I'm in a bit of a creative slump lately. Not sure what it is. I've had them for years, usually when I'm in the mood to listen and not talk. Then I blast out of them.
I think I'm going to rip out shorter articles for a bit. This will take the pressure off of me.
We all have pet-peeves. Stuff that irritates us.
A big one of mine doing the whole RSD thing over the years has been watching how people often defeat themselves when it comes to "Experiencing Knowledge".
Some background......
One of my big "secrets" to success is that I continually surround myself with the right books/DVDs/influences, etc...
I do this every single day because it continually "re-aligns" my brain with the phenomenon that people in eastern philosophy would call PRESENCE.
"Presence" is another word for "being in the moment". It's the state of mind that "alphamales" (as community-heads would call it) usually experience.
Basically it means that you're not caught up in all the bullshit and nonsense that most people in the world are. You're experiencing life directly which allows you to act with strength and unity of thought.
See, most people are so caught up in limiting beliefs / fear of failure / ego fulfillment that they can't get out of their heads long enough to see the path directly ahead.
It's like they're surrounded by a cloud. Life is actually REALLY EASY if you can see past it.
Keeping the cloud away is like a constant struggle, however.
Some people say that "presence is just a shift in understanding" and I agree with this...... but I *also* believe that REMEMBERING to remember this is a ongoing challenge as well.
I'm a lucky guy. People try to help me all the time. A lot of big shots, rich people, popular folks, etc etc... It seems to increase every year.
I think they offer me this value because I've taught myself not to objectify people in terms of status. Unlike many people who prod them for "secret tips" to enhance themselves, I "get it" that the best way to learn is just to EXPERIENCE them.
It's really just a much more fun, laid back way to hang out with eachother... no??
Obviously it takes a while for this to really "click" (it did for me...), but really it's just common sense.
If you hang out with a go-getter like, say, Anthony Robbins for a day... you can PROBABLY figure out how he'd deal with your situation. That's because when you FEEL the way that HE FEELS in his body, the types of solutions he'd come up with are usually presented to you.
Why??
"Presence" is contagious.
When you hang out with people who have their heads screwed on right, you come back feeling re-vitalized. All the noise and crap that the rest of society seems to inadvertently instill into you is washed to the side. The "way forward" suddenly reveals itself without much effort.
You also get it from books and writing in general. When you read something that's written from a "place of presence" it's always coming through.
Humanity does this collectively, too.
I get "presence" from books by guys like Marcus Aurellius that were written thousands of years ago, and I try to offer it to the people around me, and it gets "paid forward" on an ongoing basis.
We all have the job of keeping that "frequency" in our minds tuned into the right channel, and coming together to fuel it into a raging fucking inferno.
Alright so what's my pet-peeve then??
It drives me nuts seeing guys defeat themselves by coming at knowledge from the stereotypically American "ego-enhancement" angle.
What are the symptoms??
1- Striving to "cross it off the tick list" and say you've read/watched it, both to yourself and others.
2- Looking for that "ONE TIP" or "ONE MAGIC PILL" that will make you feel "enhanced" or "fix" everything for you.
3- Trying to find "permanence" in getting everything handled because the thought of day-to-day upkeep is too scary.
4- Interpreting/judging/comparing/labelling it relative to something else you've been through, or trying to conform it to your pre-existing system of beliefs.
5- Approaching self-development as a math or science "problem" instead of as an artform.
All of these are typical, and all just are just blatantly counter-productive.
I've seen countless guys who have a million dollars worth of direction and momentum laid out right at their feet...... and they're just oblivious because they're too caught up in holding onto their existing belief-systems or looking for that "magic tip".
It's like "This isn't as good as x,y,z... And I didn't get that NEW TIP I was looking for that would have allowed me to circumvent being a big dork without having to really change..."
You see this in the community in full-effect with guys who just need to "burn through" every single dating product they can get their hands on.
Later you ask them what they learned from each piece, and they might be able to remember like ONE OR TWO bits out of an entire book or program.
This isn't even a memory thing, either. It's in their overall process.
They're looking, looking, looking for that one super-tip that will change the whole game for them, and in the meantime they're failing to EXPERIENCE what they're actually being offered.
