Let me try to clearly define my life, and what I want.
Pause. I start here! This is my journey, I want to change the status quo to three questions, “Who am I?”, “what am I?” and “What is the purpose of my life?”. My life is 100% my responsibility and no one else’s. All three will go together. I want a clear picture of my answers to the questions above. I am creating a change, therefore a clear picture of ‘what’ I want, ‘why’ I want it? and ‘how’ get there from here?
My tools to start the pathless journey to self-discovery:
I want to take all the help I can get from anywhere, but starting from ‘within’. The building blocks of my tools. My biggest friends or enemies:
Genes are basic building blocks of all living things, including me! Genes dictate my behavior and ‘my goals’ are sub goals of gene’s goal. Gene’s goal is “survival and reproduction”. Because I have the cortex ‘thinking brain’. On psychological level Instinct is a strong, automatic and hard-wired behavior shaped by evolution for same goal as of gene’s; survival and reproduction. Instincts always need a trigger from our five senses. Instincts do not need any thinking at all on my part. I can go beyond gene’s basic goals of ‘survival and reproduction’.
Instinct is not the same as skill or habit. But it is possible to go through intense training so that some responses may become automatic or ‘instinctive’.
Drive is self-motivation; ability coupled with ambition while instinct is a natural or inherent impulse or behavior. My top ten drives (everyone has these): To live a charged life these drives influence how we I think, feel, and act. Five baseline drives: Control, Competence, Congruence, Caring, and Connection. These are baseline drives for my inner self, because only I can tell whether or not I am meeting or exceeding my standards.
- Control: To achieve the right ‘control’ balance over my workflow, I keep positive activities with friends, adopt an optimistic mindset and add new things to my daily life. My approach is inside out not outside (other people’s agendas) in.
- Competence: My competence will come from learning and practice. I regularly assess and focus on my required learning. Get relevant coaching and then integrate new learning into it.
- Congruence: Is my ‘thinking’ and ‘behavior’ is same as my self-image? It is important for us to create a unifying self-image aligned to internal measures of worth. Nurture a positive mood and dispel negative media and people, helps in getting into positive self-image.
- Caring: My focus is on caregiving for myself and everyone I meet. By the same token I appreciate the thoughts and gestures of others.
- Connection: My drive to connect with people is naturally strong, I don’t have to work on this. I am constantly looking for “growth” friends who can bring out the best in me.
Five forward drives help me look to the future and fulfill my dreams: Change, Challenge, Creative Expression, Contribution and Consciousness.
6.Change: My drive to change is continual desire for newness and excitement. Positive change, help me to master my fate. I don’t have a fear of change, but for a new change to make part of ‘me’ I get clear, think big, bold and make real choices.
7. Challenge: Challenge thinking about my thinking drive stretches my self-concept, skills, beliefs and mental or physical capacities.
8.Creative Expression: This is how I showcase my creative expression from my work. My unique and individual talents, strengths and perspectives are areas of creative expression. I study people, things, music, art, phenomenon and designs around me.
9. Contribution: I have to work on this drive, “Where can I make a difference” and ” what legacy I can pass”. How can I share my gifts and abilities? How do I find opportunities for creative expression, mentoring others, and the direct social impact of my actions?
10.Consciousness: I want to live big, therefore with this drive I go for greater thought and transcendent consciousness. Consciousness is the experience of a feeling. I try to focus my consciousness on my thoughts, deeds, and others around. I can transcend consciousness by being in the present, mindful of coincidences and intuition. This is the point where I can see I am not my brain. I am not my mind. I am other than these two.
Need is a requirement of some material such as air, water, food and shelter; essential for survival. When I have a need, it leads to psychological tension that motivates me to act and take care of the ‘need’.
Intuition: compared to instinct is a feeling of knowing without conscious thinking. Intuition is a judgment or evaluation about something, but I cannot tell why and how I reached that conclusion. It just feels right. Examples: Getting good or bad vibes from people, getting an insight, a gut feeling about something.
Stimuli: The information I get from my five senses is called stimuli in fancy psychological terminology. My brain is bombarded with tons of data from my environment (the world) and my senses and I try to make sense of it, and do something (my behavior or actions) about it, in response. I have to fine tune and refine my sense making faculty to take my responses to the next level. I use my mind’s three-layered tools Instinct, intuition, and rationality to work on demystifying the stimuli. I always give a brief pause before making any sense of Stimuli, so that I do not reach to wrong ‘understating’. Instinct at the bottom, then intuition and rationality at the top. I always start with then instincts and intuition, keep their ‘suggestion’ under advisement but, at my final decision-making mechanisms is ‘rationality’ aka the thinking brain.
Decision making: Instinct can save me in a life-and-death situation. Intuition is great when you’re wondering whether you should get into a relationship with someone. If they give you good vibes, why not give it a try.