Author: sandra_geisler

The feeling of tiredness and exhaustion are not quite the same. I might feel tired when I get up earlier than usual, or I had broken sleep. I might feel tired because I have started running or taken up any new exercise. Exhaustion, in comparison, is something you experience if you do something for a prolonged time. Let’s say you go on a multi-day hike, at the end of the trip your body might be exhausted (mostly because you haven’t adequately prepared or not fuelled your body correctly throughout your hike). You might feel exhausted if you run from one appointment to the next. Whilst you just make it or you are somewhat late, you can’t even enjoy being there because you are already rushing off to your next engagement, for which you are also late. In contrast, getting up earlier over several weeks, is not something that leads to exhaustion, as your body will get used to it. What it comes down to is beyond what most people think.

I know getting up earlier in the morning means that at some point during the day we feel it. We feel a drop in energy in the afternoon or early in the evening, but if we push through it and do so over several weeks, the body has been conditioned to a new time. It has a new body clock. If we however only sleep three hours a night, every night, for weeks, we will feel exhaustion. Whilst this may not be true for everyone, I would argue most people would feel exhausted at some point and there is plenty of science and data that support the fact that three hours a night may have negative consequences. We see this phenomenon of exhaustion often with new parents, where in the first few weeks they get only little sleep and the signs are written all over a new parent’s face without them having to complain about it. We could tackle the science of what type of physical activities, food, lack of sleep and other factors could contribute to exhaustion, but this post is not about that. It is also not about any mineral deficiency or any medical reason as to why we may be exhausted. This post is about the difference of knowing and differentiating between tiredness and that part of exhaustion that a lot of us feel where we don’t know why because there is no ‘apparent’ reason.

We get to the weekend and think we need to sleep more because we are mentally and physically exhausted. We end up watching shows on the couch after a ‘big’ day in the office, or we think little catnaps on the weekend will do the trick. Unfortunately, without realising, we partook in the nap roulette, where you hope to nap for 20 minutes and feel refreshed but instead, we slept for three hours. By the end of the weekend, we feel more tired than before and we already start dreading the next week. We are filled with feelings of guilt of having wasted time, but yet we are feeling drowsy and still exhausted. And even if we really needed to rest, which we sometimes actually do, more often than not this is not the case. No amount of sleep will actually make us feel better and our mental state is worse than it was before and we have no idea why. If this is you, I would argue you are exhausted by how your life plays out day in, day out. I know, you are strapped for time but we all have the same 24 hours in a day. And so the time excuse does not work for me. It just comes down to how we use all the time within a day.

Exhaustion comes from doing stuff that drains us; the stuff that we feel obligated to do when really, we dislike doing them. We may dread our jobs, but we do it because we have a mortgage and there possibly couldn’t be a more fitting job that could also pay the bills. We may dread hanging out with the people we have nothing in common with but we do it anyway because otherwise we have no friends. And, what does that say about us? We eat things we don’t like but we do it anyway because we signed up to some fad diet even though our body is screaming at us to stop. Whatever it is, we feel more and more exhausted and our weekends are never long enough. We lead a life that is full with things that don’t inspire us.

Deep down we know we want to change that because we have already realised that we need to change in order for your outside world to change, but there are hurdles. Hurdles can come in all shapes, forms and sizes. Hurdles might be the people-pleasing part within us that struggles to say “no”. Hurdles might be attachment issues to things, people or unhealthy behaviour. Whilst we could discuss attachment in a complete separate post, and I probably will do so, this post would not be complete it. There may also be reasons why we struggle to let go of certain behaviours, even though we know they are not helpful. Sometimes, over time, we have acquired a behaviour because that very behaviour at the time helped us to get through something. Take binge eating for instance. Binge eating can be a form to numbing our feelings or trying to escape reality and not having to face something. The same could be said about smoking. We took up smoking at a time when we felt vulnerable and stressed that we just wanted to get some reprieve from whatever it was. In some ways the behaviour helped us cope better. Unfortunately, when the stressful event is over, we are not able to let go and our once ‘useful’ behaviour has turned into addiction. This is obviously a very simplistic view of the world and it is way more complicated than that, but this is the whole point, if we wanted to let go of something, we need to understand that at some point in our life this unhealthy behaviour served some protection mechanism, and it is time to let go because we don’t need that anymore. Another attachment hurdle can come in the way of us being attached to our current situation, even though it causes us pain. We are somewhat attached to our own suffering That pain is still not large enough; it still doesn’t outweigh the effort that comes with change and as such staying in painful situations are easier than change; or so it seems in our heads.

