RULE NUMBER FIVE: THE MIND IS AN ASSHOLE

I think everyone knows this, but I felt like talking about it anyway. 

We have all experienced this over and over: the mind has the power to throw your entire life out of balance in just a few seconds. I can actually list out 20 things our minds do to us that annoy the living daylights out of ourselves.

The mind... 

1.       Keeps you awake when you’re sleepy

2.       Makes you sleepy when you should be awake (like at every client meeting)

3.       Makes you stupid when you should be smart (with the "love of your life", meeting the CEO of the company you work for, or when you're at your University interview)

4.       Makes you act smart when you should shut up

5.       Makes you lie

6.       Makes you tell the truth when you should lie (personally hate this one, I've become a terrible liar and I just don't try anymore) 

7.       Tells you that you should be doing one thing instead of the other but will make you do that one thing anyway

8.       Makes you complain in points on a blogpost

9.       Makes you retardedly uncoordinated when your extremely graceful significant other is sipping wine and staring at you

10.   Makes you want to get absolutely wasted the night before a meeting because it knows you actually really just want to be late and sleep through the whole thing anyway

Okay 20 is a bit much and I really believe you’ll stop reading if I go on, so I’m going to make my point now:

Even though the mind fucks around so much, it is the only part of you that has the strength to rectify whatever is going wrong. It is powerful enough to sleep when it should, eat when it should, understand what’s healthy and what’s not (physically, emotionally and psychologically), and it’s also the part of you that’s behind all the good and positive decisions you’ve made. And the best part is, if you just get to know your own mind, you'll be a lot happier speaking it!

So is it really an asshole? Um. YES. I think we can all be assholes sometimes, and our minds are behind that for sure, so it is very capable of messing with you. But is it an unbeatable asshole? No. No asshole is unbeatable and that's something I've learnt from comic books and video games - the good may get stupidly fucked up, but the villains get pretty mauled and desecrated eventually too. I mean, even in Mortal Kombat, the makers of the game allow you to perform Babalities/Fatalities/Brutalities on the boss characters Shao Kahn, Shang Tsung, Goro, Kintaro (and sometimes Motaro depending on the version you’re playing) mostly for fun, but I think it lends a parallel to beating something that seems really big and huge and difficult (or just spammy and irritating). So pick your end game combo, and when your brain acts up or is just being totally not cool, I say to you…

Okay no, don’t go to war with yourself. Just trust yourself - trust your knowledge of what’s good for you, and you’ll be fine.

RULE NUMBER SEVENTEEN: YOU FIRST

No, I don't mean letting someone else go first. In fact, I mean exactly the opposite, and in this post I've used a little gamer-behavior and a lot of spilling-my-heart-out to explain the importance of RULE NUMBER SEVENTEEN: YOU FIRST.

After much introspection and a lot of guidance, I've found that feelings and emotions don't always stem from anything anyone else has said or done, but the things that I say to myself. It's what I think about their words or actions that makes me react, and in turn makes an impact on the way I behave in similar situations. I do think we all are this way.

I'm not going to get into how to understand it or how the mind works - that's one journey we must take individually, because it's always beautiful to discover yourself as a person.
But my post is about this one thing we all must do - PUT YOURSELF FIRST.

It's not just about big, life changing situations. It's also about the smaller things - do you really want to go to that party? Are you too tired to be on the phone? Friend not letting you leave even though you're feeling unwell or just out of it? Sometimes we give in to make our family and friends smile. But sometimes we're hurting ourselves by not admitting what we really want/need/are not getting. I've found that it's not easy to tell others exactly how you feel and how strongly you feel it, but there's always somewhere to start!

1. Be honest with yourself - it is the key to keeping your mind at peace. Once you can share with yourself what you need and want, you will care for yourself and trust yourself more.
2. Trust yourself, and you will be honest with others because only you know what you need and only you can tell someone else so they understand. Honesty will allow others to trust you and care about you as well (they will know you can handle yourself), or at least show how they think and feel too. This is important so you can accept the way you are, the way someone else is and the fact that you may be very different from each other.
3. This acceptance and understanding will make the bonds in any relationship stronger, or show you that a person may not be the best companion for you. Most of all, it will strengthen the bond you share with yourself and then only happiness can follow.

It is a lifelong journey to be in touch with yourself, because things are always changing. It makes positivity a very important part of the process (and no, not the "Oh everything is fine and I'll just keep smiling and looking at unicorns and cats on the internet to fool myself and ignore my problems" kind of positivity) because we don't always enjoy change and ignoring it can make things worse with time. Change means not knowing what's next, and the mind doesn't enjoy the unknown very much no matter how equipped we are to deal with it.
Well, here's one way to understand and tap into a consistent kind of positivity - the kind that drives us to keep playing our favourite games!

It's pretty much like playing a new version of an old game series - you're not really super-pro at it first because you're used to a certan set of controls and they've changed a few things around. But that doesn't stop you. You keep playing till you learn the controls, beat the bosses, win online multiplayer challenges and then eventually move on to the next version, or even another game where the controls are completely different and zombies are attacking you while you're in the middle of war, instead of unlocking that Lambo after 5 egoistic guys in vests challenged you to the next race.

So yes, life is but a game, and we are merely its players... using our own consoles upon this massive network set to permanent multipayer mode with occasional boss battles and constant Level Ups till it's Game Over. Or something like that!

Now that I have written all this out, my mind wants to change the whole thing and explain this to you with a better, more "relevant" example that everyone will understand. But I trust myself, and I have been honest with you, so I will keep it this way and trust you to tell me what you think!

Hope you've had a good read. I've definitely had a good write!