you had articulated it, I found myself holding onto many simultaneous narratives, often that contradicted one another, like Euroethnonationalism, American Exceptionalism, Corporatism & Clerofascism, Christian Esotericism, Some Kind of Existentialism Between Camus' Absurdism and Lovecraftian Cosmicism, Freemasonry, and so forth. Countless spiritual, economic, political, and artistic schools of thought of which I took something while suffering the contradictions therebetween it and everything else I've assimilated.
I don't know how but, I see now that I've got to clear to the board and build from the ground up, principle by principle, so that I can live within a hierarchy of precepts which I _KNOW_ I agree with and not just what I think "feels right". I've not the foggiest as to how I shall achieve this lofty goal and I may die before ever having reached a reconciling system of conception but, I've got to try.
Thank you, sir, for helping invoke this thought...now...where the hell do I begin? That's the question I have to answer for myself, lest I reject exterior inceptions and be forever lost...
Building the discipline is the most important virtue in these routines for me. That discipline gets me then thorugh hard time, does not matter if I do not get results, the prize is mastering yourself.
Hobbies give a lot of meaning to my life. I do love weight lifting, I've been doing that consistently for the past 10 years, I recently gotten into archery, and also hanging out with my kids.
Archery is a lot of fun. Expensive though
@chrism8180 its way cheaper than shooting guns. You can get all the stuff you need for less than 200. Then you just have to pay for stuff when yours breaks. Check out the black hunter recurve. They are like $100 and work great. My favorite is my H2 Tartar bow by Deerseeker.
My two primary motivations for doing things are: to relieve stress or to give me options for other things. I no longer expect anything to come from doing something just because I'm doing it, but perhaps the doing of the thing will be useful for some situation at a later date.
You can have the how, but without the why, you won't have the will
At seventy years in, managing the decline is a full time endeavor. By full time, I mean every waking and sleeping moment.
Running and playing football (soccer) are my copes. The walking example is exactly right and that turns into running potentially. Running chemically and physiologically is an end rather than a means!! I was a gym coper for a long time but it’s honestly a depressing and vapid cycle. Running has really helped me overcome debilitating nihilism
I love running too, it is the feeling of motion that is exhilirating. Endorphins aside.
One of the most irritating gymbro cultural developments over the past decade has been a jihad against running.
Especially due to the cult of a pot bellied fitness guru- Mark Rippetoe whose lord and savior is squats, squats and more squats.
Some of his acolytes even ask brilliant questions such as - why do you need to run?
Life is just an MMORPG with permadeath. But it's filled with endless side quests IF one chooses to pursue them...
Don't forget all the mini games!
Except unlike the MMO there is no respawn. If you die during one of your many escapades and sidequests its over.
@@LordMalice6d9 Ugh... another dyslexic fool. 🤡That's why I put "PERMADEATH". That's what it means...
@@chrisortiz7487 Clean the dirt out of your va jay jay and calm down.
@@LordMalice6d9how do you know if there's no respawn?
Engineering motivation will always be harder than being granted it by circumstance.
Background in video games; Hero’s journey is just an evolutionary pattern of completing objectives that we exploit in pretty much every media
so video games make people feel like they accomplished something when they really didn't and they end up being losers instead of earning real life accomplishments?
I've dreamt about that hero's journey way to much. Probably like 70% percent of my waking consciousness
This is why religion ultimately survives. When there's no logical reason to do a thing, religion offers that last line of motivation to pull through. And I'm not religious.
How about the post-religious Scandinavia? Most Scandinavians don't even have a concept of religion. They may be Christians, but not religious. Scandinavians find meaning and purpose in family and friends and everything they can and do. That religion has anything unique to offer is a myth. There's not even a definition of religion that covers all types of "religion." The word religion comes from religio, which has nothing to do with religion as conceptualized in Christian Europe. Religio "In classic antiquity, it meant conscientiousness, sense of right, moral obligation, or duty towards anything[3] and was used mostly in secular or mundane contexts.[4][5]"
@@grisflyt "Scandinavians find meaning and purpose in family and friends and everything they can and do. " how do you know that?
