Ravi, Year 3: Self-Improvement Log - Data-Driven, Incremental Growth. Feedback Welcome. Ego & Defenses, Dropping [Its Done]

Waiting about at the garage for my car atm. Reading a bit about Felix Dennis, a smart business tycoon from London who I've had interest in over the years. Has a lot of very valuable things to say.

Chap was quite an extreme personality. Estimates that he spent about $100 million on crack cocaine, had orgenies with escorts virtually every night, and I find his eventual meeting with his lover, a french hairdresser he meets, Marie-France Demolis, and how he begins to change after this.

A lot of blokes I have known in this game, had a similar personality. Insane, insane drive, excess in all manner of things - women, drugs, workaholism & money making.

History is littered with examples of such people. But what triggers my interest, is the points at which their personality stabilises a bit. I've seen it with a few guys now. Eventually, when one is ready, actual balance can come. Felix would get into poetry and writing, and then guys like me began reading his books.

This, I kind of life. I am still very much on my own come up and have a few years of focus and push ahead to get my own vision sorted....I have a lot of time for a bloke who is well rounded. You meet a lot of the player sorts, and often, these are men who are so odious and bereft of substance, you are scarcely able to share a room with them. I recall a dinner here or there where I actually had to stand up and leave. The deeper part of you, gets the ick....

But at the same time, I also have had a decade+ long interest in playerism and have a long standing pattern of peering into their lives with a latent intrigue. My own forray into hedonistic worship of the holy vagina, seems to have taught me a lot, but also created a bit of a problem of unhappiness. This I have made a lot of progress on now, and as I re-engineer my identity towards other things, it is curious what I am still drawn to

Romance, success, and a life lived to legendary proportions

That, is what it's about.........


-R

Excuse the atrocious spelling, typing on my phone while freezing my ass off in England

Missed my check out yesterday. Day was great. Productive. Happy. Great training session.

Weight, is a bit all over the place. 227lbs this morning. Getting back into training, it has crept up. Interesting.

Diet, is super clean. I am reticent to track, as I am trying to reset my leptin levels at this moment. This, tends to make a cut of any description, far more effective,

Monged out in the evening and enjoyed my nerdy study of alternate history.

Feeling good. Just DOING. And living, how I personally want to live.

As a guy, I am a nerd. I enjoy cerebral and mentally stimulating activities, and this is more of what I personally want to do.

Rounding out this aspect of my being in the year of 2025, will bode well. All good.

Onwards. Today, I have to do some work on a property my parents purchased. And attend the weekly CMU call.

Thereafter, I'll train legs, do a KoT session, and probably play guitar, read, and study Spanish.

Some good value on the forums lately. Hope this continues. Feels like we are maturing.

-MAC

Superb leg workout but rather wiped out at the moment. Just going to relax and watch content and absorb good information on self improvement. Will complete the log tomorrow. Looking forward to crushing my body goals and getting lean. I have learned a lot about training and I am grateful for that.

Just for transparency's sake, I too, struggled last night with wanting to go find women to fuck.

My mind was pulling me into all sorts of rationalisation - just go to the clubs, or just go book a trip somewhere in January and smash a few women.

This, is pure weakness, and I cut it off.

Self-control, and to go from Good to GREAT, requires the proper evolution of a human being.

Chasing skirt, is not this chapter. And sticking to commitments is required for there to be proper higher level success.

I would say, I am 80% "on top" of life at this time. This week, got a lot better. Training, was good yesterday. Sunday, will be spent on personal development, reading, study, and improving my inner game.

I do not want to be a man who cannot "stop" hedonic pleasure. The mind virus, tells us, well, I have to gain more experience (utter cope after you're slamming plenty of women each year), I have to see to my sex drive, so on and so fourth.

When you are in the player life, subconsciously chasing skirt, your subconscious mind becomes consumed by it. It was always on my mind, in how I speak, carry myself, and how I respond to the world. After several years, it did become more autopilot, and I suppose, a degree of unconscious competence had set about. Nonetheless, llagrant underachieving and slow actualisation of one's being occurs in playerville. I have personally seen it, many, many times. Yes, there are geniuses like Pancakemouse who can seemingly do it all. But this is not the rest of us, whom are rather mediocre in talent and ability, but overcome these deficits, with superior mental models as well as grit and determination.

You ask yourself, who do I want to be?

It is a far more successful and actualised man.

With a far more adventurous and interesting life.

I began feeling very empty during the prolific pursuit of the holy vagina, an object of great veneration and subjugation across these boards, and though I would feel some happiness during the quite notable times (rotation of 3 in Budapest, getting laid endlessly), a void began to open up which I believe was the beginning of the end of that version of myself.

