Mood Follows Action

Mood follows action. Or behaviour first - Thoughts and feelings second.

Scientifically proven.

I am not criticising thought. Of course I am not. Don’t be a silly sausage! And I shall not go into it here, my thoughts on how thoughts can encourage action. The focus for me today, and moving forward, is to hone in on this idea of too much debilitating deliberation and rumination, and not enough action. A little less conversation please :stuck_out_tongue: - Elvis Presley

I think too much, when very nearly always, I need to just do.

Andrew Huberman, the neuroscientist, talks a lot about this, if anyone is interested on listening, watching more.

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Rumination can often be linked to anxiety… maybe there is anxiety at play that is holding you back from “doing”?
If we start by creating small achievable goals or tasks, we can become encouraged with the satisfaction it brings. Applying positive thoughts to completing these tasks also helps.
Interesting article :ok_hand:

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There is certainly an anxiety. There is a fear of success. I fear giving myself joy, peace, happiness, success. All of these kinds of things. To me its clear that I feel like I don’t deserve this.

People often - i think - quote ‘fear of failure’ as something that holds them back. But i don’t think this helps the matter. If someone can see that it’s a fear of success, then maybe they can see it’s because they don’t feel deserved, like i don’t. And with that, perhaps I and those people cana work on self-esteem, and also on acceptance of the past, whilst also working on understanding that we DO deserve as much joy, peace, and success, as we can give ourselves.

Similarly, creating small achievable tasks and goals is really quite key for me also.I tend to create big grand goals. I am trying to make up for lost time (so to speak), and I want to run before I can walk. When I Do want to hit, I want to hit big, to knock out my opinion of myself in relation to my past. I create goals that are most likely always not going to be reached, and as you allude to, this can make you feel like a failure and inadequate. Because at this early stage, it can be too tough to deal with failure. It can be learned how to deal with that, later down the line, after repeated ‘hitting small goals’, raising the self esteem. I guess confidence in yourself can then help you stand up after failure of missing a big goal, and realise that these mistakes can help us. So later on, it’s maybe not such a bad idea to create some ambitious goals, but only when the time is right, and after you get out the rut that holds you away from achieving even the smaller goals.

For example, if you don’t have the motivation to brush your teeth in the morning, don’t book yourself to do a marathon. That is extreme. But for me, I need to add tasks and goals incrementally. That is my plan. When in a rational state, I will create achievable goals as i go through my days, smashing through without rumination or much deliberation. The very fact that I am ‘doing’, or ‘trying to do’, means more than meeting the goals, right now. To see that effort in yourself, i think is massive! I think it’s almost the first step to a long rewarding journey, for people like myself.

Thanks for commenting Becsta. I am pleased to have heard from someone. And especially you : )

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Ahhh, I am a very impatient person and struggle with achieving things that take time, because I want them now, today lol. In the past, it typically resulted in me giving up and walking away :woman_facepalming:(an example-why I primarily withdrew from 3 separate degrees after completing the first year of each, urgh!)

But I am learning to break the end goal down into smaller more manageable pieces as it encourages and inspires me.
I think I lack alot of confidence but by ticking off the smaller goals, self belief starts to become restored.

Recently, I actually started working on a vision board - with short, medium and long term goals, I’m hoping this will help me stay better focused.

I can also relate to those thoughts of not feeling deserving of success… I don’t believe I am a bad person but like you say, I have trouble accepting certain aspects of my past and the role I played in that… do I have a fear of failure? No, to be honest I’m kind of used to things turning to shit. Fear of success? Hell yes, because I’m still working on accepting that I deserve happiness.

But in truth, we are not our past!
And everyone, I mean everyone deserves to have joy, peace, happiness and success. Even you. Even me. You matter and you are worthy.

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Move a muscle, change a thought, is a classic AA-ism. I like that it is move A muscle. A little action can get the ball rolling in the right direction.

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Thank you for your post.
I don’t think your example is extreme, i think it is right on spot.
Sometime I keep thinking about the best routine I could be following, what the principles I want to live by, how better could I make my schedule or just be a better person; but while I search for those things that I want to have and become, most of the time I am passive. I fantasize about finding the way to obtain what I am searching for without actually trying that much.