Essentially their unconscious strategy is to be able to say "I've read/watched all this stuff that the other guys in this place haven't......" as a way of rationalizing confidence, instead of getting to the ROOT of confidence itself.
I mean, look, I personally have a huge list of books and programs I want to go through just like everybody else.
I'll look at the rack on the book shelf and just want to buy ALL OF THEM......... frothing at the mouth at how cooooool I'm going to be once I've read them all.
The thing is.... over the years I've learned not to RUSH these things because that's not what it's all about.
That "one tip" I'm going to get isn't what's at stake here. It's the overall "re-aligning" from day to day.
Sure, an integral part of the experience is to accumulate specific shifts in mindsets, better ways of doing things, and habits that will improve your life....... OF COURSE.
More important though is just the DEPTH of it.
It's the process of dialing yourself back into the whole feeling/vibe/energy that you want.... and that daily re-synchronization with an abundance-based-reality.
Any time I create something, that's my only real goal for the people who experience it.
The new content is just to keep it novel... to keep it fresh.
In the creative process, I re-align myself with the feeling that comes from offering value as well... and strip back layers upon layers of persona to move closer and closer to my core self.
It winds up being something positive for everyone involved... just as long as we intuit the core purpose of it all.
Anyway, that's about all I have to say for now.
And btw.......
This stuff isn't really my "pet peeve" in the classic sense. The world has always had these funny little quirks, and probably always will.
I mostly just opened like that to get your attention.
Tyler
30 comments:
Wisdom is nottin' mo than applied Wisdom!!!
And plow through those unpretty pety peeves Ty-laaaaaaaaaRR!!!
Go Tylahh, go!
look like your creative slump is over cause that was a great article!!!
keep up the good work!! :D
Didn't you approach the whole idea of pickup as a science problem more than an art form? That's the impression I've gotten from your description of your early years in the field.
I understand you need to be fluid and that you can't come up with a response to memorize for every situation but I'd still love to get a look at your notes. ;-)
Thanks for identifying it, making it clearer for me. Now I can catch myself whenever I reverd back to that mentality of trying to force the knowledge into my head and looking for magic tips instead of "experiencing" the knowledge in it, the presence. Often, I just dip into my bookshelf and pick a book and read a random page of it to get back into the feeling of that book. Same with Transformations. Too bad it doesn't really work the same way with my schoolbooks.
great stuff tyler.
How do you balance keeping the right head-space with keeping up with what's going on in the world?
It upsets me to see all thsi war and hunger and I get motivated to solve the problems but I wonder if it puts me in a negative, misanthropic, scarcity frame of mind.
Great post. It reminds me of something that Tolle said on one of his youtube vids that sometimes people keep attending his seminars over and over even though the information content is the same.
It's because he's speaking from a place of presence, you just click to the vibe he's giving off, and all of a sudden, you're seeing the world from a much calmer angle - without really knowing how you got there.
I think you're making a very important distinction which isn't really mentioned in the community very often, partly because other companies are so busy exploiting weakness in their customer and partly because they themselves don't know.
I think you've hit on the reason why a LOT of guys try this and fail - they see the process of getting better with women as a Rubik's Cube to be solved, when in fact it's much closer to a process of unlocking and unleashing your natural potential.
And even though it's easier to market the shallow tricks of the first process, it's the more seemingly diffuse latter process which is what, in my experience, rapidly improves your game.
I also think that what you're talking about here, while highly applicable to game, is of course something with much wider significance- as soon as we stop our egos from tripping us up, we humans are juggernauts of superlative brilliance.
And that goes, as you point out, for business, life, any new skill you want to cultivate as well as women.
It was worth the wait..! :)
Wow..
Yea after watching Transformations I went out and REALLY experienced it and man, there is so much stuff in there, the only way to absorb it is to go out.
I jumped up and down, did box dance, yell i dont care what ppl think of me....... even tried Jeffy's Douchbag opener for the hell of it. It was interesting.
Great article. Hope to hear more from you soon!
tyler. how can i make sure every male on the entire island of oahu is reading your blog word for word every update and putting it to use in their own lives? besides making a post about it on my blog, that's a start....
can you, like, hire some hot chicks to pass out postcards with the url?
anyway. lovely reading as usual.