I'd get laid, and during the sex, felt like I was just going through the motions for muhhhhh lay count.....

I'd retain some quite nice girls, who actually treated me fairly well, and still feel quite miserable and dismal about it all

And this was a pattern that kept going, and drove me a little crazy. At this time, the way I see it, my inner game and psychological foundations, were the real problem. And I expect, there will be a version of me who will exist, perhaps in 6 months, who is just happier, more grounded, and perhaps sees this all differently.

Anyway........

Today, will be spent on personal development. Reading, study, thinking, reflecting, all of that.

-R

Today, was pretty good. Solid in the personal development front. Read a lotta good stuff. Watched some good stuff. Working on different aspects of my personality to be fun/happier. Something D talks about when working with people. He has them do different things to develop different aspects of themselves. Picking up a lot atm. That’s good.

Read GLL for a few hours, the success articles, stuff about life etc. I am also trying to dig deeper into aspects of what began happening with me. Chris said after 2.5 years of Game he realised he didn’t want to stick to his plan of going until he was 40. He seems to be writing from a place of a level of actualisation, and knowing himself, and seems to have found his own lane. It is evident in what he shares. And yet, to others, reading him, is like reading the ramblings of a mad man. I recall when GLL entered into a controversial era, and there were some hit pieces, etc. The perspective many people had, was that the community was deranged and borderline psychotic. And yet others, really liked it. Myself included, albeit in the capacity of a lurker. Values conflict, are part of life. A screening mentality applies more generally. You can play it safe, not speak your opinions, and think you will be fine. In truth, it does not work like this. Detractors and critics, are a perennial companion of anyone who has put their head above the parapet. We do not need to please those who do not align with us. It has been my own life experience, that this is often a bad move: you attract people who do not like you in their core, and a relationship with them, will involve you subtly pushing their buttons, until things reach a crescendo. Anyone who has had people pleasing tendencies, will know this. Very unpleasant stuff. As we become less of an injured puppy, and more of a person, I think offending those who don’t like us, is probably a stage of the journey. My own herd thinned considerably and I expect it will continue to do so. And in this space, others will enter, with whom, I will be able to build better bonds, and enjoy brighter avenues and vistas. I suppose everyone who has changed themselves, has been through something similar. C’est la vie.

Watched some standup comedy for a few hours.

Then some journaling/processing.

Planned the week ahead.

Things, are moving forward. Some niggles here and there. But I do see much improvement in myself, as I look at myself, and the relationships which are in my life right now. Am getting along with my parents and bro, better than I have in years, and also understanding aspects of their personality better. Noticed my Mum, really does want to be acknowledged, and wants a certain level of approval and appreciation. Something I am historically not good at. It makes me very uncomfortable, in truth, but I am able to see it and take steps in the right direction here. This, I want to continue to build on. The deeper aspect of relational trust, is tricky. Barriers/boundaries, are there, but 100% better than before. It feels good to be able to actually hear the perspective of some people, such as my brother, and actually sincerely appreciate where he is coming from without feeling any type of way. He is a Chad so lives in a very different reality, but this seems to have brought a lot of other challenges his way. Like at his level of looks, there are STILL issues finding partners, because he wants someone on his level physically, which I can imagine can be tricky. Trying to have empathy, and despite the enormous gulf in our life experience, not push the lad away. I find it hard to relate to him, but upon patient listening and consideration, there is more that is similar about us, than different.

This has helped me, quite a lot, and upon being able to understand my bro better, it’s meant conversations and just being around him, is 100 x easier. I can see why he thinks and feels the way he does, and can not be triggered by his more abrasive behaviours. I can see, he has a boatload of trauma himself. It will take him years to realise, like it did for me. The best thing I can do, as a sibling, is be endlessly patient, never judge the lad, and just let him feel heard, listened to, and let the light of human kindness and compassion flow into him in whatever capacity I can bring to him. There are aspects of our relationship, I think, that are quite broken. It can feel like some small resentment is held by him. If I am to guess, it might be that he was acclimatised to me being a former loser. And now, my life is quite cool. It’s in small things, rather unjustifiably harsh behaviour on his part, which you just don’t do to people….Flat out refusing to help me with small things, which I’d do for him. He didn’t used to do things like that when I was a fat virgin. Relationships which are in their core, not built on a foundation of respect, tend to end up like this. The person doesn’t actually like you in their core – perhaps justifiably, or perhaps, not.

IMO, as we ascend in self-improvement, there is just a clean-up operation required. You salvage what you can, and you just accept the rest. I don’t think some of my relationships are salvageable. I will form new ones in 2025.