There is this atheist philosopher named Nietzche who I think had a very similar observation. Keep in mind that this is the same guy that said, "god is dead".
I mean you can sell any old BS to a dumbed down dependant population who has nothing left. I could make a religion following anime lore, and get people on board, and it'd probably be more popular that current religion
self controle -> self respect -> self-esteem. Once you have self-esteem, motivation and mood becomes obsolete.
As someone who only leaves his apartment 90% of the time to go to work I will say I am excited to try this baby step approach. I've come to realization that a great difference in comparative circumstances over too small a time span is equivalent to making a casual jogger run a marathon. The jogger's result is easy to guess: catastrophic and demoralizing failure.
Thanks for this vid
I deeply resonated with this topic. As one with many afflictions, the only release resembling anything satisfactory enough to sate my need for meaningful progress is exercise. I have 8-pack abs because the pain it took to achieve the physique is the closest I feel to alive. It reminded me of a profound moment in Teen Titans (of all shows), where Cyborg lamented the limits imposed upon him post transformation, and how in his fully human form, the potential for growth was seemingly never-ending and that gave him the motivation to push himself (pun intended 😁)
"That which doesn't kill you makes you stronger!" -Nietzsche "Pain is good, a lot of pain is very good! Pain is the weakness leaving your body!" - Jesse Ventura
But sometimes, as Marilyn Manson said "That which doesn't kill you... is gonna leave a scar" or worse, leave you crippled, missing a limb, etc. and of course too much pain can be a recipe for burnout. My "grand narrative" is simply this: I find meaning in progress. Sometimes though, slow progress is all you can do and it's better than nothing.
The purpose of life without getting all existential is just a one liner. Reduce suffering. Everything revolves around that whether taking care of your health to being financially responsible etc. Everything else is just an added benefit. We don’t need to make this illusion of grandeur. The kid who got drafted to war in ww2 and got head shot off the break beaching in Normandy isn’t thinking today and not even a memory in anyones mind. Just relax and live. We’re just a cog in the wheel. Enjoy it but not too much either.
Yeah, this is my mantra now whenever I question why I'm doing something like working out or eating healthy, to minimize my suffering. Of course I still lose even that drive and rot for a couple days consuming black pill shit... But eventually I realize it's not enjoyable feeling like a sack of rotting shit all stiff in bed so I go back to the gym... Have a real problem not falling off like this often though so I'm not consistent at all.
"What if you don't believe in that sort of thing?"
Trust me, you will if you start seriously and earnestly practicing it. It's just like everything else; you have to put in the reps. But most people won't, unless they value the thing for its own sake. The Hermetics and Gnostics were right about a lot of things, including personal, internal transformation, and I don't know if I would quite describe it as 'self-actualization' either. I happen to place a great deal of personal value on the transformative insight one can gain through an experience of _satori_ , because, and I know you've talked about this sort of thing before, it's one of those 'realms of the archmage,' and that happens to be my realm. Understanding the purpose, the real purpose, of ceremonial magic and putting it into practice has had a profound effect on me as a person.
Hermetics just gave us fake heliocentricism
During the pandemic, I followed this exact advice. I started exercising for the first time in decades. My requirement was a very low bar - Put on your shoes and go outside for at least 5 minutes every day. Seriously.
A year or so later, I could do 30,000 steps in a day, about 11 miles WHILE testing positive for CV-19. And, I had lost about 40 pounds.
All without ever *requiring* anything more than 5 minutes outside per day. Yes, I often did more, but I never let my expectations rise. The goal was to succeed and avoid any mental feeling of failure.
Side note... Weight lifting is *great* cardiovascular exercise. If you don't believe me, get a heart rate monitor and compare your average HR while walking to lifting. Walking is mostly zone 1 and 2. Lifting can hit all zones, like interval training.