EXCELLENT ARTICLE TYLER.
You create awareness. I love it.
All you guys out there, be very careful of Idol worship.
Tyler is just a dude. A dude, who stepped up! He is NOT cut from a different cloth.
Step up! Be a man!
From the bottom of my heart, thank you Tyler, for caring enough to give back. It is quite rare, today where there is more fear than there has ever been.
Love you dude,
Mitchell.
Tyler wrote: "One of my big "secrets" to success is that I continually surround myself with the right books/DVDs/influences, etc...
I do this every single day because it continually "re-aligns" my brain with the phenomenon that people in eastern philosophy would call PRESENCE."
Could you explain this further please? What would be example of a DVD you would watch? What do you mean by "influences?"
Thanks you.
Nice article as usual man. Nice pics too!
You sound like a machine with your reading. I've got Atlas Shrugged staring at me as i write this, begging to be read once my final exams are done. Can't wait!
J
Very helpful and insightful, thanks Tyler! Other than The Power of Now, can you recommend another book or two about presence?
"Presence" is called "mindfulness" in modern psychological therapies and it's been found to be useful in treating disorders from substance addiction to borderline personality. For an interesting read about acceptance of this sort, look up Steven Hayes' Acceptance and Commitment Therapy.
Kick ass article! I slapped myself in the head when I read about the "ego-enhancement" tendencies /mistakes. I do them all the time...
Daaaaaannng F@#& it!
All ya look at me, even I the majestic creator of everythung dung including chewing gum am not flawless!
He-hemm WHAT I SHALT HAVE SPOKEN WAS:
Wisdom is nottin' mo than applied Knowledge!!!
WORD!
ADAM AND OUT :D
Hey Man.
Great stuff as usual.
I also have been into Robbins for along time.
Heres a paradox,
I read Awaken The Giant Within 12 yrs ago, in something like 8hrs.
I was under stress at the time, being young and in a new job. I had gone into the bookstore looking for help.
The sad thing is I got such a state change from that book, I have always been a good emotional modeler. Yet that initial buzz didnt last. I also got into Zen philosophy at the same time, and the understanding I got from zen was that our minds especially in the west are filled with crap from day one.
So after getting it 12yrs ago I am still trying trying trying everyday to empty out the bullshit that I got fed from day one.
This I feel is what a lot of us in this are trying to do, from what is being said here and on rsd forums. We do get it, its just the never ending job of emptying out and keeping bullshit free.
PEACE
about the creative slump:
"When I am, as it were, completely myself, entirely alone, and of good cheer - say, travelling in a carriage, or walking after a good meal, or during the night when I cannot sleep - it is on such occasions that my ideas flow best and most abundantly. Whence and how they come, I know not, nor can I force them" - Mozart
The magic pill is to understand human nature. It completely changed my perspective and energy investment strategy.
Amazing as usual. (I just wish you could respond to my PM :) )
Tyler, your writing is as clear as spring water.
On another note, you look tired in the pics. Maybe you need some rest?
great article...you have such a positive influence on my life! Thank you Owen!
I like this post. I don't know how you can say you're in a creative slump when you wrote such a long article and got it right.
I find that Eastern philosophy often holds many truths that pertain to my own ambitions whether it be getting good with women or simply for the many ambitions that I have.
Great article as usual.
If you can't think of anything to write, just
use power of now : )
write about your surroundings, your girlfriend, FRs...
Find connections between three small things of your daily life
and BOOM you have your philosophical article.
Hey Tyler,
Great article, I liked the angle that you came from. I didn't really understand what pisses you off about pet peeve 4 and 5, could you explain why? Thanks man.
great post, summed up exactly the thought that was brewing at the back of my mind wrt surrounding yourself with positivity.
much love.
This is great! I was at the NYLC when I read this and it really helped me synchronize my mind in the right direction. I returned to my room somewhat tired, and I thought I had logical reason to be. After reading this, I was fully...present. Not raring to go, just really comfortable in the fact that "Hey, I can do this."
Then I got a makeout. Score.
Post a Comment