life - Arv' Musings

The drama triangle and other stories

Learning to separate facts from stories is imperative. Hold on to your stories with curiosity. Your stories are your framings from your limited perspective. Many a time, your stories are triggered by implicit memories from childhood which you haven't addressed.

framework

How much is too much?

Having too much is a confounding method of copping out from figuring out what I need to be doing.

coaching

The bane of weighing yourself

But the association of how good a person you are, how good you should feel about yourself, how much you should berate yourself, how much harder you should work at the gym, how much starvation you are going to endure - that's all coming from somewhere inside of you.

discussion

The issue with advice

When you ask for advice, know that no one can or should be able to answer this question for you. If someone attempts to, it is a good litmus test (that you should be warier of what they are saying.)

habits

There's a cost to everything, including passion. Especially passion.

There is a cost to everything we do. Knowing the cost is important. Knowing our values and our end game, equally so. And then, we can start working on ensuring that we aren't fucking ourselves up while narrowmindedly going towards a goal that does NOT encompass all of us.

challenge

Keep doing more of this with the goal of stopping

And so, we are all stuck in a fucktarded trap. Where we all think we will find salvation by doing more of this and we'll get out of here where we can start doing less of this, once we get there.

activity

Start with recovery: 7 strategies to feel amazing

When you are unwell, you feel like staying in bed for longer. You want to push work away and instead vegetate on the couch, watch some mindless TV. That's your body getting what it needs - minimal calorie expenditure and lots of rest.

discussion

On why we are bored and dissatisfied

One is to keep accumulating new experiences. There are infinite options out there. This intuitively sounds silly. If you got bored with the first 20, the next 200 will lead to the same end.

discussion

To stand still against the current

Recently, I had the chance to do something interesting - to eat by myself. I thought I could do this anytime. But that's because I did it while reading a book, which for some reason I didn't think was the same as a distraction like watching TV. It is, as much of a book snob, as I might be.

discussion

A few fundamentals we shy away from

the unfortunate definition of a blind spot is that you don't know what it is. By asking for feedback from the people I spend a lot of time with, by journaling and by reading those journals, I've been able to decipher these rather fundamental things.

discussion

Zooming out and a sense of time

One limitation in our progress is our handicap of looking at time. Using one hundred years as a lifetime, we tend to focus on short durations. The disruptions we are producing i.e. the variables in the system we are affecting are unbeknownst to us.

challenge

Is it possible to quit your favourite thing?

It is a tool and a tool you can use to learn a deeper skill. That you can deprive yourself and be comfortable with the discomfort.

life

Hustle Hustle Hustle

I think we get confused between hard work and application versus the constant craving and desire for more.

guilt

Work Anytime, Anywhere

But the dark side of everything needs vigilance. The doom scrolling, the endless notifications, the FOMO - all wreak havoc on our senses. If you are always reachable, you have to answer the phone anytime or respond to texts and emails within a short window.

life

The Stuff of Miracles

The gap between what you know and what you do. That is the real issue.

coaching

The Particle and the Wave

The world around us wants to divide us. And because we need to be here or there, we pick an extreme. Or worse, we choose inaction. Because deep down, we don’t agree with the extremes. That’s great. But we need to use the complementary theory here to dig deeper into our perspective.

discussion

Friday Thought: Is That Your Idea?

Understanding why the idea feels important to you though is something you can look deeper into, as part of exploring the idea.

coaching

How to find the right direction for yourself

We are all searching for something. Deep down, something does not feel quite right. We know what brings us joy. But too often, a quick glimpse is all we can afford because there are a zillion things to do, and there's rarely a moment to pause.

coaching

Friday Thought: Write Less

In both these anecdotes, the outsiders do not get the import of what the protagonist is saying. Because it does not match the climactic moment.

dont quit

The Most Important Thing

Don't forget the power of compounding. Warren Buffet made 95% of his wealth in the last 15 or so years.

life

A wake-up call

I think we are all being pulled down a bad path. It is on each of us to reject it and fight the current. Swimming upstream is awfully hard. Or get out of this river and find another one.

coaching

You never know what they are going through

You never know if the person in front of you spent all week at the hospital, taking care of their ailing parent. But they showed up. Because this is their "me" time. This is where they can switch off for a brief hour.

coaching

Against the Current

You need to start swimming against the current. You need to arm yourself for that swim by curating the barrage of information and snake oil around you.

coaching

Learn from yourself

Have you learned something fundamentally true about yourself from someone else? Something that you could not have come up with by steadfastly sitting with yourself and your organised thought? I seriously doubt it.

life

Friday Thought: Best Friends

You look at it on paper, it makes no sense. You want to be your best friend. You understand you better than most. You know all the great things you are doing. But yet, you behave like anything close to a friend.