Ascended Mogul + Ultimate Artist

[Malkuth]

I’m the type of person that will almost always assume I don’t know a lot. Unfortunately that planted the seed of doubt in my own head and I was more likely to throw out my own stuff in favor of some authority figure that I perceived as having more confidence in their opinion.

yup. same here.

that tendency to let the jury stay out for an EXTREMELY long time before coming to a conclusion. I actually LIKE being that way (sometimes), but, boy, does it open you up to some misadventures of the headspace. On the positive side, there is a definite pleasure and wonder about life that comes with open-mindedness. But to this day I’m still teasing out a lot of notions and perceptions that I just allowed myself to entertain.

People can’t force their beliefs on you, that only happens if you let it. So despite what happens it’s my responsibility to make sure I don’t bend on my own beliefs.

I think INFP children probably tend to be agreeable. I guess that later when the boundaries kick in, we really feel it all the more. I know in my case, I went from believing everything I was taught to wondering if I might be from some other planet. (Can’t remember when exactly one turned into the other.)

[Fractal_Explorer]

yup. same here.

that tendency to let the jury stay out for an EXTREMELY long time before coming to a conclusion. I actually LIKE being that way (sometimes), but, boy, does it open you up to some misadventures of the headspace. On the positive side, there is a definite pleasure and wonder about life that comes with open-mindedness. But to this day I’m still teasing out a lot of notions and perceptions that I just allowed myself to entertain.

It’s almost like holding multiple competing viewpoints in your head at once, it can get very tiring if gone unchecked. But I agree with you here, I value my ability to think this way.

I think INFP children probably tend to be agreeable. I guess that later when the boundaries kick in, we really feel it all the more. I know in my case, I went from believing everything I was taught to wondering if I might be from some other planet. (Can’t remember when exactly one turned into the other.)

Lol, I’ve also had the being from another planet thought in my life. Probably a combination of agreeable and trusting. But come to think of it most kids are that way, I’ve just always found it interesting how those childhood events have varying levels of impact from person to person. What’s minor to one person is traumatic for another.

[Fractal_Explorer]

Fuck. Sometimes I wonder if I’m just doing stuff wrong or I’m not giving myself enough of a break for how much energy this growth process demands. I woke up this morning at 7am, I couldn’t get out of bed. It wasn’t me being tired, I was just so anxious, panicked. I tried deep breathing, watching my thoughts, it took me until 8am to be able to leave my bed. Then I had to go grocery shopping which I almost put off because I didn’t want to even leave my house.

I feel so stressed for no reason right now. I basically took today to look into workflow improvements when working in my DAW. So something I couldn’t be overly critical about, like what happens so often with my music. It’s productive enough to where I don’t feel like I’ve wasted the day just watching tv or playing video games. Hopefully some of the improvements I make will streamline my creative process more.

But overall, this must be related to those realizations I came to about death a few posts back and I’m still feeling the ripple effect. Sort of unlocking the stuff related to that and now my mind is going to work on it. And I have to say it’s brutal for me right now. So many doubts about everything in my life and where it’s going. I can’t muster up any positivity. I got really angry at myself the other day, just this feeling of “why the fuck are you like this?” It’s like I intentionally ruin everything for myself and I can’t stop it. I’ve been trying for years, too many years to overwrite this side of myself with positivity and it just never sticks. I’m starting to think what I really need to do is purge it by moving through it and my insistence of maintaining positivity has backfired on me.

I think the catalyst for all this though was yesterday. 1 hour before I leave on a friday and our fucking warehouse application on our server just decides to start dropping transactions. So now I get calls from the warehouse to fix it asap and the only fix is to manually create the entries and then link them up. So I do my best and work as fast and carefully as possible because I’m doing updates on a live database which is a huge issue. But the links don’t work and my boss says we can look at it monday. But my whole night was ruined from that and it shouldn’t have been because it’s how I reacted to it. And that’s what pissed me off and made want to punch a hole in the wall. The fact that when shit like this happens and it throws off everything for me. My plans to work on my music that night went out the window, I was asleep by 8, but I didn’t even get restful sleep because my mind kept turning the unsolved problem in my head over and over and I just wanted it to shut up. I was probably anxious this morning because it was spillover from yesterday.

It’s just beyond frustrating to do all this work and improvement on yourself and then you think you’ll react differently when a challenge hits and it’s the same fucking thing it’s always been. I’m so easily knocked off balance by life and I’m sick of it. How can something so dumb and insignificant just completely trash my nervous system for the next day?