All of this stuff, is messy, unfortunately. I don’t know a clean and tidy way to do it. I don’t know how to also not offend and upset others in the process. Perhaps you never can do such a thing. I don’t actually know. It is often said, “winning is ugly”, and those who are seeking to change themselves, are often misunderstood. David Goggins in his books, talks about how hated he became by so many people as he was going through his own mental transformation. I am not 1% a man that David is – not even close. I hope I can one day become 2% of what he is as a human being. But I truly can relate to how much the individual who has to change himself as a person, has to go through. Principles that I think that serve the self-improver best: mutual respect, tolerance, patience, and acceptance.

-R

Mon 2nd Dec 2024

BW: 225lbs

Actions

(1) Business:
-Coaching
-Reading
-Content: Study
-Biz: Thinking

(2) Body:
-Gym: Push
-Nutrition
-McKenzie

(3) Inner Game:
-The Practice

Others:
-Guitar
-Spanish
-Admin

Felix Dennis on Self Belief


Anyone out here can win.......Putting tonnes of time into my beliefs and inner game.

EoD report in about 10hrs lads

-Ravi

MakingAComeback said:

Mon 2nd Dec 2024

BW: 225lbs

Actions

(1) Business:
-Coaching [done]
-Reading [done]
-Content: Study [done]
-Biz: Thinking [done]

(2) Body:
-Gym: Push [done]
-Nutrition [done]
-McKenzie [done]

(3) Inner Game:
-The Practice [done]

Others:
-Guitar [na]
-Spanish [na]
-Admin [fail]

Click to expand...

Inner game focused day.

Gym was solid.

Some progress I'll report: I am able to engage with inner game, across all dimensions, without the profound resistance I had before.

This resistance, prevented me from engaging with any content, materials, and resources related to dating/relationships, for about 3 years. And also made it hard to receive coaching.

It would manifest as a serious inner tension, and this would be so unbearable I'd not be able to engage with the things I'd need to feed my mind in order to change and improve.

This, I believe, may have been a deep form of self-sabotage, or perhaps, a success barrier, or mental block?

I am unsure of what the term would be. But it was real, and utterly frustrating. I tried every day to study game related resources in Budapest, and simply couldn't do it. The stress of just engaging with the subject matter, would at times make me break out in a cold sweat, but going to approach for literally 10 hours was something I could do. Odd?

When I say, I could do, I was not quite happy about it, and pushed through a lot of pain.

The resistance, was the first red flag. I was too early in self improvement to know. But with getting further along, you understand, and can see you've changed. I was able to review tonnes of material, connect the dots, and have deeper empathy for other peoples experience, and also understand my own.

Looking at the metrics that matter, we're seeing green shoots in CMU. We doubled our revenue from last month.

Studio is being built.

Did my best today. Progress is being made. I feel it.

-Ravi

Tuesday 3rd

(1) Business:
-Coaching
-Content: Thinking / Training

(2) Body:
-Rest Day
-Nutrition tracking

(3) Inner Game
-The Practice: 2 x
-Read: Dr Pete Walker

Others:

-Admin

Notes:

I am feeling a bit of shame about how hard it is for me to properly connect with others. I saw a few messages from the forum user, and my friend, Brady (@Dewm) and I felt my heart sink when I realised I am having anxiety in replying. He’s actually a guy I relate to massively, and was one of my fave forum users in terms of following his journey, even hung out with him at his place in NYC. I replied today, but it showed me how far I have to go in terms of being safe enough within to properly connect with others again.


The nuclear bomb that was going off in my subconcious for years, has slowly began to diffuse. I know that, because I can properly read, study, reflect, and get granular as hell about my various sticking points as a person. I have been working on every facet of myself for 3 years, and it is this year, where I can “see” a lot of my “things”.

Confronting these aspects of our being, and working on them, diligently, with patience, I have found, they DO fade and with that, you are just a different human being.

As one improves as a man, and the years of self-improvement begin to shine through, you are….different.

The way you speak, move, the way you look, just how your subconscious brain operates. This is evident to others. I live a monk-like life at this time. And I notice, when I do go out (gym/ store), I turn heads (as 6ft5 men who are moderately attractive will do) and when I am engaged in just casual conversation in the gym, women do treat me very, very differently from how they did the first year or two. It is a different look in the eye, and a different, open behaviour. A certain respect, it seems? I can tell the way I interact with people, is different now. More authentic, I feel. There is less “character armour”


Character Armour (See Willhelm Reich for more about this)

https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=947895105232813&id=160367813985550&set=a.166254416730223


The person who has not truly figured out self-improvement, wears it in their physiology and in their being.