Even if we are not held back by hurdles, and there could be many more than mentioned above, we feel too exhausted from our life that we feel like we have no energy to really change anything and so we keep living the same life and feel more and more exhausted. We rest more but it feels like there is no amount of rest that can cure this exhaustion. We put it down to age, to stress at work, to running around socially. But what really happens is that we feel exhausted because none of the things we do inspire us. We go back to numbing ourselves and trying to survive and hope that something will happen that gets us inspired. But what are you hoping to happen? Are you waiting for some magical inspiration to appear? Some magic-sprinkling unicorn to cross your way? Even if it actually existed, you would not see it because you are too busy repeating the past and sleeping off the exhaustion that no amount of sleep can heal . What is even worse about all this is that on any given Monday or Tuesday we say to ourselves: “I just need to get to the weekend where I can rest and thankfully it is the weekend soon”. When we book a trip overseas, which certainly is something to look forward to, we want to be there already, even if it is months away. In essence, what we are doing is wishing time away. We wish for time to speed up all our life to get us to some ‘good’ or ‘pleasant’ feeling, thing, or event, but we don’t want to experience the other stuff. In fact, we through everything and the kitchen sink at it, to not live and to avoid experiencing our mundane daily life. It is only when someone close to us is about to die, or has passed away, that we want time back.

If only we took the time that we spend doing useless things, and instead did stuff that we liked, stuff that inspired us, stuff that makes us feel like we have a new lease on life, we would feel less exhausted. As much as it sounds counter-intuitive, going for a stroll when we are tired, writing when we feel like we have nothing to say, reading about some topics we are interested in when our mind was challenged all day long in the office, would give us back time. Over time, even though it seems like hard work, we would feel less exhausted and more inspired. We would have more energy to love, to be less agitated, to have better relationships with others and ourselves. We would rush around less, we would be more present and we would realise that our exhaustion comes from things that we undertake, not from external environments.

If you really want to know why you are exhausted, take a look at your life and all the things you do that you can’t stand and change something about it. Love yourself enough to take a hard look at yourself, at your circumstance, and what you can do about it. Love yourself enough to say “no” to the easy, yet detrimental items in your life, and say “yes” to life that is meant to be lived every day. Say no to exhaustion and start living by doing something that inspires you. And no, you don’t need to make radical changes, you can start small and do something for 5 minutes a day. A five-minute-deep meditation can feel like eternity.

No one is going to save you from your own exhaustion. No amount of sleep or time off work. The only person that can cure this exhaustion is you by doing something that inspires you. And if you don’t know what that is, start doing things that help you explore it. Don’t waste your time being exhausted and wishing time away, but start living the life that you dream of by starting to make small changes. These small changes will have a ripple effect beyond what you were expecting.  

Life is actually good, even when it isn’t, but somehow, we think things always go against us and we subconsciously keep looking for affirmation of that. Instead of seeing that today we have another day where we can create our story, we dread getting up in the morning. We complain how busy we are in our jobs, instead of being grateful that we have a job. We complain about our spouse texting us about some meaningless thing and get annoyed at her, when we should be grateful that she wants to communicate. We rather whinge about being held up in traffic by every light turning red, instead of considering that we may have been slowed down to not be in an accident. We focus on all the things that are going against us. We create a space of negativity, enforce limited thinking and by doing so we limit ourselves. We don’t think that life can be different. Instead of pondering what life could be, we paralyse ourselves with limited thinking. We keep repeating the past instead of creating a new future. We keep thinking the same way over and over again and stay in the limitations of our own thinking, reinforcing a life lived by limitations.

When we consider a job, for instance, or what is possible in terms of payment, we think that can only be paid a certain amount, because we talk to others, we do market research, and so on. We don’t consider that maybe our skills are more valuable and as such we can ask for more money, or ask for additional benefits that most people may not have. We may also think that we have keep having this ill-fitted job to pay the mortgage when there actually is a better suited one with more money and better benefits out there. We kill any possibility, or chance, of a different life before it even takes its first breath. Just because it hasn’t been done before, or happened before, does not mean that it is not possible but we rather think that way. Think about professional athletes though. Do you think that the few men in the 1960s who crossed the 100m line in under ten seconds for the first time, since being able to electronically record sprinting time, were thinking that it wasn’t possible? No, of course not. If they thought it wasn’t possible they would not have achieved it, but they didn’t let the past rule the future. They thought it was possible. And ever since then the sprinting time keeps being broken. It doesn’t happen all the time and not every year, but none-the-less it happens, and those that do it don’t let anyone stop them.

The only ones who give up before they even start are the ones who live in the prison they have created for themselves. The prison is made up of bars of limited thoughts. It is those very bars that are holding you back. You have spent many years carefully building this prison by the limitations that you put upon yourself and the thinking that runs in endless loops looking for problems where there are none. But…. you are right. If you think something can’t be done, it won’t be. If you think you can’t win, you won’t win. Let’s also get clear on one thing, it is not a circumstance that is holding you back either, it is you. Your choice of attaching to the circumstance, instead of letting go and moving on, is what keeps you stuck in this mind-fuckery. It is not your partner or your friends either. If they actually discourage you from whatever it is you want to undertake, maybe they are not the right people to hang out with in the first place, but it is up to you.