[Fractal_Explorer]

I’m going to work on more consistently visualizing every night and getting into the mindset of what I want. It seems like that is something I don’t focus enough on. It doesn’t matter how much I grow if I keep repeating the same stories over and over throughout the day and tearing myself down.

I told myself I needed to vent all this, but I don’t think that’s true either. I need to stop indulging this type of stuff and let it go. The more I let these narratives grow, the more I get sucked into the reality of them vs seeing them as a tiny bubble in a whole universe of possibilities. That’s the greater perspective I need to enforce more. I think for me I have trouble doing that because I’ve never felt in control of my life and it’s always felt like shit happened to me and I just had to deal with and accept my circumstances. I need to exercise my own personal power more.

[Malkuth]

I’m going to work on more consistently visualizing every night and getting into the mindset of what I want.

Same here. Moreover, there seem to be numerous approaches to doing this kind of visualizing. So it may be helpful to try a number of different ways. This may be a kind of subtle effect of practices like magickal workings or prayer. They get you to imagine and articulate what you want.

The more I let these narratives grow, the more I get sucked into the reality of them vs seeing them as a tiny bubble in a whole universe of possibilities. That’s the greater perspective I need to enforce more.

I like this insight. That image really resonates. Moving through this field full of world-bubbles and if one of them touches you, you get drawn into that world and forget anything outside of that world. When I was reading your post maybe 2 or 3 posts above, the image/idea that came to my mind was ‘We are like Superman who is stuck in Clark Kent mode and has forgotten what else he is and can do’. (haha. that actually sounds like a premise for an actual story. It’s probably been done.)

I think for me I have trouble doing that because I’ve never felt in control of my life and it’s always felt like shit happened to me and I just had to deal with and accept my circumstances. I need to exercise my own personal power more.

Personal power. This is the leap of faith, in a way. An increasing sense of belief in your personal power. ‘What if I can actually do it?’ What if it just takes the right combination of effort, energy, properly sequenced action steps?

[Malkuth]

Do you ever feel like you’re/we’re learning the same lessons over and over again, to different levels of depth and in different areas of your being?

[Fractal_Explorer]

Same here. Moreover, there seem to be numerous approaches to doing this kind of visualizing. So it may be helpful to try a number of different ways. This may be a kind of subtle effect of practices like magickal workings or prayer. They get you to imagine and articulate what you want.

Yup, still working out what’s best for me. I’ve started reading Neville Goddard again. I’ve already established I am not a strong visual person. Definitely more kinesthetic, so I’m going to figure out some more “feeling” based visualization practices.

I like this insight. That image really resonates. Moving through this field full of world-bubbles and if one of them touches you, you get drawn into that world and forget anything outside of that world. When I was reading your post maybe 2 or 3 posts above, the image/idea that came to my mind was ‘We are like Superman who is stuck in Clark Kent mode and has forgotten what else he is and can do’. (haha. that actually sounds like a premise for an actual story. It’s probably been done.)

Haha, yes the Clark Kent thing so true. We have amnesia to how powerful we are. It’s not that we have to become powerful, it’s that we have to remember who we are and recognize it’s innate in us.

I think also with regards to the world bubbles if you’re an empath you have to be extra vigilant to not accidentally immerse yourself in someone else’s bubble. Consequently I think this is what’s been happening with me at my job, I keep letting myself get pulled into it vs remaining detached.

Personal power. This is the leap of faith, in a way. An increasing sense of belief in your personal power. ‘What if I can actually do it?’ What if it just takes the right combination of effort, energy, properly sequenced action steps?

Indeed it is. But ultimately if you can have that faith and exercise your power that means it’s entirely independent of all circumstances in your life. To me that’s freedom.

Do you ever feel like you’re/we’re learning the same lessons over and over again, to different levels of depth and in different areas of your being?

Absolutely yes. The amount of times I’ve circled back to different themes and epiphanies and thought to myself “wait I’ve been here before”. I think for me this is basically the equivalent of 2 different identities oscillating back and forth. Something keeps pulling me back to the old one while I retain awareness of the new one but I’m not “being it”. Possibly fear, possibly limitations I still hold onto. I can’t tell if this is how most people process change or if there’s something about me that makes me have a harder time transitioning or making the jump. Sometimes I think it’s my more rational or evidence based mind, that lack of faith, needing the why behind everything vs deciding what I want and getting it regardless of past events or what’s existed in my life up until now. In a way I’m “smart” for being highly in tune and aware of the complexities of my own life and in another I’m completely dumb because I let those dictate far too much and put too much stock in what they really mean.