If you look at the above posts, of Johnny Berba, to the trained eye who knows this stuff deeply, just looking at him, you see how deep his trauma and brokenness was.

-Severe pattern baldness, indicative of calcification and fibrosis from chronic stress
-Impaired airway development, underdeveloped jaws, indicative of mouth breathing from childhood, I suspect initiated by an unsafe environment and stressed parenting
-Anxiety disorders

People who are WHOLE, look well, and are capable of quite effortless performance.

People who are broken, drown in stress, negative emotions, and cannot get shit done. They have issues. See above for my own battle with resistance, that took years to improve, and that was with deep focus. Jeez.

If you want to be the best you can be, that is, a top 1% man, your biology must be top notch, as well as your inner world, and the way you are strategically investing your time, into areas with Level 10 potential (business, location independence, AND building excellent relationships which I do recognise involves a few years of getting laid, yes, casual sex is fine and great, my own personal issues with inability to enjoy life and sex is my personal problem which I am working on)

How you function and perform, is a product of how integrated and well you are, in particular, how good your brain and body mitochondria are, and how healed your psychology is. You can’t have weak links like shit airway function, which just bathes the brain in stress hormones. Everything must function well in the human body, so you can have focus and drive for higher-end self-improvement.

How you approach this, is very holistic. True self improvement isn’t just, look good and talk to girls. It’s becoming a whole person, who is able to win big, and have Level 10 outcomes in life.

I am figuring my own stuff out, and sharing as much as I can. The more minds we have here working, deeply, and sharing, we will figure it out.

Trying to post less on the other logs as some feedback I have gotten a few times now is, it isn’t helping people me sharing my own opinion on other logs. Apparently this is really annoying people. I personally enjoy helping people but this may not be a good use of my time anymore. I won’t yap on the other logs. I can see the points being made, and if I am to be helpful in any real way, I think this is just by myself succeeding in my life. I don’t actually mind, and there are probably things I am doing and saying, at this particular stage in my journey, which offend others and piss them off. This, is a ME problem, and I hold myself accountable for this. In time I will make progress on this sticking point.

-Rav bot 2000 out

Really solid day yesterday.

Learning a lot, healing (slowly!), shifting my mindset. Barriers coming down. Subtle ability to relate to others more, increasing.

I'm experiencing personal growth and healing. Can feel it. I can see, due to my turbulent past, I unconsciously isolated myself from others, creating emotional barriers. This stemming from extreme stress and an inability to be vulnerable tbh. Shame, doubt, fear, anger. All toxic shit I inherited from my fucked up Dad, and being in a fucked up situation growing up. I am not ashamed of that, because I am dealing with it, and don't blame anyone. I'll end the cycle, for sure.

Stuff I've noticed:

• I'm learning to understand and connect with people better. All people, young, old, man, woman.
• I've recognized the dysfunction in constant grinding and obsession. Traumatised people do this to cope with life.
• Self-improvement is a complex, ongoing journey with multiple layers. It shifts. It probably is a good idea for the true self improver to "get women handled" because it shows your real issues. I think not all guys have issues like I do, and their path is very different. They are going for something different. Many guys should NOT be looking at my log and thinking this will relate to you. You might want to instead focus on others, who might align with you a lot better. Lots here, are solid. I'm gonna do me on this log.

Things I think made my case far more deep and complex (baggage):

• Went from being an obese, depressed, anxious, sick, totally destroyed virgin to basically flipping a switch at 24 and deciding I will succeed in life, and dedicated 10-12 hours daily to self-improvement. This created a savage drive but probably at its root came from trauma.
• Worked intensely on myself from ages 25-29, and regained Selfhood, I would say, 20%. Was still disconnected after all of that.
• Developed an incredible determination to change my life, which IMO is the most positive thing that came. With sufficient perseveerence, you can win. I don't care how bad your cards are. Mine were fucking horrible. People would tell me earlier in this log, you don't have it that bad dude you're tall....They don't know sh*t about my life. 1 or 2 people in this world do. JourneyToOptimal is one and when I told him the full story in NYC two months ago the dude's face is something I will never forget. Yeah. And yet: I WILL SUCEED. Just having drive, just having work ethic, just having a WHY and a burning desire within you, I promise you, is enough to achieve your dreams. I have fucking seen it first hand.