Motivation comes after doing oddly enough. That’s what self discipline is. I just lift to failure and have my 5 day a week gym workout and my set diet. My goal is just to stick to the workout and diet. I don’t have a fitness goal. If you stick to a plan even if you don’t see results quickly they will happen regardless. Hitting the gym is worth it. My dad is in his early 70’s and seems like he’s 100 already. Even though we all die and it’s all lost I’d rather stay at least mobile into my old age instead of letting entropy speed up.
The thing about the gym is that the thought of it is always terrible, but the act of it really isn’t that bad, in fact i find it very satisfying, seeing some tiny improvement each time I go. And of course afterwards you feel incredible. It’s strange that the thought of it before you do it remains so bad. I think it’s just a little hero’s journey just getting yourself to the gym.
I heard Tucker Goodrich (nutrition and fitness guy on the radio) say - "If you ever feel like skipping your exercise... just think how many times have you gone for a run and thought to yourself 'man I regret doing that' after?" Also I'm half-assedly quitting chewing tobacco. (Nicotine gum but I still use the real stuff a couple times a week). Every time I'm tempted I think to myself - "The more you do it the more you're going to want to do it. Desire only begets more desire."
"Your purpose" should only be to become the best person You can be in whatever situations that you are in and that it! Never waste time trying to change or "save humanity".
There's no "best version" of anyone on this dirty planet. It's all about human ego, you don't "break boundaries", you don't " conquering your failure " and someday you and your ego will die. All you doing right now just, quote, "mental mastrbtion".
Self-improvement is based around branding. It has been this way for years. There is no self-help book that will awaken your desire. These books and other media may influence your thoughts and emotions but, you have to decide (either on a conscious or subconscious level) to do it yourself. It matters not what you believe in if it isn't powerful enough to cultivate a strong enough sense of purpose to make you want to live. Believe what you will to do what you must.
"Wild boys wonder
where is glory?"
as Duran Duran once said.
Heroes are not setting out on a long journey anymore to slay the dragon. They are cleaning their rooms for yet another only fans meeting with princess.
Can resonate with this. I like running, lifting weights, playing guitar, pursuing career and academic goals even though I know all these activities are ultimately futile they make life slightly better/more interesting. I just do them.
It's true: up to a certain stage in the life cycle, people need to believe that there's a grand narrative. A Point to It All. But I've found it a huge relief, as I approach fifty, to finally wrap my head around the fact that there's no master plan. Existence is still fundamentally bleak but I'm no longer swimming against the tide, which was pointless and exhausting. I get a little more sleep these days, and I'm not straining feverishly to reach out and touch a happy ending like Gatsby on his dock.
@Razvan I think that the grand narrative worldview happens involuntarily. It's something our brains do to allow us to cope--not just with tragic events, but also with day-to-day boredom and discomfort. If we felt that difficulty had no meaning, many of us might not survive the first arduous thirty-five or forty years of our lives. But if we make it that far, we gradually come to an understanding of what existence really is. With kids, it's hard to say what position a parent should take. I definitely wouldn't want to discourage a child, but I wouldn't want to foster unrealistic expectations, either. I think that by the age of twelve or thirteen, most kids know--more or less consciously--what their roles are, and whether those roles come with advantages or limitations. That's when the involuntary mechanism kicks in: if severe limitations are imposed on us, we still must believe on some level that life has a greater purpose. It's necessary to go on functioning.
It's Not. Nihilism just serves as a comfort zone for You. You don't Want to accept your suffering was probably designed. You are part of the Western problem
There is nothing for people who don't have faith. Faith means believing in that which you can't see. The future where you achieve whatever goal through hard work literally doesn't exist. It can't exist without your faith in it forming first. This extends to all things. Materialism is dumb.
Coffee is my motivation for getting up and feeling positive even about doing mundane things.
🍃 🍃 🍃 💨 for me. The only thing that helps me function and gets me up now.
