I decided to carry on a new experiment, one smaller than usual, but a challenging test, seeking discomfort and finding comfort on it. It was dancing with the most significant discomfort and inconvenience I could find and face it, even beyond; it was about getting rid of my defenses and my mental strength. How? By forcing me to go to bed late and get up very late, because I knew that would destabilise me and put me in despair. And by doing so would be much more likely to feel disturbed and susceptible to any daily situation or person with whom I interacted.
So I set up myself for a 7-day experiment to destabilise my holistic high-performance routine, super-habits, ultra-productivity.
The goal: seeking discomfort, finding myself unbalanced, and being the most awkward place possible.
Waking-up
These were the times when I got out of bed every day:
- 11:30 am. on Tuesday, 24/02.
- 12:30 pm on Wednesday, 25/02.
- 12:50 pm on Thursday, 26/02.
- 1:10 pm on Friday, 27/02.
- 12:50 pm on Saturday, 28/02.
- 1:30 pm Sunday, 29/02.
- 2:10 pm on Monday, 01/03.
Sleeping
Here are the times I turned off and went to sleep:
- 02:20 am on Wednesday, 02/25.
- 02:15 am on Thursday, 26/02.
- 01:50 am on Friday, 27/02.
- 02:10 am on Saturday, 28/02.
- 02:33 am on Sunday, 29/02.
- 01:44 am on Monday, 01/03.
- 02:30 am on Tuesday, 02/03.
How to handle what you don’t know how to handle: by seeking discomfort
What happened when I changed an essential part of my lifestyle? Well, what happened that I was late, that I didn’t have time, that I was already behind, that I was losing. It was constant self-sabotage, especially at first. Although that was what I expected and wanted to happen because only if I could, I could then evolve and overcome a situation that would one day happen fortuitously. Seeking discomfort was vital for being more self-aware about how I was sabotaging myself.
During the first three days, there was no way to clarify until the shocks like this were seen, they wrote the night before, they had to do the same day I published them, which caused me to stop publishing between 9- 9:30 a.m. My ultra-productivity index falls below 20%. I lost my focus, zero mental clarity, emotionally stunned, zero motivated.
Getting out of bed seemed like torture to me, I woke up almost stressed, there were days that I didn’t even do The Great Tomorrow, mainly due to the pressure of 2 or 3 pm, imagine, I also stopped meditating on day two and three. I was where I wanted, deranged, destabilized, dominated by time, my emotions, by my thoughts. He was anything but a stoic; he was an easily manageable puppet—bad mood, insecurity, stress, frustration, tension, a show.
To win, stay at the bottom
That’s when I decided to continue, later increase the time I went to sleep, and the time I woke up, or this ended everything that had taken a lifetime to build, or I ended up mastering it. Fire is fought with more flames.
In effect, I began to become more aware, to accept the hour that I woke up and what happened, I began to observe how my mind boycotted me, the story that it told me to despair. When you become the observer nothing affects you because it does not go with you, you are the third person, so decide not to look at the clock, imagine that it was 6 am and not 14:40. I relaxed my to-do list, cut 80% of external communication that will keep a journal.
Retrain your beliefs and give them the fear they seek to flee
The big problem was thinking about the time and feel that it was “late” (a damn label) and changing to “it’s only 4 pm”, at which point my workday begins. And from there, I retrained myself at every moment to rename those kinds of (limiting) categories and beliefs that block and knock us out.
Change “I’m late” to “I’m going at the rate I can go.”
“I can’t do this” with “has appeared on my way, interesting.”
“It surpasses me” for “what a good challenge to learn.”
“I am not ultra-productive” by “I am in the middle of something that will propel my method.”
And I started to win the day as if I had got up at 5 am and I went to bed at 9 pm.
Despair is a good place to overcome anything.
Change the story, and the story will change
What happened? That changing the story, you tell changes the narrative you live; it’s that simple. If your tale is a fatal tale, guess what will happen, and what if it is a magical tale?
Another advantage was being able to face something I hated to do and repeat it every day as much as I hated it, to make me insensitive to that feeling, and guess what, it was. High overexposure to overwhelming stimuli, carried out with awareness, consistency, perseverance, and self-discipline, becomes an engine of growth and development.
Looking to be in the most uncomfortable place possible it’s a great advantage because it makes easier being comfortable by seeking discomfort.
Now I master getting up late and going to bed late as if I woke up and went to sleep soon. There is no difference, serenity, that is.