Critical points:

• Success is ultimately about personal responsibility. You CANNOT care about your defects. You CANNOT fall into ANY victim thinking. Yes, others have it easier. You have to brainwash yourself to develop a belief system whereby all the things that victimised you, fucked you over, hurt you, wounded you, were in fact the tinder that started the first of true fucking willpower and grit, true determination and drive, until that small kindling eventually became a forest fire, that is now a blazing inferno of drive to go high in life that will never burn out. You can see ALL challenges and obstacles you have faced in life, as opportunities for growth that you leaned into to actually obtain strength and change from, and to become a better version of yourself. Rising to the challenge, and finding ways to win, you can become a beast.
• Healing requires humility, repeated learning, and expanding knowledge. You will think you have a handle and grasp, and 6 months down the line, prove yourself wrong. You will think guys you learned from 6 months before, didn't have it down, and you'll then see they were right. You evolve again and again. This is normal and even happened with all the great ones.
• Limiting beliefs will keep you stuck. I've seen how hard they are to dislodge. You can't force it. You have to go very deep on yourself, and step away, so you can come back, better. You will go as far in life as your PARADIGMS allow you to. If you are stuck in the grinding paradigm, you will stay there and never live your true potential. If you embrace the holistic paradigm, where life is non-binary, a scale, and there is no black or white, you can broaden your intellectual horizons and have access to an infinitude of developmental pathways allowing you to FIND ways to win
• Low sexual market value (SMV) can be reframed as an opportunity for growth, an opportunity to looksmaxx harder, get tatted, get surgeries, lean into more edgy style, lean into more niche photography, lean into pushing your mind to find answers.......It IS possible if your mind is open enough to see the many ways you can optimise. Look at it scientifically.

Other principles:

• Hurt people tend to hurt others without them knowing or even trying. They will adopt bad attitudes, and be dismissive of others, because of the world they live in. This will be very subtle, small things. Diminishing attitudes, snootiness, taking away from others achievements and subtle, barbed ways of looking at others. This, I believe I have done a lot. This, isn't me in my core, rather, it was a defence mechanism I developed through a hellish life to protect what minuscule sense of Self I could find within. As if to say, yes, you are not less, you also have merit and value, and you don't need to allow the external world to fuel your already existing inferiority complex. Just ignore them, they are not special. This, I believe, comes from a lot of hurt and is pure ego protection.
• Personal paradigm shifts require openness to new information. You have to look at the situation. When I think about a lot of the mentoring I got from my guys, I can see I just wasn't ready at the time due to ego defence mechanisms being too strong, but it was all going into my subconscious, and I absorbed most of it at a core level. I am now, able to connect the dots more and accept more. If you cant' ACCEPT NEW INFORMATION.....You will not shift paradigms and your life won't ever, ever, ever, ever fucking move. Getting over this, involves stepping away and healing yourself man, I'm sorry to tell you.
• Mindset and thinking patterns are crucial to personal development. You think like a hurt fool, you're doneso. Again, sorry to tell you this. But it's true.
  

The journey is ongoing, but I feel fundamentally different and more hopeful about my potential for success.

This, I think, is because the deeper parts of us as men, such as our insecurities, our doubts, our fears, are the true demons that live within us. Papering over this by pursuit of financial success or whatever else, won't do it.

I can see why the great ones say handle women first. Because that is how you see all your real damn issues.

But how complex this journey is, baffles me at times. When you FINALLY improve, get results, 10 OTHER sticking points pop up.

I do this, day in, day out, with TOTAL focus. TOTAL dedication. I am one of the most serious and committed self-improvers out there man. And this shit has killed me several times over.

The real sticking points we have in life, are so much deeper than we think. Women, for whatever reason, just show us where our issues are. But it takes intelligence and deep self-improvement awareness to be able to interpret this and figure your case out. Something I learned from other people who were ahead of me.

The more you heal, and properly improve and get results, you evolve your PARADIGMS:

Personal Requirements of a Paradigm Shift
● True tragedy is when a human comes into contact with information that could change their paradigm for the
better, but the information is rejected, forgotten or misunderstood. Below I’m going to list the 3 primary things
you need.

● Humility: presenting people with information that challenges their sense of reality often leads to them getting offended, thus rejecting the information. Ego, pride and the need to be ‘right’ all the time are the biggest contributors to a slack of progress. You only have to look at anything political to see this is true, or try telling someone their favourite music artist sucks.
● Repeatability: we need to be reminded more than we need to be taught. You might learn something
instrumental but it’s easy to forget it and return to your old mental conditioning. It’s a constant fight against
entropy to our old conditioning.
● Knowledge: base intelligence and a ‘network’ of different mental models helps you learn new ones and recognise how they fit in. Often we find it hard to accept ideas that don’t fit into our current comprehension mechanism/network of ideas.

THE TRUTH:

SUCCESS in life is the true test

If you don't have what you seek, it's YOU

No one else....YOU

Cheers lads,
-Ravi

SIck coaching calls with the guys today loved it!

