The Courage to Live Consciously

This article gets a little weird at times but does a good job of capturing why I started the slackers guide to self improvement.

Courageous people are still afraid, but they don’t let the fear paralyze them. People who lack courage will give into fear more often than not, which actually has the long-term effect of strengthening the fear. When you avoid facing a fear and then feel relieved that you escaped it, this acts as a psychological reward that reinforces the mouse-like avoidance behavior, making you even more likely to avoid facing the fear in the future. So the more you avoid asking someone out on a date, the more paralyzed you’ll feel about taking such actions in the future. You are literally conditioning yourself to become more timid and mouse-like.

But there’s something else going on behind the scenes, isn’t there? That tiny voice in the back of your mind recalls that this isn’t the kind of life you wanted to live.

Don’t die without embracing the daring adventure your life is meant to be. You may go broke. You may experience failure and rejection repeatedly. You may endure multiple dysfunctional relationships. But these are all milestones along the path of a life lived courageously. They are your private victories, carving a deeper space within you to be filled with an abundance of joy, happiness, and fulfillment. So go ahead and feel the fear – then summon the courage to follow your dreams anyway. That is strength undefeatable.

Yes at times it reads too much like an Oprah special but it does spell out the thinking that led to the slackers guide to self improvement.  A couple of years before I started this adventure   I had the realization that I was getting old, was out of shape, in debt, and doing nothing of importance with my life.  My life was work, eat, video games, sleep, work, and repeat.  You can read my journal entries from the time about how I wanted to change.  I referred to it as living with intention. Not just drifting through life waiting to die, but having a purpose and a goal that would drive my decisions and life.  It took me two years to actually start doing that and I admit it’s not been an entirely smooth effort.  Old habits keep asserting themselves.  Curse you bw3 and you vile video games.  But progress is being made.  Note I haven’t mentioned yet what my goals and drives are, maybe some day in the future.  Till then.. wonky out.