[Fractal_Explorer]

Something I’m trying to do more is treat my life as an experiment. Which means not taking others “facts” as proof. For example, people very often talk about how hard it is to find a job around me. Instead of saying “yeah it is, man this sucks”. I’ll ask myself, is this true for me? Have I tested the exact opposite of this statement? The thing I’ve come to realize is the collective opinion is not any more valid than the single strong belief of an individual. And in the end it only matters how your life is impacted, so you might as well disregard a lot of what’s out there. Looking for validation and proof then constructing your reality around that is the exact opposite of what should be done.

[Malkuth]

This sounds like an Emperor kind of thought.

Maybe it’s an @Fractal_Explorer thought.

[Fractal_Explorer]

That’s good to hear. It’s probably me becoming more aligned with my own personal power. Closer to what is mentioned on the sales page of AM specifically.

See, we define “power” as your ability to assert your will upon the world when you please

I told myself no leaving AM until I can say with absolute conviction that that phrase is true for me.

[Fractal_Explorer]

Quick insight after having a dream where I basically bitched about everything in my job to my friends and family.

If it occurs in dreams, it’s occurring in my head. Obvious, yes. But the larger point is I try to monitor and control my thoughts and feelings in an attempt to guide myself towards the desired path. The irony being what’s below is the driving force and the surface level thoughts are actually the brakes holding it back. The spill of subconscious feelings of power and possibilities clash with the “rational” part.

That’s the thing with the subliminals. They work from the bottom up. The feeling hits me first and when you have a feeling independent from reason, it confuses the mind. The goal is not to convince that part of my mind, but learn to accept the state that already exists within me. No puzzle to solve, basically the opposite and letting go and trusting.

[Fractal_Explorer]

More shifts in awareness. Due to technology we live in a subconscious expectation of instant reward. I was listening to a podcast with an edm producer and he said the hardest thing about making music for him was ignoring what everyone else was doing and making sure he spent time on his songs. Everywhere you look people are putting out half assed music just to get popularity or to “get ahead”. It seems like everyone can be ahead of you, but then you dig deeper and realize it’s a lot of quantity with limited quality.

This spurred the larger realization of my ongoing perpetual anxiety of “losing time”. The irony is the more I worry about losing time, the more anxious I get and consequently procrastinate more. Whereas if I calm myself, tell myself I have all the time in the world, I find myself automatically doing what needs to be done. This isn’t a reason to slack off, it’s to remind myself that the window isn’t closing anytime soon so I don’t live in a perpetual state of panic.

And society feeds into that. Having these dumb milestones in place at certain ages that fuel the anxiety. Life is not a collection of certain age groups where only certain things are achievable. That’s all limiting beliefs. There’s so much bs that’s been floating around in my head making me feel like crap that was just all expectations. Slowly starting to feel what it’s like to live life on my terms and not some stupid checklist imposed on me.

[Fractal_Explorer]

I was taking a deeper look at myself today. I’ve been feeling burned out and I have this inner tension like I’m trying to push something away and get ahead in life. Well today I realized what that “something” is. It’s not one thing, it’s all those things that make someone human. Wanting to be loved, wanting to connect, wanting to trust, wanting to have your emotions validated. These are all things I buried really deep and shamed myself for wanting to experience because to me they were a point of weakness that had to be eliminated.

Nothing more I can say on that except I feel like I opened a box of really raw emotions and it’s completely thrown me off. Feels like I just unpacked all the pain and isolation I’ve experienced for the past 10 years of my life. And I’m making my best attempt to not analyze it because that’s what got me into this mess, instead trying to use the other parts of my mind to just process the emotional part of everything without having to tie excessive meaning to it. But damn if it doesn’t feel like someone just tugged a thread that caused the entirety of my mind to unravel in one big heaping emotional mess.

[Malkuth]

Well today I realized what that “something” is. It’s not one thing, it’s all those things that make someone human. Wanting to be loved, wanting to connect, wanting to trust, wanting to have your emotions validated. These are all things I buried really deep and shamed myself for wanting to experience because to me they were a point of weakness that had to be eliminated.

Those things that you listed are all related to attachment and connection. I don’t know but it seems like you’re working through core human issues. I think these kinds of issues live in everyone, but often rather than facing and working through them, we project them outwards onto others around us, who we then despise, envy, desire, fear, etc. You seem to be working hard to own your stuff.

