END: How I stopped being a self-help junkie and became a... -> ROUGH DRAFT <- Uncopyrighted 2023 Enjoy! "Self-help is no help at all. Self-sacrifice is the way, my way, to finding yourself, your true self." -Luke 9:24 A versus B How to consume this book This isn’t a normal self-help book. There are two parts to this book—do them in order! Part A - All on your own. I'll give you some stuff to read to convince you to do it all on your own and a few tips to focus your thoughts, but this might be ALL you need. No other person, YouTuber, or self-help book is invited, only you and you alone are allowed on this journey. This will take up about 2 weeks to 2 months of your life. Part B - YOU AREN'T ALLOWED TO READ THIS UNTIL YOU'VE DONE PART A. I'll give you some reading material that might help you further along, but you need to read and DIGEST the material. Read ONE chapter and take a break. Let the idea sink in. Sure, you can read read it all in one day, but don't speed through it. One chapter at a time (and each chapter is only a page or two with a few exceptions). PART A SACRIFICE MOTIVATION The Dopamine Detox After ironically writing “The Last Self-Help Book”, I came to the conclusion of: Help yourself. Ask for help. Give help to others. This is absolutely true, but I didn't do it. Why? Motivation. Those three ideas came after doing a hard trip of walking across my state. Yep, walking. Those three ideas came straight from me without any of the self-help I read before. And that’s the thing I had read a TON of self-help before, so much so that when I wrote I wasn’t too sure if the thoughts were mine. I was so motivated that I wrote a book about it. But I never did them. Sure, if you took action enough in those three regards you would be unstoppable, you would solve your life. But I didn’t do them. Why? Again, it has to do with motivation. So why wasn’t I motivated? The answer eluded me even though it was right in front of my face: my computer. Not just my computer but all the dopamine feeding activities we do in this modern society. Just like white sugar, our body and mind isn’t built for this extract of entertainment “calories” being feed to our eyes. And just how sugar will cause cavities and a host of other health problems, your brain is rotting from the inside out. I was spending 10-16 hours a day on my computer. No wonder I didn’t have any motivation. But unlike the rock-like structure in your mouth, your brain is very plastic and can heal (or at least adapt like nothing happened) if you work at it. So what’s so great about this dopamine detox? Dopamine Motivates Dopamine motivates. It’s the reason why you stayed up all night until playing video games, binge-watching that TV show, or couldn’t stop surfing the Internet. Perhaps “addicts” is a better word. But dopamine is a normal part of our brain. There is nothing addicting about it, until it gets hijacked by unnatural sources. Studies show that cavities were rare in ancient man, despite eating plenty of carbohydrates, both complex (ancient grains) and simple sugar (fruit and honey). But the body evolved for this kind of stuff. Plus, they were out in nature where a ton of other bacteria is always competing against the type that causes cavities in the first place. The point is, ancient man probably never had a dopamine or addiction problem. But if you want to stop getting cavities, you have to stop eating sugar (at least the white stuff). And if you want your normal motivation back, you have to using unnatural stimulating objects like your computer, smartphone, TV, etc. But I’m no expert in this, so let’s see what the experts have to say... Andrew Huberman – Like many, I first learned about the actual science behind dopamine detoxing by Andrew Huberman. He says two weeks is when the brain pathways start to change for the better. He also points out that dopamine isn’t about the reward but the addicting/motivating behavior (i.e. it isn't the reward but the craving). And this system can overtake our minds. And this craving despite no reward explains why we watch YouTube videos until you get sick only to keep watching. You know this feeling. Most importantly, dopamine is why you keep consuming self-help books and other infotainment , despite making no real progress with it in life. Anna Lembke – But Andrew will almost always mention the professor who is the real expert in all of this—Anna Lembke. Her suggestion is 30 days of a dopamine detox for the hardest case scenarios. He always gives the example of the pain and pleasure seesaw with little gremlins on it. Basically, when you do a pleasurable activity like watching YouTube video, the little gremlins will start to pile up on the other side of the seesaw, the pain side, and you’ll start to feel horrible. But, l as I said before, you’ll keep watching because of the addicting/craving nature of dopamine. However, the opposite is true. The pain of going for a jogging is often balance by the high of doing exercise until you feel great. And she points out that the pleasure that comes from seeking "pain" is "more indirect and potentially more enduring" and "triggering the body's own homeostatic regulating mechanism." Basically, it’s how we’re designed to really live--for the hardships of life. And getting the reward without the effort messes us up. (Do you have air conditioning, a roof over your head, entertainment at your fingers tips, and plenty of food in the kitchen? Did you have to work for it or did your parents give all that to you? Hmm...) As she puts it "pain is the price for pleasure, so too is pleasure the reward for pain." David Goggins – And if anyone knows about the pleasure for seeking pain, it’s David Goggins. He's the anecdotal evidence here. David is all pursuing discomfort to find yourself. Whether it’s doing a 100 mile race without training or going through the Navy SEALs Hell Week three times, he knows all about pushing himself. And that was after being extremely overweight and depressed. Basically, he shows that someone can overcome the worst circumstances in life and become successful if you go to battle with yourself, if you’re willing to embrace discomfort, if you become determine to succeed, if you put in the work. So now we’ve heard from the experts in this field. Basically, those "painful" activities like jogging, lifting weights, ice baths, meditation, fasting, dopamine detoxing, etc. make a