There is no reason a person ought to be totally demotivated. There is no objective measure of good and bad, so you can assert anything to be good that you want, and if you believe it, it will be true (at least to you). The only dangers are in asserting things to be good which are factually untrue or which are internally inconsistent. But you can, for instance, assert, "My life is worth it just because I have tried to be me." or "Doing my best is enough," or "The sky is pretty today, and seeing that alone has made the day worth it," and nobody can effectively argue with you to say that you are wrong. You just have find values that you can honestly believe in, and then act outwardly as if you really did believe. Acting is the same as believing the idea behind the action. If you find that any particular goal you have was delusional or has become impossible, just move through your despair and find another thing to motivate you.
So, people're running on hedonistic treadmill and you, basically , suggest another more spiritual treadmill before oblivion. Shame.
@@trickytrack00 My experience with despair is that doing random stuff that you don't even think will work is better than doing nothing. Despair can also be like a tunnel, rather than a pit, if you are willing to let go of the thing you can't have. And it is easier to have self respect if you try to be your best, even in difficult circumstances, than to settle for less. I am not ashamed of telling people these things.
Baby steps to getting in shape, it can be as simple as, the first thing you do when you wake up is drop and do some pushups.
Even if you can only do 5, if you do that every day, you'll be shocked at how fast your body and attitude change.
When you start to see changes, start to be able to do more, you'll start making better choices with food, sleep habits, everything starts to snowball in the right direction.
If you're having trouble getting to the gym, get a workout partner who is motivated and stronger than you.
Stay healthy guys, you deserve it.
One of the few things that really interest me in life is handbalancing. The grace and beauty of those movements. People like Yann Simyan are idols to me. I have been doing them for about 2 years and I still cannot even one arm handstand, but wow it is peaceful and fun. Go to some river, or just in my garage with the local homeless cat who pretty much lives in my garage now, and just doing handstands listening to music petting the cat. It has been a major coping mechanism for me for this life.
cats always help
at least i get homeless pussy. He still chilling in my garadge, built him a cat house in there. @@rao8559
“We do not think ourselves into new ways of living,
we live ourselves into new ways of thinking.”
― Richard Rohr
''Buy my book and learn how to be the unplugged alpha you always wanted to be''
--- Richard Cooper
This advice "baby steps" has been the most useful and effective advice I have ever gotten. Last year I was 270 pounds and now I weigh 195 all I did was stop eating junk.
All that other advice from gurus didn't do jack for me.
A lot of men aren’t motivated anymore because we can’t get any women
Because average dudes mean nothing to women even landwhale 3/10 think she deserve tom cruise.
Every man can get something, but few can get satisfatory experiences with woman
Good video essay. Lifting weights is also very important to preserve the muscles and bone density. I do agree that gurus take it over the top. But do not dismiss the importance of resistance training for people who are older
Going to the gym is a torture for me, but every single time, I leave the gym a happy man. Sternious physical activity just does wonders for your state of mind.
This was a great video. I go to the gym as a habit it makes me feel physically and mentally better. I also look better.
I started learning Russian about 18 months ago. The reason at the time was because I had a Ukrainian girlfriend. She is no longer in my life but I still study Russian language from 20 mins to 2 hours, 7 days a week. I won't be going to Ukraine or Russia in the near future, for obvious reasons but it's a habit and I actually enjoy it, unlike the gym.
I think people fundamentally misunderstand what the hero's journey is. Its not about god, religions, spiritual things, self improvement, doing heroic things, going to the gym, or any of those things adjacent to those concepts. The heros journey is a pattern one lives without even knowing it. Its a pattern that can manifest in the smallest of things. The heros journey, like all other archetypes, live unseen from those expressing them. You cant decide to "go on the heros journey", you cant decide anything in that matter. If you dupe yourself into thinking this is stuff that leads to glory, boy, you are in a for a rude awakening.
In real life, the heros journey is the opposite of glorious. There is suffering, doubt, darkness, hopelessness, pain and most of all, fear. Its the human condition talking to you about the dirt you came from, and the dirt you will return. The hero makes peace with it, stops to seek glory, stops to seek magic and starts to be just a man that uses what he was given. Do not seek the heros journey for when it finds you, you will complain to your god to take away this burden that seeks to eat your soul. And if you complete the cycle, you will end up where you started without even realizing what happened to you because you are unable to understand what you did and why you did it in the first place. Such is the nature of all archetypes.
