Mindfulness: The practice of curating the life you want

There are a number of buzzwords on the internet: Minimalism, Essentialism and Intentionalism. Mindfulness is what they all have in common. When practicing minimalism we are being mindful with the focus on our surroundings, when practicing essentialism, we are focusing on how we spend our time. Mindfulness can make us very happy. And I would go as far as saying many people are unhappy, because they are not being mindful.

But what does being mindful really mean? A minimalist, does not have less stuff, because he or she hates stuff. An essentialist, does not carefully choose what he will work on next, because he is lazy. We practice minimalism, because we want to appreciate the things we own. And we want to only own things that add value. And we focus on the essential 20% that produce 80% of the result, because we want to be effective rather than efficient. We want to do the right thing, rather than a lot of thing. It is the difference between being productive and being busy. It really is about value.

Why are things related to mindfulness such buzzwords? Truth is: we now need it more than ever. In today’s day and age it is so incredibly easy to not be mindful. To go shopping and impulse buy all the things that we think are awesome, but we really don’t need them. It is so easy to just spend hours on the couch watching TV and being genuinely bored. We do it because it is the path of least resistance. And then when it gets real bad, we get addicted to shopping and watching TV. Our brains get stimulated by pretty colors and release feel good hormones, why would we ever do anything else? Because we are unhappy.

We often wonder why we are unhappy. But are not even mindful enough to notice why it is we are unhappy. Or perhaps, we are just not willing to admit why it is we are feeling unhappy. We may even have a vision of who we want to be and it might even literally include “I am not someone who spends all day binging TV.”, and yet we turn a blind eye to what could actually make us feel happier and more fulfilled.

But how can we become more mindful? It is all about value and realizing our own limitations. The space we have in our homes is limited. Our time, attention and emotional capacity are limited. So we must learn to spend those resources on “things” that add value to our lives. That can mean different things. Some things make life easier, those are mostly tools, but if we don’t use them, there is really no point in keeping them. Some things add value by making us smile. If we are excited to read that novel that is on our shelf, we should read it. Otherwise, we don’t need that pile of paper. And if that TV show that we are watching is making us smile or ponder deep philosophical topics, go for it!

Maybe one of the most stigmatized thing is to “get rid” of people who don’t add value to your life. Yes, I know this sound very harsh. And no, “getting rid” of those people does not mean killing them. But it means to spend significantly less or better yet no time with them.

So for being mindful about possessions I recommend reading Marie Kondo’s Life Changing Magic of Tidying up. But in essence it is about questioning whether an item “sparks joy” or is useful. And useful means we have used it in the last few months.

For being mindful how we spend our time, consider this: “Priorities are what we spend your time on.” And “We are what we do on a regular basis.” Let’s think about who we want to be. Figure out our goals and your vision. Because unless we do, we don’t know what it means to spend time on something that adds value. I am not saying to never ever do the dishes again. But quit that emotional shopping habit and get a dishwasher. And once we know who we want to be, we will know what we want to be spending our time on. No worries, it’s okay if that changes. But we have to start somewhere. Then every time we go to do something, whatever that may be, we must ask ourselves: is this who I want to be? Do I really want to spend my precious time on this? This also means that we will not be multitasking. I have mad a whole post about this, so I will not be elaborating on it.

There is one more category that we have not yet addressed. And that is our mindsets. We have to be mindful about those as well. The mindset is the sum of our thinking habits. That includes anything from how we think about ourselves to our attitude towards the world and our work. The way we think reveals a lot about who we are. Therefore curating our thoughts will impact who we are. This one might be the most difficult one because we often don’t catch what we are thinking in each given moment and often we have multiple thoughts at the same time. Once we also have our emotions mix in with our thoughts, it becomes even more complex. And yet, being aware of how we tend to think has a huge impact on our mood, our image of ourselves and therefore also our confidence. I hence recommend trying to be mindful about our thoughts and curate them.

One more thing we need to talk about: Being mindful of our emotions. Our emotions are very strong. And is alright. But we need to learn to express them. We are unable to deal with emotions, if we are not capable of explaining them at least to some degree. I am currently doing a simple exercise that helps with identifying emotions: It is a bullet point journal (no, not a bullet journal). Each bullet point refers to one thing that happened and how it made me feel. I keep it in two columns one for negative and one for positive emotions. I will write 1-3 bullets in each column each night. This is of course very customizable and allows us to learn to identify emotions, but also is a nice journal to look back at and design your life around. Of course more traditional journaling as in: writing down what happened, how it made you feel and how to proceed in more detail is also a great way to become more mindful of our emotions.