lot more sense in improving our overall mood and life. But it also might help to fix your dopamine system, just like how eating healthy food can help to improve your life. This also explains why things like porn, video games, movies, TV show marathons, Netflix, YouTube, junk food, etc. makes us feel bad over time and creates dysfunction in both our minds and bodies. Anna Lembke’s final advice to embrace the world instead of running to whatever you're trying to use to escape from it, to face whatever it is you're trying to escape from. And that in the long-run you'll find that the world doesn't require escape and is rewarding when you face it. She also says to have faith that all the good things you're doing will eventually pay off. As the old Buddhist saying goes, drop by drop the bucket is filled. Now, let’s get you off that dopamine crack. "You first have to go through suffering to find that great peace we're all looking for. There's a lot of books out there about these five steps, do this, do this, do this, get there. No man, it's not that easy. To find real permanent peace and enlightenment you have to go to the dark side of who you are." -David Goggins "The mind has capabilities that are so unknown I found that through suffering, and there's a whole other world on the other end of that." - David Goggins "The hardest obstacle was myself." -David Goggins THE PLAN Three Steps It's very important that you learn to figure out life on your own, not with self-help books. A dopamine detox combined with time to reflect on your life is necessary 3 things for the dopamine detox retreat of 2 weeks (up to 30 or 60 days): 1.) Complete dopamine detox (not even paper books are allowed) 2.) Some kind of challenge in life, something that is hard, something that scares you, even just a little bit. 3.) Reflection using video journaling (no paper journaling) While a dopamine detox might make you feel better as you balance your brain and give you perspective on life, it isn't until you have a challenge to overcome and time to reflect on it that you really grow. That's where the video journaling comes in. I'm not against paper journaling, but it doesn't belong here. What I'm trying to avoid is escapism projects where you avoid reality. By challenging yourself, you're engaging reality. By talking to yourself through a video journal, you've again engaging reality and your behavior. A paper journal (or typing on a computer) can become a cathartic, escapist project that can go on for pages and pages, hours and hours of your life. No more projects! No more escapism! Use your video to get to the root of your problem and then move on! Finally, it's VERY important that you do this alone. So if you have roommates or family you live with, you need to get away for those 2 weeks as they'll infiltrated and influence your life too much during this time. Heck, getting away from your usual environment in general is probably necessary to break you out of your old ruts. That's why it's called a dopamine detox retreat and not just a dopamine detox. You can get an extended stay hotel for two weeks, find a cheap hostel in across the country, stay at a federal camp site for those two weeks, or if you're going to college plan things out so that you're alone for two weeks (get to the dorms early or stay for the winter break). There are a lot of options out there. Just take the time to research things and don't rush to get to through these two weeks. In regards to food, you don't have to do a food fast, but I would encourage you to not eat any processed foods or anything that overstimulates your taste buds. I would encourage you to go hungry a little bit. When you visit the pantry to get a snack, deny yourself and sit with that discomfort for a few hours before giving. I would even encourage you to do no snacks at all. That being said, you can certainly do intermittent fasting or an extended water fast while doing this dopamine detox. For an extended water fast, I would insist you to read up on the literature before doing one and to seek medical supervision if you plan on doing it for more than 72 hours. But you don't have to fast during this dopamine detox retreat. You will be uncomfortable during this. Bored. Lonely. Irritable. Some would even say they're in pain. But stick with it. You'll discover things changing for the better. Tips A few hints on how to spend your time: • Talk to yourself--positive self talk. Either you'll do it automatically or you can purposely direct your inner voice. • No meditation (no more self-help projects), but you can sit in silence and be mindful (or you can sit and think) • No daydreaming (it'll be hard but worth it) • Reflect on life on where you've been and where you want to go (but not fantasizing about it) • Isolate yourself, you're smart enough to figure out things on your own None of the above should be the focus on the retreat (only the three assignments are), but you're going to have plenty of free time where you might want to try the above. Ultimately, you're on your own on how to productively use this time alone and your life. READING MATERIAL Intro Those tips are all I have, but I know it won’t sink in your head unless you read it a few times (that, in theory, is why self-help books aren’t just a few pages long to describe their main point—well that and no one would pay for just a few pages of material). Like I said, you really need to do Part A entirely on your own, but I’ve done long road trips to find myself where nothing really came of it other than wasting time and money. As such, I do want to offer some guidance besides the tips I just gave. You can refer to this next stuff during your dopamine detox retreat if you want, but I would recommend you just read it before you start. It’s up to you. Again, this stuff is not your focus, the three steps are. Stop wandering/wondering your life away A badass knows what he wants and goes for it. That's what I said in my blog. And I still believe it is true today. No more wandering around in life and wondering about things that don’t really matter in life or to you. Doing that isn't going after what you want. No more day dreaming. Start living your life No delays on your dreams and start serving others in a way you're certain they are clearly getting what they want (sadly, money from them to you, directly or indirectly, is often the best indicator of this). Wake up!