You vs You
When trying to improve ourselves in any way, it’s common to get stuck with the wrong mindset along the way.
We all need a push, we all need something to overcome, and if you don’t already have enough fuel on the fire, sometimes we can try to find that fuel elsewhere.
Potentially coming from films, when the main character has to overcome an enemy to win, we always tend to find an enemy of our own.
This enemy, however, can often be the wrong kind, and although it acts as a highly flammable substance, it can end up burning us too.
Common damaging fuels include comparing ourselves to someone else, proving others wrong, like our parents, or an old peer who made the wrong comment, and desperately seeking external validation.
The truth is, we already have all the fuel we need; it lives within us, it is us.
The Internal Battles
As human beings with a consciousness and emotions, doing anything in life can be extremely difficult.
Overcoming your self-doubt, building confidence, dealing with change and the unknown, fighting laziness and procrastination, and handling loneliness and rejection.
You already have enough internal demons to overcome, you’ll always have a potential future version of yourself that’s better than the current version. Why fight anyone else when you can have an eternal battle with yourself?
You’ll always have something to overcome, often it’s the same problems as always, just bigger than before, because you’re better than before.
You can blame and fight external things and people all you want, but the truth is, the only one capable of stopping you is you, and the only one responsible for ensuring success is you.
The only person worth being better than is you yesterday; there is no greater feeling than looking back at a previous version of yourself and reflecting on how much better you've become.
So choose you, fight yourself.
Winning the Battle
You may be wondering, what exactly does fighting yourself look like?
Well, for this, you’re going to need to become very introspective. You’ll have to know yourself better than ever before, from your deepest desires to your biggest fears.
Truly knowing yourself can help when navigating self-improvement; it’ll aid in filling in the gaps between your emotions and behaviours.
For this, journaling can be extremely beneficial; jotting down your thoughts and feelings on a consistent basis can help you identify patterns and behaviours, creating a window that you otherwise wouldn’t be able to see.
Another thing that can help fight the battle is to master the art of self-discipline.
There will always be a version of yourself that seeks comfort and warmth, that chooses easy over hard and chooses sleep over anything else. It’s your job to continuously conquer this version of you.
Essentially, you need to put yourself in situations where this version of you arises, and then actively do the very opposite of what it wants.
By doing this, you’re building a muscle, a muscle that will allow you to face fears and thrive in discomfort.
When you're staring into the water of the cold plunge with thoughts that are trying to convince you out of it, that’s when you get in.
When you wake up for your morning run with thoughts that tell you that one day off won’t hurt, that’s when you get up.
This is how you build that muscle, and you’ll be thankful you did the next time you have an important interview or a difficult conversation.
Building this muscle is how you slowly win the battle against yourself, it’ll allow you to do what needs doing instead of what you feel like doing, which is often the worst thing for you.
Meditation is another effective tool for this battle, just like journaling, it opens a window. But if journaling opens a window, meditating opens a door.
Sitting quietly with nothing but your thoughts as company is an uncomfortable thought for most people, but that’s exactly why it should be done.
Most of what we think and feel during the day comes from our subconscious, and most of it is negative, and most of it is repetitive. This means that we’re the cause of most of our daily suffering.
What meditation will do is allow you to observe exactly what pops up, giving you insight into the inner workings of your mind. This, in turn, gives you another opportunity to win a small battle.
Usually, during the day, this same thought may pop up and spark a whole day of frustration or anger or regret, without you ever noticing. But when they pop up during mediation, you have the chance to fully control your reaction.
Winning these small battles will slowly defeat that thought, it’ll diminish the subconscious beliefs surrounding that thought.
Essentially, if you no longer carry any emotions connected with a specific thought, your subconscious mind will no longer replay it. And it’s your job to remove that emotion.
So, from here, stop fighting other people and things, and instead fight yourself. Do so by taking note of your thoughts and behaviours, stop letting the inner bitch win and sit in silence with nothing but your thoughts every day. Good luck.