And just in case TA reads this, topics like that are what I follow for the last 20 years or so. Those things go far deeper and are far more mysterious than we can imagine. I would love to talk about that with Thinking Ape on a podcast or so because this directly touches so many things he himself talks about. Just in case he wants to venture a bit deeper into it, away from all the guru nonsense and into our own psyche and the lies we tell us, you know where to find me.
Interesting take on the heroes journey. What sources do you recommend for this interpretation?
@@hansfrankfurter2903buddy this isnt a college essay. Im willing to bet most of this is his interpretation, and probably has drawn from a compilation of sources over time. Do you really think hes going to be able to drum them all up?
As someone who probably has ADHD, I do get motivated but it burns up real quick. I can't really grind, nor are my interests consistent. I have so many uncompleted projects I do want to complete but I'm exhausted or start a new project.
A lot of life seems to be menial maintenance chores that have no payoff other than avoiding the chaos of entropy.
the smarter you are, the more you understand this. it's partly why the smartest people are the most sad
Fear. Fear of what happens if you don’t do what you’re supposed to do.
i used to go through a hero's journey every week just about... nowadays, it's almost every day.
this has been most of my life's obsession as well, i used to save an old lover often when we were in school together, i was very protective over her. if something happened to her in front of me, i would become unable to control my actions, i'd be on autopilot and help her.
I'm fairly certain I'm specifically mentioned in the Book of Revelation. Meaning, I'm fairly certain I'm in a grand narrative.
That doesn't motivate me at all. I would argue it's the opposite: it demotivates me. This is why I'm not entirely sure people like Lobster Boy know what they're talking about.
I went from a grand religious/spiritual narrative that I was 100% dedicated to, to an existential vacuum when it became evident that it wasn't real. That was some years ago. Now I just forge ahead with a personal narrative. Borderline solipsistic at times, but it is something I can hold on to. On a more practical level, my daily motivation is to work and position myself to be as unreliant as possible on the world around me. I want a coastal cottage where I can raise my family a good distance away from the madness. And I work as much as I need to, also prioritizing personal time for the hobbies and interests I'm passionate about. If there's any prevailing message of this decade, it is that "it" really isn't worth it. "It" meaning the rat race that we all deluded ourselves into thinking we had a measure of agency in, meanwhile it can be every man for himself at the drop of a hat, and we could all be annihilated at any moment. So yeah, it's about finding the balance that works for you, and caring for yourself, whether or not anyone else does.
you never had a miniscule proportion of that "spiritual narrative" then. weak, blind, delusional whiny modernist.
Soy atheist
Little by little is exactly how I started my health journey.
There is no hero's Journey, not in real life anyway. That's why that archetype of story exists purely in fantasy and Sci-fi stories.
The heroes journey is paralleled to ancient Mythologies. And mythologies are just true enough to it’s core of story and intent. It’s just a small exaggeration So yes it is real. This UA-cam audience is just miserable and pathetic who doesn’t derive pleasure from suffering to become great at any craft.
What's the end goal? Do you take all of your accomplishments when you die?
No. Life is subjective. Live how you want it.
On you tombstone it will be written " Self-Improved"
This is it buddy boyos. Take the minimal pill
The reincarnation of Schopenhauer - Chad-dusk
I totally needed this TODAY ! ! !
The david goggins motivation worked for me. I think you need to come back from hell to start it though. Haven't told anyone what I do or boast just challenge myself because the alternative is worse.
If I sit around I start thinking about things. Today was shit but at least I pushed myself physically.
If I may ask, who do I cite for the term "Crisis of motivation"? Stardusk? The framing is great.
Anyway, I'd argue motivation is a feeling more than anything... and all feelings are fickle. Something like a grand narrative is meant to inspire feelings of motivation, but there is a sort of tolerance built up after hearing the track played over and over-it's like an opiate. So even the things meant to give rise to a particular feeling are also fickle in the same way even if they're mechanistically different. When it comes to things like staying in the gym, I try to find multiple reasons to go. Admittedly, I started going as part of a looksmaxxing journey, but when I discovered how much better I felt, and most of all, how much more mobile I am, these things became the reason, and it's these things that keep me going. I'm getting a result, so my brain registers as worth while, thus I keep going.
