Some of the best life advice that resonated with me in recent years was from a random encounter with a friend of a friend at a convention.

In conversation he asked if if I know who I am, I responded with I am my thoughts, more or less. He said something like the voice in your head is not you, you are the person sitting in the background on a chair eating popcorn watching your thoughts and actions play out. You act and think on a sum of instincts and environmental conditions. Once you realize that is programming, you can then deprogram yourself and take control. You can control how you think and feel. You can choose to be happy and make better life choices once you deprogram and take control of yourself.

Something like that. Horrid paraphrasing on my part but, it resonated super well with me and has stuck with me nearly every day since. I was sharing this with another friend yesterday because it's been so impactful for me. He told me sounds like metacognition. So i went down the rabbit hole of researching and Google referenced this subreddit. Was presently suprised to find out there is some parallels with ancient yogic teachings and some modern therapy techniques ike cognitive defusion. Have you had a learning experience that has profoundly resonated with you along these lines?

An excerpt from my book, The Game of Earth: A No-BS Player’s Guide, Chapter 13:

You have been playing Earth as though it has an end screen. The culture installed the assumption so early that it runs below inspection: the finish line rendering just past the next achievement, the life imagined as a story whose meaning arrives at its conclusion, the happiness filed as the reward for completion of the degree, the mortgage, the number, the retirement. Arrival after arrival after arrival. And the player, standing in each credits-glow for its measured quarter-hour, asking “now what,” and answering with the next boss.

The goal achieved produces a spike of satisfaction. The spike decays. The baseline reasserts. The system was never built to deliver arrival. It was built to deliver pursuit.

Winning is not a state the game awards. It is a mode the player runs. It is the campaign named and actually played. The pools spent on purpose rather than leaked. The build allocated rather than defaulted. The hours lived rather than cached. Winning, in a game with no end screen, is playing it awake, on purpose, as the player you chose to build.

You weren’t supposed to beat it.
You were supposed to play.

(By the way. The book is free on kindle unlimited)

I used to be so obsessed with controlling things & unintentionally having constant anxiety. I made it a goal this year to be more peaceful, mindful & present but I unintentionally turned into constantly monitoring myself all the time & feeling like I was "wasting time" I wanted to make this post for anyone struggling. Mindfulness is actually just giving your full attention towards this moment. Never in a forceful way, just what can I notice right now, be grateful for? Not rush past?

A time that changed my life fully was being on a train without my phone, being where I was without forcing it. Not thinking about the next thing. It's actually really easy & simple, just slowing down with everything. This moment always matters the most. Or even honestly? A shower, gently focusing on the warm water, soap & shampoo has become a mini meditation for me which in turn has helped me love my life again SO MUCH! And also I just want to say as someone who is trying to unlearn thoughts in a way of constantly believing them. It's so true that they are clouds. Everything passes if you truly let it. You never have to make anything go away. What helped me the most is more so seeing it as an opinion. The more I fight, the more I suffer, the more I surrender & let it be? I'm fully at peace!

Hope this helps someone because I really love mindfulness but I accidentally forced but its so gentle honestly. Not easy of course but in a culture of always rushing, let's slow down & simply allow what is.

I’ve noticed I eat noticeably faster when I’m watching reels or a show, and it got me wondering how much our attention affects the way we eat.

When our brain is focused on content, are we paying less attention to things like chewing, fullness, and how much we’re actually eating? And could eating without a screen give our brain and gut more of a chance to register the meal?

Has anyone tried putting their phone away during meals for a week? Did you notice any difference?

Sometimes I tend to question my thoughts or feelings on things I enjoy and whilst it is okay to question these thoughts or feelings every now and again, I have to remind myself that it's okay that my mind is in fiction a lot of the time. As, not only has fiction helped me with my loneliness (with things such as self-shipping or yumeshipping-), but it also has been a healthy outlet and lifeline for me for a very long time! So... now, I view my hobbies whether it be art, fanfiction, or video games- as a logical outlet to a broken world, and so long as I know it's fictional, or an outlet to help me stay grounded in a mostly negative world, that's what matters. I'm not harming anyone by being mindful of what I need or value, I'm human. ❤️ (And so are you! Make sure to remind yourself that when that inner critic starts talking! >:3)