You may say you have problems though and as such these problems prevent you from doing something else in your life or with your life. You have a job that stresses you out, your co-workers take time off when a critical deadline is due, you think you have just made a mistake in a high-stake deal, for some reason Rosey doesn’t talk to you anymore even though you have been nice to her, Jimmy isn’t texting you quickly enough so maybe he has moved on, your child hasn’t washed their hands before dinner,…. I could write pages upon pages with things we think are problems, when they are actually not. You may have a stressful job, but it is how you manage stress that is important. Think about your co-workers, they don’t seem to care about the time-line, so why do you worry so much about it? Do you think worrying about it will help you get the project done in time? You may have made a mistake, but guess what, we all sometimes make mistakes. Rosey may not want to talk to you, or anyone for that matter, because she has had no sleep all night. Jimmy may be on a phone-detox and as such is not texting you, or anyone else.

Most often the problems that we think we have, are not even real but we have manufactured something in our heads about something or someone. Instead of questioning the validity of those thoughts, we give them space to roam freely in our head and we even get other people involved. We go to others under the pretence that we need to have our problems solved, when in reality we are seeking validation and to get others’ buy-in. And when we have talked to everyone who is willing to listen, we spend more thinking about them or on what possible other problems there are. We start creating this loop of filling our time with thinking about “problems” that we don’t have, talking about them, validating them, to then trying to solve them to make space for the next problem to be solved. We rob ourselves not only of precious sleep, because most of the ‘how to solve a problem’-thinking happens right before we fall asleep, but also of all the time we could spend on working on our dreams. We let our faux problems fester and grow into something so large that we think our world is caving in soon. And by now we actually have a real problem. We have built a prison in our heads with all these problems that aren’t real and we spend our time either creating problems, or solving problems and by doing so create more problems so we can keep ourselves stuck in our prison instead of breaking out.

And even if we are not focused on any problems for once, we talk ourselves out of anything that possibly could be achieved. If you don’t think it possible, it won’t. If you think others only achieve something because they are an outlier, and you are not, then that is your choice. You absolutely can be the outlier but you have to consider removing the ‘im’ from ‘impossible’. You will always be right in your thinking. But if you consider that there is a possibility that it can be done, you will leave no stone unturned to get there. You will do whatever it takes to get there and leave your problems, that aren’t real, behind. You will stop putting limitations on yourself and consider any possibility. And just because it doesn’t happen the first time when you try, doesn’t mean it will never happen.

I will leave you with one final comment to ponder about: In case you think you need to spend time looking for a key, the door to your prison has never been locked, you just need to swing it wide open and step outside into a world filled with endless possibilities.

Time is something we often think about and is frequently mentioned in conversation for one reason or another. We ask what time it is, what time an event starts, what time it finishes, what time we need to be somewhere, etc. We also cite time as one of the most common excuses for why we are not able to get something done. It is either that we don’t have enough of it, or that we have plenty of it. These statements have a different starting point but lead to the same outcome of not getting anything done.

You can tell yourself whatever you want but if you are young and you think you have all this time to pursue your dreams later in life, think again. Whilst probability is small, death has also claimed young lives. Death doesn’t discriminate against age. Death comes when our time is up and there is no way about it. No cheating or escaping it either. The only escaping we undertake almost daily is escaping life. We escape life by spending time on things or with people that do nothing for us, that hold us back instead of lifting us up. It is not other’s people’s fault, but only our own and the choices we make. We might also be scared of what people may think if we choose ourselves over a social function, if we choose getting up early to hit the gym, if we spend time by ourselves, working on ourselves and our gifts. We load ourselves up with useless things to spend our days.

You can also keep lying to yourself and tell yourself that you have no time for nothing, not even yourself. People often say that they have no time to cook healthy food. Guess what? You don’t have to spend two hours every day to cook a five-star meal. You just have to spend ten minutes to cook something that nourishes you. Ten minutes is plenty of time to achieve this. Likewise, people might say that they would like to write a book, but the thought of the time expenditure needed to achieve this seems impossible. People give up before they have even started. But consider this: If you take ten minutes every single day to write something, anything, you probably can write a page a day. In a year, you would have written 365 pages; in essence you have written a book. Maybe it isn’t the fiction book that sits in your heart, but you have written a book about something non-the-less of substantial length.

Whatever it is that you think you don’t have time for, just start with ten minutes. Maybe five even. No one can tell me that they don’t have or can’t take five to ten minutes for themselves. No one can tell me that they can’t find just ten minutes to meditate, to write, to do push-ups, to do whatever. What these people are really saying is that they don’t love themselves enough to take just ten minutes every single day to better themselves. They can’t take ten minutes to start living because it is easier to spend those ten minutes complaining about circumstances. They are too attached to living a life that causes them pain, and ironically the pain seemingly is better than bettering oneself.