Of course I am being hard on myself right now, because it’s not true that I do nothing - I do work hard. But I do recognize myself into what you’re proposing here : do not book yourself for a marathon when you’re not actually doing some work for this or at least having a basis in your day to day life. I often work for something in the future while neglecting my needs of the moment. Therefore it leads me to feel like crap a lot.

Yesterday I was actually watching the last podcast of Rich Roll with Steve Magness about his new book “Do hard things”. It’s funny because, I was watching this, again, trying to find a new way to organize my routine or to focus on a goal, while I was feeling crap and eating chips. (Side note, I am ok with that, because I had a night bus from NY and Montreal after a couple of days of work, so now I recognize it was ok to just chill. But on that moment I felt some kind of guilt, because laying down on the couch & do nothing for me is really related to my drinking days.) So anyway, at some point by the end of the pod, they say something like : doing the hard thing isn’t following a strict plan or perfect actions. Doing the hard things is actually doing the more nuance work of listening to our body & create space to respond vs react.

For me, ruminating & overthinking or just not taking action is a reaction to my feelings. Fear of failure, getting in the loop of guilt of feeling any sort of bad feeling, etc etc. Then my pattern is to look for a solution in the future instead of the here & now. Sometimes it makes me feel better to do that (like yesterday when I watched that pod), but most of the time I am wasting my time & later on I feel guilty of it.

Solution is to try & do something small.
A good transition for me, from thinking to action, is handwriting. It’s not too hard of a jump like going from couch thinking to running, but it get my mind focus on one thing and makes me moves a little bit (engaging my body with handwriting & sitting at my desk). Where I struggle is the days when even that little leap of faith into the smallest action seems too much & I let my overthinking/feeling takes the leads. This is when I react instead of respond & end up my day feeling ashamed.

I guess we know how to break our vicious circles. It is just uncomfortable and tough. That is the hard work: doing the small thing for ourselves; not sign in for a marathon when we can’t even do what’s right for us in the here & now.

Thanks for sharing and wish you well,

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I wanted to do a marathon, but knew it wasn’t enough to just have that as the goal to be focusing on. It was too overhwhelming (perhaps like staring down the barrel of a 3 year degree course? Which I am currently on right now, so I feel you).

So I broke that marathon goal down into much smaller goals that were all leading up to doing the marathon. So when I set out, I devoted my focus only to that first goal, which was to run 5km without stopping. I thought I could do this with dedication. It seemed ambitious but manageable. It seemed within the expectation of myself, just. I did the 5km, and then I focused on the 10km, and then half marathon, and then marathon. I did each step using an app that helped me out with the routine for each distance. Focusing on the marathon the whole time, would have made me feel so far removed from the success I wanted. I didn’t believe at all that I could do it, so I built a ladder to it.

Blah blah blah, aren’t I amazing!? Haha. Just kidding. But just wanted to share with you my understanding. I have got this down quite well with running but I have found it hard to adapt it to other facets of my life, but im working on it.

Thank you for reminding me that I matter and I am worthy. That’s why I am just about coming back each day with at least one message in the morning. Cos I leave feeling a little better than when I came.

Thanks to you and all.

x

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I didn’t know about this. I think it’s great! Thank you for sharing because i think i like that phrase just as much as the name of this post. Especially because it insinuates it only can take the move of ONE muscle.

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“Doing the hard things is actually doing the more nuance work of listening to our body & create space to respond vs react.”

This is perfect isn’t it? I mean it takes into consideration more, the idea of living more in the moment, taking care of each next decision, and continuing to make sure that our environment and atmosphere. We put ourselves in, is sufficiently fertile enough to help us grow.

You mention the ‘perfect actions’. We judge ourselves massively eh? Trying to make up ‘quick step’ for the past, and how we feel about ourselves today? It has to be perfect, because we have wasted enough time. It has to be perfect because if its not, then we can find space to judge, and if you give me an inch to judge myself, I will take a mile to judge myself.