In summary we need mindfulness to allocate our limited resources in the way that will create the most value. This is why I think that making a significant difference between the buzzwords I mentioned in the beginning makes no sense. Of course minimalism has as lightly different focus than essentialism, but they come from the same place. And that really is not a mindset of scarcity. It is about being grateful and fully present in the moment. It is about choosing and curating the life we want, rather than going the unhappy path of least resistance. It is about building your happiness.

Caring healing Aggression against ourselves.

There is this trend in our society to declare, that we do not care about anything anymore. And to be honest, I have participated in this. And it does make sense. We assume the worst in everyone. We assume, we will get hurt. But if we do not care, we cannot be hurt, right? Obviously not. Because what happens is, that we feed into our hatred for ourselves. We naturally care. Because we are passionate. And because we do care, we end up hating ourselves, because we don’t even manage to not care. But this is not the worst part of it. there are so many things, capable to bring us joy, if we choose to not care about them, we will end up in a cold, joyless world, left with nothing but pain.

There is nothing wrong with caring for things. Caring about our health, our relationships, our hobbies and our work. Because after all we have the right to care about our lives. We don’t have to numb ourselves towards everything around us, just in order to not get hurt. Because our dependence on our hobbies and relationships may hurt us, but not caring about those things at all will hurt us more in the long run.

Why is that? Why do I claim that we inherently want to care? What do I know? Well, it is not just about caring. It is very much about a purpose. And about a direction. It is about individualism and self-identification. We all intuitively know, that what we do and how we think, defines who we are. And that is exactly how caring defines who we are. Which is, why we should never blindly care about something. Which is, why there needs to be research in order for us to be sure about something. But we all need to care. Because we all need a goal. Because we all need something that is worth fighting for.

Here is what may happen, if we do not care. We isolate ourselves from everyone around us, which will hurt us, because no one can live depending only on oneself. But we will ignore that hurt, because we decided to not care about those people that we pushed away. The pain will grow, but will will keep choosing not to care. But there is also nothing else, that we can focus on. We end up trying to focus on identifying ourselves as the person, who is cold and does not care.

Someone said, we should not drink a whole bottle of our favorite high volume percent alcohol? Oh well, we do not care. And with not caring we damage ourselves. But we don’t care about whether or not we damage ourselves or not. And we end up in addictions or self-harm. But we don’t really care, but now we have the perfect way to identify ourselves with not caring.

I know this is harsh. I know it is scary to care. It is scary to just be ourselves, because it is so much easier to desperately try to not care. But not caring and the constant need to prove how much we do not care is so damaging to us. Yes, we may get hurt, if we start fighting for our hobbies. Yes we may run into people who judge us for taking care of ourselves. But I think we should rather take care of ourselves, than end up hurting ourselves, just because we are afraid, what people think of us.

Why do we despise ourselves for caring? Why do we feel, if we start caring about things, we loose our independence? Because we don’t unless we let someone else choose what we are supposed to care for. Choosing what we care for means choosing who we are. And it is power. It is like a woman choosing to be cute and kind. She may have dreaded that her whole life, because she has always feared that being cute may be viewed as being immature. Or weak. When frankly that is a decision entirely up to her. And the world envies women who make the choice to be cute and beautiful, rather than badass. Because there is an undeniable appeal to someone embracing who they want to be, despite of their fears.

There is a distinct appeal to someone choosing to care. Because it is well known how much strength it takes to make that step. We don’t end up vulnerable when we care. I have wondered for too long why I was fascinated so much by all those protagonists in books and movies. I knew my life was perfect but I could not get rid of the feeling that it was not as good as those protagonists’ lives. But why? Because no matter the heart-ship and pain and confusion those characters were undergoing, they were always motivated. By hate, by pain or by love. Those are strong emotions. Emotions, that we are not able to use to our advantage unless we care. Yes, we can hate ourselves for caring, but that will only destroy us.

Caring for something can also help us, to stop feeling uncomfortable with it. I have experienced that myself. I used to hate my feet and find them very ugly. At some point I started caring for them. Nothing fancy. Just taking a little time every other week to put some polish onto my toenails. And guess what: I don’t hate my feet anymore.

So when we hate our bodies, we can start battling that hate, by caring for it. There are so many ways of caring for your body. My favorites are applying body lotions and peelings. But there is also water intake and nutrition and exercise. Understand that taking care of yourself is the polar opposite of engaging in self-harm (with exercise potentially being an exception to this). And that is, why it helps to get more in tune with ourselves. It helps to not hate our bodies so much. And for me the next step always is to take care of things mentally. Be it my blog, my studies or the stories, I want to be writing. This can also be the people around us. Our family. Our pets. Caring for and about them will decrease our level of aggression, will give us a purpose and will define who we are.