Feeling good. Mood is UP!

Content: Building the studio, improving a bit. Bit by bit. A few more steps to go and then we properly focus on content.

Inner work is priority atm.

The DARK SIDE of Being The Nice Guy (The Harsh Truths That Change Men) #masculinity #confidence

We're back, with a NEW FORMAT! We're building the studio, still setting it all up, big improvements to come rest assured.

But we are just levelling up, taking and implementing your feedback, until we WIN.

Passion, drive, and endless push for MASCULINE GREATNESS

Today, a topic we all can relate to, something the guys who are serious all went through, the many deaths we die in this game.....

"To become good in Game, you must kill your inner beta"
-Coach D

Listen to our story, what we went through, and how we changed and found drive to become masculine.


Wisdom from Coach D & Ravi

Please comment, like, and subscribe - we are going to build a true brotherhood and movement.

-Ravi

RANT ENGAGED!

Busy weekend coaching a client, spent 2 days with him to do very deep work on him, and on his business.

We had a blast, and it was a phenomenal experience.

I want to do more of this intensive kind of work.

Tuesday 12th December 2024

(1) Business:
-Block 1: Coaching
-Admin/Study

(2) Body:
-Gym: Push
-Nutrition: Keto

(3) Inner Game:
-The Practice: x 2
-Reading/Watching

Others:
-Life Admin
-Spanish / Guitar
-Cold Thermogenesis, Sperti Red

In this like discovery phase

Getting so many ideas, mind is ablaze with shit, evolving and going through a form of intellectual evolution

Feels like I am going through a stage of reality transmutation from old to new

Super interesting. It's like, I am outside of my body, watching myself, aware of myself in meta.

Pointing out everything going on at multiple levels. Understanding where it came from, and why.

For my own future research & reference:


Some good shit there.

Really focused, and in control. Mind is clear. Low carb (keto) is helping a lot.

Able to focus and control my behaviours, thoughts, well.

Chatted to the parents yesterday. Mum said: "You're happy...?" and looked at me quite surprised.

Yeah. Different energy.

Hardcore Self-Improvement grinding, for years, was not producing a happy human. Neither was it optimal. I'm doing better now. And am on top of my life. Gym, personal development, mindset. Just dialing it all in, focused, and my day is like 10-12hrs of solid, no distraction, monk like focus.

Not stressed anything. Just living.

Very cool.....

Thur 12th 2024

Actions

(1) Business:
-Block 1: Coaching
-Block 2: Mindset
-Block 3: Planning

(2) Body:
-Rest day
-Nutrition
-Cold Thermogenesis (15m), Sperti Red (15m)

(3) Inner Game
-The Practice: 2 x
-Learning & Study

Others:
-CMU Content
-Life Work

Notes:

Will write a report on insights, this weekend.


Love,
-R

I had a very helpful conversation with Rags over the weekend, which helped me come out of my social withdrawal a lot.

I am bad at expressing myself, and over this year, learned that to those who are close to me, seldom do they actually know what is really going on in my life.

Due to this, and social withdrawal, some negative social feedback, and just honestly not having the level of social skills & awareness I'd need to be my full best yet, I recognise I've been making some mistakes and I take full ownership of them.

I was able to understand, that I can serve, and can be effective, and I am sure there is a me who exists in a few months, who is a more harmonious person, who is able to have far better group relational ability.

What helped, was being understood, expressing how I think, feel, and being able to give contextual, full, big picture expression of what I worked on/went through this year, to someone who understands the context well (Rags) and is far more socially adept than myself.
I take ownership of my flaws, and I am working on them.

My needs:

-A core need to serve. A core need to help & produce value. It pains me in the core of my soul that sometimes my current level of communication, prevents me from being the leader I know I can be. I've been a leader in different settings, professionally and in my personal groups, and I have been given good feedback, and people have told me I have added value to their lives. Rags gave me some positive feedback here also and let me know, a trip he went on with another one of our friends, Arcade_Fire, was in part due to my fulfilling my core need of service & adding value. I believe I have added value to others, and for those who have been around me, I believe it was a net-good.

-A core need to solve problems. This one drives me and is something that is extremely important to me as a person. Not being able to work on these problems, and help move them in the right direction, causes me a lot of negative emotions - anger at myself for not being effective at my missions in life, and then, anger at the world and civlisation. I channel my energy of my life into constructive focus and engaging with the issues I care about, in a meaningful way, and taking personal responsibility and ownership - being the change I want to see. Making change. Creating things. Being a man on his purpose.