Are you still running Regeneration? It really seems to be working.

[Fractal_Explorer]

Definitely seems like it. I often wonder though are my issues particularly bad or do other people let these unconsciously rule them? It’s tempting to think I’m doing some deep introspective work because it makes me feel better. But what if other people just grew up fine? I guess what I’m saying is I used to have my ego tied up in self growth thinking I was advancing as a human being. It’s how I coped with the fact that it felt like my life was out of control and everyone around me seemed more put together.

Interestingly enough I haven’t been running regeneration. I should get back to it. But I have been running the elixir. Ran it once two days ago and then it must have knocked a lot loose in the proceeding days.

[Malkuth]

It’s tempting to think I’m doing some deep introspective work because it makes me feel better.

I think there’s nothing wrong with feeling better as long as you keep doing the work.

But what if other people just grew up fine? I guess what I’m saying is I used to have my ego tied up in self growth thinking I was advancing as a human being. It’s how I coped with the fact that it felt like my life was out of control and everyone around me seemed more put together.

Yes, I can definitely relate to this line of thinking. From a purely objective, empirical perspective, it’s a valid question. But from another point of view, it’s kind of asking, ‘do I have the right to celebrate myself and my journey?’ And from that perspective, I’d say, ‘yes, definitely’. It’s not that you’re better or worse than anyone else, it’s just acknowledging your greatness. I think as long as it doesn’t result in complacency and resting on your laurels, it’s a healthy thing to do.

Anyway, as always, I quite trust that you’ll settle on what works best for you. And if not, you’ll work on it until you do.

[Fractal_Explorer]

Thanks for the insight. I guess this circles back around to that human thing I talked about a couple posts back. I’ve always had this weird obsession with having pure intention. So for example making music, for the longest time Id beat myself up because I wanted others to like it. In my head that was approval seeking or validation. I told myself no, that’s the wrong motivation. But at the end of the day there’s nothing wrong with it if I’m not compromising on my own artistic integrity, it’s just another part of being human.

I think you touched on something and why I’m so obsessed with the purely objective. It further detaches me from myself and my wants and needs, some of which I absolutely do not have a good relationship with. And I’m just highly perfectionist by nature and it’s been damaging to my own self worth. I essentially expect myself to be this super being. I don’t know where it came from though or why it’s important to me. But I imagine I use it as a type of shield to guard against the real me. Or something like that. Anything self help related just threw gasoline on that fire. That’s why even with these subs my thought patterns aren’t always healthy if they come from that frame.

That turned into a ramble. But there was a steam of consciousness sort of unfolding there that I just needed to capture. Kind of just happened as I wrote more.

[Fractal_Explorer]

Sometimes the answers really do stare at you in the face and you’re just blind to them. I think for me a pervasive feeling of not being good enough has encapsulated my whole life. What did I do to fix it? Well I tried to make myself good enough. The problem with that is it’s a bar that’s constantly raised. Get a job, need to get a better job. Finish a song, need to write a better song. Get more confident, need to be more confident and fearless. It’s never been me as a person and telling myself I’m good enough as I am. Yes I can always improve, but fundamentally my life shouldn’t be a paralyzing mess of proving my worth. And that’s largely what it’s been.

I had the full intention of working on music today, but it just hurt to take any little step. It felt like every step was just the inevitable end result of failure and never being good enough. I realized that’s what holds me back. Not the challenge of music itself or the skills I have to acquire, but my relationship with it. And that goes double for anything else in my life.

I come back to this a lot. Cultivating a good relationship with oneself seems to be key to getting what you want out of life. But a lot of advice out there seems to fall short. Yeah it’s about creating and visualizing a self image of who you want to be, but if at the heart of it you’re never going to be content with yourself it’s a moot point. I’m starting to realize I could achieve all I want in life and with my current mindset I’d still be deeply unhappy.

[Malkuth]

Like a tornado or a whirlpool, at the core of it is Nothing. Highly potent, overflowingly empty, nothing.

The belief in self-worth is based on nothing other than…the belief in self-worth. Everything after that is just improvised, post facto justifications.

This woman says it very wisely and well

There was only one variable that separated the people who have a strong sense of love and belonging and the people who really struggle for it. And that was, the people who have a strong sense of love and belonging believe they’re worthy of love and belonging. That’s it. They believe they’re worthy.

[Malkuth]

On another note (pun intended), what do you think of the idea of creating a series of minimalistic musical haiku?