I like the thought of being able to define who I am. It is work. But it is so much better than being at the mercy of my own hatred.

Memories and their impact on us

Determinism. According to Wikipedia “Determinism is the philosophical belief that all events are determined completely by previously existing causes”. I like to hate on Determinism. Why? Because I had a very good friend who used it to justify anything. And even though he denied it, it felt to me that he was not taking responsibility for anything. To this day I still remember. And I remember that I have chosen to not use Determinism to be able to do whatever I want. But I also know that our past and our circumstances have an incredible impact on us.

This is just one example. I will always associate Determinism with that friend. And I will always remember the conversations we had about how we hardly have any free will and how helpless and sad that made me feel. But it is not the only thing that I associate with Determinism. Because I have seen that point of view, I was able to make up my own mind. And Memories are a perfect example, for how our past is part of us, but not what defines us.

We have memories. Maybe we associate a song or a movie with a certain person or situation. And every time we get confronted with said song or movie we remember. But the thing is: if that memory pains us we can do something about it. We can reprogram our brains to associate the movie or song with something else. It is like we are overwriting the memory. It is called learning. And yes, we may never forget anything that once was correlated with that song or movie. But that is actually a good thing. This memory is part of us. And we learn something with everything we experience. But just because we do not forget, does not mean that we will always remember that certain person or situation with the particular song or movie. And it will definitely not make us loose ourselves, just because the song was played in the mall.

When we look into our past, we will find things that we consider mistakes. And there is no use in denying anything. Just because we wish something never happened, we cannot simply forget it. Those memories are part of who we are today. And coming to terms with those things means admitting our mistakes. Sometimes even regretting them. But we cannot dwell on them. Because our past does not define our future. Our past may be an explanation to certain things, but do not let it be an excuse. We must learn how to rewire our brains such that we do not suffer an emotional reaction every time we think of certain chapters of our past. (Don’t get me wrong, emotional reactions are nothing to be ashamed of. But there are certain times, when we’d rather not show them, because they would be plain inappropriate.)

We cannot deny our past. But we can decide how we react to it. We can decide what we take from it. We can decide how we want to live right now.

I do not know if some day I will not feel triggered every time I run across a craft-knife or a classical razor-blade. But I know that I have not cut in a month and that this is something I can be grateful for. Every time I see those blades I can remember the pain of this world. And I can be grateful that I have experienced some of it. Because it means that when I say “I understand, what you are feeling.” I am not lying. I know that my cutting has given me a totally different approach to addiction and I dare say I understand it better now. And if all it did, was teaching me how to be less judgemental, I am grateful.

I do not deny that I have the urge to take a blade and just run it over my skin, especially in the evenings. Especially when I am alone. But whether or not I do is not predetermined. Just because I have cut in the past, does not mean, that will do it again in the future.

A totally different aspect of memories is, that I believe it is, what ties us to people. Because if we could not remember, we would never get close to anyone. We would never learn to value or fear the people in our lives. And this is important to keep in mind, when we want to interact with people. When we wish to get close to someone. Sharing memories is probably one of the strongest bonds there is. And the friendships that can grow from those bonds is precious beyond words.

Forgetting someone we share a lot of emotional memories with… I do not think it is possible. We come across people in our lives, that we may wish to forget. But chances are we will never get them out of our heads. Because we do not simply forget memories. We can do the same as with anything: Reprogram. But we will never really forget. And I wish I could say I am okay with that. And some day I think I will be. Everyone who we across will teach us something. And we do not want to forget those lessons. The pain will fade with time. But the memory will stay. We will remember. And thinking about it is beautiful, because sharing memories with someone we may not engrave our names in their heart (huh this line is cheesy) but we will engrave the lesson that we taught them in their brain. Which is worth so much more.

All in all: we cannot forget our mistakes. We cannot forget people. But we can choose our future. We can choose to learn from the past. And to not make the same mistakes again. And this way even when we cannot get rid of the painful memories, we grow. We learn to understand the world and ourselves. And those memories will keep the lessons alive. This is forgetting is not even that desirable. We want the pain to fade. I get it. I really do. And it will fade. But there is no need for us to fight the memories. Fight our past selves. We just need to have the courage to accept who we were and who we are today. And then we can decide who we will be in the future.

I wish I could believe

Four minutes. One song. That is how long it took me to write the 8 letters onto my skin. My hands sweaty. And shaky. My eye twitching. My fear is as strong as always. And I feel nothing. Nothing. All I know is that I will always be convicted. That whenever there is someone who is getting close to me I will end up trying to explain. That I will be asked questions. Even after I may or may not have won my war. There will always be those lines and letters on my arm. On my legs. Manifestations of my pain. My addiction. My fear.

