The Introverted Thinker #025
A thought piece on how to make progress in life, an eye opening podcast on the life of Indian mystics, and a self-love thought excersise.
Hello everyone!
Currently writing this at the airport.
As you are reading this, I’m on a flight to the other side of the world. The beauty of scheduled posts. For reference as to where the other side of the world is, I live in London, UK.
I won’t tell you quite yet where I’m headed, but I will give you some personal updates and tell you more in next week’s newsletter… So stay tuned (pics will be included.)
This week I’ve decided to send you a segment of an article I wrote on one of the most important personal philosophies that guides my life. It’s simple but can feel like a warm hug at times.
Also, I have a confession to make. Over the last 2 to 3 newsletters, you may have noticed the lack of book recommendations. It’s because I’ve picked up a bad habit. That is that I’ll pick up a book, read 1/2 to 3/4 of it, and move on. So I don’t feel worthy of recommending books. But I’m breaking that pattern from next week.
Enjoy, friends.
Two Steps Forward, One Step Back
A simple philosophy to understand life — say goodbye to not feeling good enough
“There is scarcely any passion without struggle.” — Albert Camus
Progression is nothing but a big fat illusion.
To get better at something, to be the best, to achieve the success that you hold pride in, to make progress let's say, is an uphill battle.
You will have to hike up this hill, and there will be huge ditches, boulders rolling down, lakes of mud, obtuse weather. The list goes on.
I’m here to tell you growth is never linear. We constantly degrade and beat ourselves up out of not living up to the expectations we create for ourselves.
But when you can adopt this mindset of “two steps forward, one step back”, I can guarantee you will see life through a lens of delicacy and compassion, not just towards others but more so towards yourself.
Self-criticism can be brutal…
The Mental Battle We All Face
“This is the mental battle. The struggle to accept that with progress there will be setbacks, sometimes the setbacks will even be greater than the progress itself.”
What is a life without struggle? I sometimes feel guilty for living a life of relative comfort and privilege. Why is it that I get to be in the safety of my own home whilst others struggle so gravely?
It really makes me think hard…
“Never throughout history has a man who lived a life of ease left a name worth remembering.”
― Theodore Roosevelt
This same goes for the philosophy of “two steps forward one step back.”
When we start an endeavor that is dear to us, a project of passion I like to call it, we are blinded by the vision of where we want to end up that we forget what the process is really going to look like.
Do you think you are going to choose to write a book, and it’ll be done in a few months, with no procrastination, for it to be published and be a best seller?
“The path to achieving a goal is never going to look like a linear graph.”
That is not going to happen.
The path to achieving a goal is never going to look like a linear graph. And having this false hope will tear us down mentally sooner or later.
This is the mental battle. The struggle to accept that with progress there will be setbacks, sometimes the setbacks will even be greater than the progress itself.
We place these blind expectations on ourselves all the time. I do it constantly. And when I see a slight blimp of decline in progression, I think I’m a failure.
The best thing I did for my mental health was surrender to the fact that nothing can ever go smoothly…
Read the rest of this article over on Medium, a platform where all my writing lives, and thousands of other talented writers.
If you’re already a member, a kind 50 claps would be greatly appreciated, it helps a lot.
A Podcast Episode You Must Listen To
The Joe Rogan Experience with Sadhguru:
Last week, I listened to this 3-hour podcast, and my perception on the following topics was greatly changed:
What it means to be a spiritual individual
What yoga actually is
How I should see the world
Happiness vs sadness
And so much more. Eye-opening would be an understatement. Whether you are a fan of Rogan or not (I’m a huge fan), this one is worth listening to for the guest.
Sadhguru is one of my inspirations when it comes to Eastern philosophy and spirituality. He is a South Indian Yoga guru/yogi mystic and a spiritual teacher.
The reason I believe he is so popular is because of the way he communicates his message, he is so multi-faceted. He’s a mega-successful public speaker and author.
This is how I came to know him, youtube videos of his speeches have amassed a collective 2.2 billion views. And he has close to 10 million subscribers!
The podcast entails everything from Sadhguru’s childhood, and how much of a unique person he was growing up, from how he started to yoga to more and explains the common misconceptions around what yoga truly is in the American West.
At the start, Sadhguru also talks about his environmental projects with soil conservation, as he believed our topsoil is becoming heavily deficient in nutrients, and in 30-40 years our fruit and veg will have little to no nutrient value.
One of the parts that struck me the most was when the pair talked about the pursuit of happiness and why it’s making us so unhappy. Rather than seeing life as a pursuit of happiness, Sadhguru says we should see life as an exploration of joy.
I think the subtle shift in these two perspectives can honestly be life-changing. Everything can be a joy when you see life through this lens. That’s just a simple thing I picked up on. This 3-hour episode is jam-packed with so much more wisdom.
Go ahead and listen to it.
A Thought I Had:
This is more just a message to myself. For the last week or so, I’ve been desperately trying to do so many things at once, I set myself a goal of writing a certain amount of articles this month (more than I ever have), whilst simultaneously getting ready for an extended backpacking trip that I am currently on a flight to, whilst helping my parents out with their business, juggling the gym in the midst of this, etc… The list goes on.
Put it this way, I had a crazy busy week.
I was simply placing unrealistic expectations on myself, and when it became clear that I wouldn’t be able to accomplish my monthly goals, I started to become super self-critical.
In other words, I was beating myself up over the fact that I wasn’t living up to my super high expectations of myself.
One of my friends even recognized this quality in me, saying the following exact words in a text:
“…And I can imagine you to be especially critical of yourself as I know how much you expect from yourself/ how high your standards are for yourself…Which is a good thing, But I can imagine there’s defo room for improvement when it comes to giving yourself praise and appreciation.”
Those were the exact words in the text, and they couldn’t be more accurate.
So for the latter part of this week, I decided to recognize just how well I am doing, and the other goals I was achieving.
We can often get lost in these self-critical thoughts, seeing the glass as half-empty over half full. So it’s crucial we cultivate the self-awareness to recognize this and rectify the issue.
I hope my personal experience in this mini storytime can also help you realize some of these toxic traits within yourself. Because I know for a fact some of my writer friends struggle with the exact same thing.
Thanks for reading everyone!
If you enjoy my work and want to support me, buy me a coffee! I’d be hugely grateful. I do all of my writing in coffee shops after all.
I look forward to seeing you guys next week via our email inboxes.
Had a lot of fun writing this, as usual, particularly the segment about the tweet.
You’re welcome to reply to this email or leave a comment or even tweet at me if you want to discuss any of these thoughts/ideas further.
See ya!