-A core need to live my values. (A) I must speak my truth and orient others towards the correct pieces of the puzzle, for them to put together themselves. I take great satisfaction that after a long hunt, some people, due to me, were able to find tools that actually helped them, due to my speaking about them, they did their own research, and made progress. I am very proud about this. (B)

I truly despise the problems of loneliness, the incel problem, anxiety, depression, childhood abuse, trauma, health destruction,

I hold some unhealthy hate in my heart against abusive individuals and in part dedicate my brain power and energy to fighting back against them, by creating resources & tools that allow those who seek help, to fight back against those who tread on other human beings. I despise social systems that remove individual agency and autonomy, as well as individuals who impose themselves on others. I recognise my own communication skills and relational ability, and self-awareness, reflection, and ability to express myself, was shut down for a long time due to a bad life (severe mental & physical illness for about 5 years), but having worked on it for years, with full focus, I recognise the progress I've made.

-Safe Space & Community: One person alone, is easy to beat. A community of action takers, is a movement that empowers the individual, with acceptance, and the ability to gain strength through skills, knowledge, and ongoing support, reassurance, and creation of an autonomous individual who is able to be a leader, and live their core values positively. I am really proud that guys from the forums, meet up. I am really proud they had a house together. These things, made me feel really good about the years of posting here and make me proud that I stuck with the project when no one was posting for months and I just powered through and did not give up. Now, a few guys post. I hope I can grow CMU a tonne and bring good guys in, who will add value, and allow us all to thrive and succeed in our lives.

This is VERY IMPORTANT to me as a human being, and a core drive/need I have, and why I at times have felt quite defensive when people have given me negative feedback on the forums. But Rags helped me understand this from the other persons perspective, which helped 95% of my confusion/sense of disconnection go away:

"I must reorganize the environment of man by which then greater numbers of men can prosper." — Bucky Fuller (1965)

I learned a lot from Buckminster Fuller on systems thinking, philosophy of design, and how to fix problems via systems - how to use technologies to support human advancement, and thwart human ill & destruction. Orienting this way, makes logical sense to me, and I can't justify using my time on things which do not add to the net-good.

Which is why I don't watch TV or use social media, other than to express my own ideas.

Some of this, actually comes from the anger I hold at how many issues I had to fix in my life, and how this made my life a lot harder than it needed to be. And yet, this ignited the fire of other-worldly, outlier-level determination, persistence, dedication and just down-right grit. So, I will use those characteristics I developed in life (I built them through intention, repetition, and self-talk over years, convincing myself I can achieve anything I want in my life if I work hard enough at my goals).

I have a lot of areas for development, around social awareness, and inability to understand other human beings. I had a very weird upbringing and had to learn a lot of how top be human. I do also recognise I have a tendency to push others away, when I feel they have not understood me. This at it's root, in my opinion, is happening to me at this time, just due to how complex inner work is. I have about 50,000 different changes going on within myself, and don't have the mental bandwidth to also upgrade my relational ability, empathy, understanding, and frankly, learn how to deal with group & social situations better.

Rags explained a few mistakes I have made, and I understood them. I do not feel shame at making these mistakes, due to me not understanding the situation and how to deal with it in a healthy way, vs how I did it, and the impact this has on others around me.

I take ownership of all my flaws, and live my own core values daily with integrity:

-Commitment & dedication: I do what I say. I said I would focus on inner game this year, so didn't market my business (I made some content when bored but otherwise mostly studied, improved my thinking, and worked hardcore to the bone on myself). I said I would go teetotal, and did it. I said I would rejoin my groups in Jan 1st, and will do it.

I am not perfect, but I try incredibly, incredibly hard to do what I said I will do. That is why many people in my life did trust me. And I did the right thing.

-Community: This is VERY important to me. I am really upset and still grieving about how lonely and isolated I was for years. I suffered a lot as a human being due to this. One of my goals when I started self-improvement was to build a social circle of great, supportive, interesting, vibrant and action-taking, highly aspirational self-improvers. I was able to do this! In addition, I wanted to create communities, where people can come and find deep community and connection.

I have tried so, so, so hard for many years to keep this community going because I believe in community, it helped me massively change as a guy, and I feel shame, guilt, and sadness at my flaws and ways in which I have made social mistakes that may have not served other people here, made them at times feel unwelcome, and there is no excuse for this.

Due to now having been able to get proper feedback, from someone who understood the context, I can see, process, and work on being better.

It is really important for me, as a guy, to be heard, understood, and for myself to express the truth that is in my mind and what I am going through, and this is how I relate to others. If they understand me, it helps me be open and to also understand them, and this allows the relationship to move forward and for me to not be defensive, closed off, and learn the things I need to learn. I recognise I have relational wounds, trust issues, core fears of being seen as a bad human being, among other slightly irrational fears in relation to perception of me.