Can we please just accept, and not judge ourselves? Can we just ‘be’ and trust our intent. Paradoxically, I think it’s the trying too hard that makes us come undone. Like everything, it all comes down to balance eh? Trying in moderation. I could talk forever on this subject. I have ruminated and ruminated and made mistakes, and took valuable lessons from them, and then failed again because I tried too hard once again. Maybe concentrating too much on mistakes and learning. It tires you out eh? I have felt consumed by the past at times. But I MUST compose and control the chimp in me that wants to be free. He is a cheeky little chimp that can cause just as much unhappiness as when he used to help me drink. I have taught him some morals , values and beliefs but I need to keep an eye on this mischevious thing.

I think I am digressing. Pardon me. I can get lost in silly analogies. Ha

I love Rich Roll by the way. He inspired me to run.

I hear all of your frustrations and I relate with them all! When you start a project or any job, do you think that your subconcious is telling you that you don’t deserve the joy that comes from such a process. Of giving you joy? Of taking a step for good?

What would you do with your handwriting. Like journaling perhaps? Is there something you have always wanted to try? Sorry to sound condescending. I am just being inquisitive. I have sooo many things I wanna do, now that I am ‘capable’. Controlling myself and concentrating on one thing at a time, I think will help me. I never finish jobs.

A friend of mine asked me to make a music video for one of his songs, two years ago. I haven’t started it, and the deadline is end of June. This is my one and only focus in my any spare time, for the next two weeks. I am going to trial, only focusing on this and trying hard not to do that dreaded thing ‘think!’ (too much). Apparently, we only need to do 5% of the thinking that we do. I have just made that statistic up, but I think you get my idea.

I crave ‘flow’. Auto pilot. Stress is a killer man. We gotta fight it, simply.

Thank you to you, also, for sharing

Be well x

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Here’s some reflections I had after reading your message:

If we try to finish a project in which we don’t have joy or fun anymore, why would we continue it ? I’m obviously not talking about stuff in which we engaged ourselves with other, but with “all the things” we think we “should” do.

Now sober and “capable”, we can do a bunch of stuff. But the real & hard process after that realization is grieving… Grief that we’re limited & will not be able to do everything. This is some hard-metal stuff that I am working ob these days. After almost two years sober & I am just starting to realize that I do not “fail” to complete the projects I start because of booze, but because I am human & tend to plan like I am a superhuman.

I feel like getting sober makes us feel part vulnerable as much as it makes us feel some kind of superhuman. Vulnerable in the realization of our disease & powerlessness under it; superhuman in the realization in all the capabilities & possibilities we now have since we ditch alcohol from our lives. But at some point we come to realize that we still have limits, like everyone else, & we have to choose …

I seems to be a lot like you in the thinking process of stuff : overthink & planing, procrastinating years for stuff, etc. It’s hard to slow down the monkey and not reacting to his wants. I guess these days humility is a big thing I am working on.

Courage & humility. It takes courages to give ourselves into some sort of project, knowing we’re renouncing to something else. It then takes humility to accept that very fact & still keep going.

There’s a quote I red yesterday from Ryan Holyday and it seems appropriate with what I am talking about : “ You don’t have to be anywhere. You don’t have to do anything. All that pressure is in your head. It’s all made up.” That really hits home when I red it.

Anyways, that’s what your message made me reflect on this morning.
Thanks again & Wish you well,

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You plan like you are superhuman perhaps, but also because you are being too hard on yourself. You feel you need to achieve, and achieve, and achieve, to be enough. To be satisfactory. Because you maybe feel inadequate.

Or at least that’s what I came to realise.

I am now meditating on the fact that I should feel enough, and that I have enough. I know that this will end this tiring pursuit. The way I will do it, will not make me stand still, but it will just not make me feel so damn inadequate.

I will still put projects In front of me, because I have ambitions, but it wonn’t be to make up for ‘lost time’ or to make me enough. It will be to have fun and to see how I can evolve myself in neat ways.

I don’t wanna do it, cos I feel I have to do it. That’s where it becomes not fun and quite destructive.

Great point with the idea of how sobriety makes us feel superhuman. We have gone from being unable to feeling like we are able, in a very short time, and in a very unique way.

Just a few things in response to your message. I very much wish you well & has been great to meet you. I am sure to, and hope to see you again on here and bump into you in the near future.

Good luck with your projects.

One at a time, perhaps :stuck_out_tongue:

May you navigate them well

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