In recent months i have become blackpilled because I was a formed "chad" as you would say but i got acne and became fat. This in turn lead me down this rabbithole and now im here. I know i can go back with 100% cetrtainty but even I struggle with motivation. You see, success is something certain for me but i still struggle. I just imagine all the men that are partaking in an endless jounrey with a chance, a minor chance to make it. Sadly its not the same output for everyone. You can still put in the effort but in the end not everyone is gonna make it. Im not urging anyone to give up but if you arent successful in the end, dont be sad instead try to find peace in one way or another because in the end it doesnt really matter.
Truth bro
Ascetic pain and denialism. If you are sufficiently paranoid in correctly believing that humans around you will profit and manipulate your many weaknesses, the only recourse is learning from pain, deprivation and suffering. Choose your own pain so that others don’t choose it for you!
I recently got a treadmill for my basement gym setup. I'll be catching up on the anime while getting some cardio in. That will be really nice now that the weather is getting colder and I have a harder time rolling out of bed and going for a walk 1st thing in the morning when I feel cold.
Just continue to learn, not necessarily to better yourself for any goal. But moreso because, fuck it. You don’t need a reason. But a reason could be because fuck life. Fuck your situation and the people that would have you rot. Just keep at it to spite them, the cosmos, whatever the fuck ‘it’ is.
This video is definitely top 5 of all the videos you've made and has helped me personally.
With 8 billion souls on this little blue pearl and most of them with a mobile device in hand, the ego screams out for significance, yearns to be noticed, wants desperately to mean something, hopefully famous.
People want instant gratification, or at worst guaranteed results if they apply themselves for more than a few minutes at a time. You can be the type who quits the gym 3 weeks into your new year's resolution because you haven't lost 20 pounds, or you can be satisfied with being a little bit better than you were yesterday and have it be sufficient motivation to carry on.
Fantastic advice stardusk; motivation shouldn't be relied upon to take action as at the very most it is a temporary feeling but as you say important reasons for why this certain action will benefit you in the short and long term are paramount to getting as close to living a life of positive distraction away from the impending and realistic bout of nihilism!
As a recommendation I like to do weekly notes on what I prioritise in life and how I've progressed it's a good way of maintaining structure and progress :)
One of your most uplifting videos. Logical but hopefully too 🙏🏿
I see the Hero’s Journey more through the lens of a modernised existentialism (one that doesn’t rely on free will anymore, but still works with determinism): I don’t think anyone is part of an actual “great narrative”. However, the presence of functional narratives in society can show people possible directions to go in, like road signs. These can influence human decisions like any other outside stimulus.
There’s plenty of such narratives to chose from today - thanks to the internet, access to any given one of them is easier than ever before. And there are countless senses of meaning, secular and religious / spiritual ones alike. The problem is therefore less with an absence of meaning (nihilism), but with an abundance / excess of it (pluralism): Finding the sense of purposes that works for you personally from among the countless options is the search for a needle in a haystack.
Added to that, because it’s easier than ever to publish creative works (music, books, movies, videogames etc.), we’re also getting swamped with all the mediocre stuff we wouldn’t have gotten to see otherwise. Conversely, we’re also exposed to great but fringe ideas, which in former times wouldn’t have made it past the industry gatekeepers. In fact, it seems to be the industry gatekeepers (such as in Hollywood) who produce a majority of the trash right now - proving that not even the “professionals” always know the answers about what constitutes a “good narrative”. Thus, a lot of the road signs for potential life trajectories that are out there may actually lead to a dead end.