I cannot tell you how much work I've put into myself this year. Hours, daily. Good lord I can't even summarise it.

I have a way to go.

But, I am progressing, and many of my relationships show green shoots. My brother offered to trim my beard and line it up yesterday, something he's never asked before, because I suppose he never felt comfortable. This, is great!

I take full responsibility for my betterment, and will keep trying daily to be a better person. I feel a lot of guilt and shame at the people I've pushed away over the years. I don't judge myself too harshly because I know how challenging this year was:

-Childhood trauma discovery & various healing crisis / flashbacks
-C-PTSD diagnosis, and ongoing work on healing - has been months since I've had a deep C-PTSD meltdown
-Social withdrawal, due to me becoming overwhelmed by my inner game year and how much time, effort, and sheer freakin elbow grease you have to put into this. My good lord it can be so much.
-Group relational issues: I began to feel as if my friends were not listening to me, didn't understand me as a person, and I really struggled to understand them and relate to them at times also. This meant I was getting shut down internally, and didn't have the self-esteem, self-awareness, or communication skills to express what I needed. Granted, I didn't know what was happening within me, my inner game year was not exactly by choice, it was by necessity....

I have learned, that I do have a deeper need for others to understand me, how I think, how I see things, and have a need for empathy, compassion, and to feel heard.

I can see I can be prickly, thorny, and defensive, when I don't feel I have been understood or listened to.

This, I am working on, by finding healthier ways to relate to others, and learning to communicate, express, and share my own feelings and experience, with others in a constructive manner.

As I am working on this, I want to keep my community project (this forum) going and I think in order to be the best spiritual-servant (my leadership style) I can be, I will make efforts to:

-Not post on the wider forums, apart from the 2 threads I have created where I am able to express my ideas on health, performance, achievement, and human change. I am glad you guys let me post my ideas and share my thoughts, this helps me a lot and has helped me heal a lot as a person. These threads are MAC's Performance Thread & CMU Podcast.

-Not share my opinions/thoughts, in other logs. My relational ability, social processing, and empathy/awareness, as well as communication, deeper social understanding, isn't where it needs to be yet. I am not suggesting I am an utterly hopeless incompetent. I am, however, suggesting that I endeavor to be world class in anything I do. (1) Performance Coaching, (2) Men's Work, (3) Community Development. I do not do any of this, to lose. I do it to be effective in my missions and become a legendary human, who adds real, true value to the world and brighthens the lives of the human animal. I understand this comes from a slightly dark place of a need for "revenge", as an ultimate "fuck you", an ultimate, "I came from hell itself, and still became a good person, I succeeded despite the odds, because I cannot be stopped as a human being". This, is probably not healthy and needs to be processed, healed, and my bad past, could instead be seen as the growth opportunity that created a better human being, who is doing good work in this world and making it better in some small sense. This, is a long, convoluted way of me saying, I see my own flaws and issues, and am working on them, sincerely, and take ownership of this - I will become better, and serve through living my core values.

As you can see, all of this is complex, and hard to work through. I am grappling with a lot. And just need time to reflect and understand myself, far better.

It is best done, in a safe and trusted space, with other humans who I can learn to relate to. This, is likely going to be when I return to my groups, and not on the forums.

I am not ready to be the best leader I can be for the forums yet.

I trust the other mods, and I trust the other guys in the community who are regulars - I will not post on the wider forums, just moderate & make sure no rules being broken.

I am going to post on my threads, and I think as I improve, and my relational ability comes back, and the defensiveness/social fears of rejection I've developed this year go down, I will feel more connected, and better able to come on here and be effective.

That, isn't now. I need to do more inner game work on myself, do more wound reduction (there are 50,000 other things I am working on right now, believe me, my inner world is complex).

I wanted to share this, because I am trying my best to be successful and effective at my missions and core values, but I am also in need of compassion, empathy, and some understanding in the areas I have for development. I am working on myself, and I feel like I am progressing towards becoming the person I want to be, more each month.

Thanks for hearing me out, it really means a lot to me.

-Ravi

Monday 16th December 2024

Actions

-Block 1: Coaching [Done]
-Block 2: Inner Work – Mindset
-Block 3: Inner Work – Mindset
-Block 4: Business – Study Organic Content

Me Time: Self Transcendence
Me Time: Mind Reprogramming

Others:
-Cold Thermogenesis (15m)
-Sperti Red (15m)
-Guitar (45m)
-Spanish (45m)

What's that guitar practice looking like? ;-)