Once more I have lost my “why”. I have no clue, why I cut. I just do it. It does not help. It does not change a thing.
“The person you hurt most is yourself.” Maybe. I should care, right? Do you know what I do care about? The fact that I don’t cut deep anymore. The fact that it never actually bleeds. just a few red lines. It saddens me. Scary right? I know. I do not want to protect myself anymore. I cannot stop the pain. Trying to is just a waste of time and energy. I know. I know. I hear everyone’s voices in my head:

“You will make it.”
“It will be okay.”
“I am here for you.”
“It will get better, easier.”
“There are people who can help you.”

Lies. Nothing but lies. Form people close to me. Some of them have an idea of what is happening. Some just really care. Some helpless. But I have known this for years. Known it long before I started cutting: We are alone. And it does not matter. We are who we are. In the place we are. We can do whatever we want.

We do not give up hope. We try to keep fighting. And we want to believe those people telling us that it’s gonna be alright. We want to. But… Until I experience that it is true. That it can get better, I can’t believe it anymore. I trust so easily. I want to believe that there is an end to the darkness. I do want to hold on to the light. But at some point the poet in me dies. Leaving the scientist alone. The scientist that looks at past events to determine the future. And those past events show no sign of light. It is not even about the cutting anymore. It is about what’s wrong inside me. I should get up and fight. I should be trying to find a way. But… I am trembling. I am parallelized.

The War I Fight

In the context of cutting, I have mentioned before, that I often do not even want to stop. I realized that cutting is not my enemy. I do not hate cutting. I do not hate myself for cutting. Cutting is a friend. When I have added another line onto my skin, I do not put the blade away hating myself. I am just as empty as I was before. But I do not feel the need to cut. When I have sled down into addiction, the need to cut grows stronger and about every 48 hours I end up giving in. So, when I am done, my thought is:
“I don’t have to cut for next few hours.”

How does this make sense with the fact that I call cutting a problem?! I said, that anyone who cuts should probably get help. But if cutting is a friend, and we do not want to stop, why would we seek help?

Just because I do not hate myself for cutting, does not mean, I do not hate myself. Just because cutting is not the actual problem does not mean that I do not have a problem. I hate myself for being weak. I hate myself for being negative (yes, this is why I make such a fuss about positivity). I hate myself for the sadness. For the intense feeling of loneliness that I cannot handle. That darkness inside me. That darkness that I express, when I cut, is what is my problem. Is what I want to get rid of. Is what I want to treat. Is what I need help with.

A friend of mine recently answered my question whether cutting defined me by saying: “No, but it’s a big part of you.” Well, I guess he meant the darkness. He meant the pain. Because cutting is just expressing that. And this is why this entire thing is so hard… I am not at war with cutting. I am at war with myself. With the feeling of emptiness. The feeling of not being good enough. The sadness that just takes control even though I know I have everything I need. I have everything to be happy. And yet: I cannot escape the cold inside me. I cannot escape myself. I cannot experience peace. Because I am fighting myself. And I do not know why. Sure, I know I hate myself for sleeping through lectures and classes. For binge-watching random shows instead of studying. But I don’t feel like that is the actual problem.

This is perfect conflict material for a book: I am fighting a war with myself for a reason that I do not know. And I do not know how to find that problem, so how am I supposed to change anything? And then again: I have been told there might not be an actual issue. It might be impossible to pinpoint it. I might never really be free of the darkness. And… that is scary. Because I do not want that to be the case. I want to be okay some day. I want it to stop. I am not afraid of fighting. I am not too weak to fight and win. But I cannot fight something that I don’t know. I could win, if this thing was winnable. If there was a single way to win this, I would go it. No matter what. But I have not found that way. And I have not met anyone who can show me that way.

Just a word on how cutting is perceived: It may seem like attention-seeking. And it may even be that. But there is so much more behind it. When I started cutting, I thought it was simple. But it is not. And I assume this goes for any addiction. Maybe this even goes for anything in this world that involves human beings. So, I think, we are too quick to judge. Especially me. If there is something that my condition has taught me it is that things are not always as they seem and while it is easy to objectively determine is something is right or wrong, it is impossible to judge a person.

So, I think especially social media, but we in our daily lives, should go easier on people. Because, we do not know why they do something. Maybe they are just hurting. Maybe they are doing it for a reason. Maybe they have no choice. Maybe… maybe. Point is: we do not know. And I grew up thinking that someone who is addicted, is addicted by his/her own fault. But I have learned that this is not necessarily true. And think we should -I should- treat addicted people more with sympathy than with judgment. Because the sympathy might actually help them, while the judgment definitely will not.