Modernity is a lie and part of the problem. You are all a bunch of godless soys
David goggins: can't hurt me - master your mind and defy the odds
Even your black pill theory crafting is a hero's journey get over yourself
David goggins is a full blown narc, giving bs, low grade advice to needy people taking advanatge of people in need, for fame and adoration to stroke his fuckin ego and be this guru like figure while barely addressign the issue. Flexing on his audiance on social media to validate his massively inflated ego. Hes a joke in my opinion, I cant stand him.
"Baby steps" follows sound psychological research. Most attempts to change life, habits, etc fail. Research shows that the small % that succeed starts with something small and builds from there.
There's much to appreciate in having a more relaxed attitude and approach to life.
@11:55 to 12:20
While I do appreciate that Welsh saying...
I think the following old Finnish Proverb
addresses that paticular life dilemma a bit better:
"Happiness is found some where
between too much and too little".
Expanding upon that...
I would dare say that real life success
is also found there, as well.
If you are getting too little in the way of stimulation...
you will experience no growth or improvement at all
and are just defeating the purpose.
However, if you bite off more than what you can chew...
you will just overwhelm and burn yourself out and will soon get sick of doing it.
Said another way... Moderation is the key in all things.
Stardusk dropping bangers this week
What it all comes down to, is this......Every man has to come up with a practical reason to do what they do. And this practical reason has to be something other than BOX!
Unfortunately my only motivation is to make periodic trips to Thailand to bone hookers
When you swallow the black pill, there is no going back, even if there are moments when you feel a bit more optimistic about life. And when i see all this motivational videos it made me feel sick how naive people are. And i really don't understand why so many men watch guys like that bathrobe man.
Also hope that Pete do not go that way because he already speak about improving yourself and bullsheet.
Funny thing bathrobe man think he is chad 😂😂
That bathrobe man?
Regarding the "going (back) to gym" situation . I had similar experiences but I started a way shorter self weight training at home and made the best progress without any real hassle except the "my instincts ar programmed for energy conservation and therefore hates training" issue.
Stardusk, I encourage you to learn about holistic fitness and ballistic weight training for longevity.
Superficiality and aesthetics are not primary. Rather strength and resiliency from injury are. We train human movement patterns so that we become better at them.
Kettlebells, steel clubs, steel maces and gymnastics rings.
I lift weights as I take pride in myself. Yeah I'm also hoping it appeals to women, it can't hurt, but I'm certainly not holding my breath!! 😆
Lifting weights is good for my mental health, pushing myself abit & staying healthy. I don't even make that much gains anymore if at all, just maintenance of my muscle at this point.
People would say I'm in shape but I'm no muscle man, but I don't care, I enjoy it 👍
My motivation is very simple, and it works. It's trying to make the world a little better than it was for me, and leaving it for the next generation. This way, I will always be motivated. There are many ways to try to improve the world. Notice that I didn't say "my motivation is to improve the world". I am aware that I may not make any difference, or even make things worse. But I will keep trying.
What a downer. Was looking forward to the weekend and decided to insert a resistor (Thinking Ape) into the current flow. :(
You nailed it!
People dont stick to beneficial routines, that dont feel good. What did the trick to me:
1) Get up early (7.00h), expose to bright indirect light (e.g. lamp shining on wall). This spikes cortisone and triggers the circadian rythm so that you feel tired approx. 16h later and have improved sleep.
2) Directly after the light, go outside, jogging for 3-4 minutes. If possible, end it with a sprint. (spikes cortisone, increases circulation, and increased circulation improves cognitive function, reduces anxiety and depression).
3) Directly after jogging, expose yourself to a cold shower for 20 seconds. (the body overcompensates the cold-expose during the day by heat production. A higher body temperature during the day improves the circadian rythm and the cognitive function, reducing anxiety and depression)
4) this can be combined with fasting until noon. If you have coffee, have it after step 3. (fasting increases the "drive" and can reduce anxiety and depression)
all of these steps increase dopamin, which is responsible for motivation (and motivation is responsible for pleasure). You will feel fresh and motivated throughout a large amout of the day. And feeling good increases the likelyhood to continue with other beneficial activities, - avoiding the need of discipline.
The real problem is the lack of one on one mentorship.