It is all about priorities. Sure, life gets busy, but you have to ask yourself, what you are busy with. Investigate what eats up your time. Are you busy pursuing your dreams and building a life worth living or are you busy merely existing and leading a mediocre life. What conversations do you have? Are they meaningless small talk? Are they even with the people that you call your people? Are you spending time doing things to please others? If people are time-fillers to you, you better let them go; for your sake but also theirs. If you let worthless conversations go, let the complaining go, let the gossiping go, let the people that hold you back go, you get all this time back that you thought you never had.

We all have the same 365 days in the year, the same 24 hours in the day. What it comes down to is what you do with that time. If you spend time watching TV shows day in and day out, if you spend time picking fights just to prove that you are right, if you spend time with thinking about problems that are not even real, if you spend time feeling sorry for yourself and your life, you will never have enough time for anything. You will drift further and further away from your path and yourself. But if you go the other way and do the things that are difficult but necessary to get time back in your life, you can build the life that you want instead of being at mercy of life’s randomness.

Life may give you unforeseen circumstances but if you spend your time building a strong mind, a healthy body, and working on your craft, you will not only create a life of your desire, but you will also have a better time dealing with the unexpected and often difficult things that life might throw at you. Time is so precious. You have this one life with limited time, and you only truly have the present moment to effect any change in your life. We can come up with all the excuses why we can’t do anything and being tired is often a reason too but spending those few minutes every day doing something for ourselves, taking ourselves serious and care for ourselves, doing the difficult things, we actually get time back. Our energy will be elevated. Our mood will be better. We will be more focused. We end up feeling less tired and we want to spend more time on things that inspire us. It awakens something within us.

Ask yourself how you spend your days and any moment that you have spare. And don’t be mistaken, taking time to rest is important too, however, know the difference. Be careful of thinking you need rest when you don’t and when you actually need rest. You can only ever be as good to others as you are to yourself, so gift time to yourself to do the hard things that will lead to a life that is easy. You have to take the time to conquer your own bulls*it and excuses, to get time back and lead a life that you desire, no matter how difficult it seems at first. There has to be a sense of urgency because your time may be up sooner than you think and would you not rather use the time that is left, to lead a life you love?

There is so much distraction in this world. Most of which we know about and we acknowledge as distraction but then there are the subtle ones that we don’t recognise as taking away from our own journey. Distraction comes at us from any possible angle. It often finds us exactly when we say enough is enough and we try to draw a line in the sand. It is then, when we are being tested, if we are serious about it. You know the time, when you say you are not going to eat chocolate anymore, all of a sudden there is chocolate everywhere. Someone offers you chocolate on that day who normally wouldn’t, maybe even a stranger, and all your mind thinks about all day is chocolate. And whilst you are not being distracted by eating chocolate, you are by thinking about it and your thoughts are distracted after all.

The same happens when you start distancing yourself from some people that you recognise may not be your people. All of a sudden, they ring you because they have an issue or something is going on. And of course, you don’t want to leave them high and dry in their hour of need. Likewise, suddenly there are the people you have not seen in years who come out of the woodworks. And if it is not them, then there are all these new people making it into your life in very subtle ways. You change jobs and you left your old work colleagues behind and things fizzle out because you really only had work in common. Now that you have all that time on your hands, you start bonding with new colleagues and before you know it become real cozy with them. We are social creatures after all, so this is only to be expected. But are you really friends with them because you truly bond with them over things you share, or is the carpet you walk on in the office the only thing you actually have in common? With some people you absolutely will vibe and you may even find your people there, but equally they may just be another time filler. And only you know the answer to that.

It is the same when you just want to spend time by yourself and doing a lot of self-development. But instead of doing that, you find yourself knee-deep into baking cookies and cakes, enough for half an army. You spent the last five hours baking away instead of reading, writing, meditation, exercising, r whatever else you actually had set out to do. And now that you have more sweets than you have friends, you give cookies and cakes to people that live an hour away or your neighbours that don’t actually care about them and may just throw them into the bin. I am not suggesting that you suck as a baker, but you don’t know what fate your cakes await. Don’t get me wrong, gifting things to people that you care about is not a bad thing but the question is, did you actually need to do it? Did you really want to do it, or was it simply self-sabotage? Was it yet another attempt at taking away time from yourself? You may not want to look at it that way and maybe baking is better than numbing yourself with shows or anything else that you usually use to distract yourself with, but essentially it is the same. Once again, you take precious time away from yourself. You make sure that you spend time doing something that doesn’t actually matter and no one cares about. And let’s be honest, does anyone actually need cake?

The people that suffer from the “helper”-syndrome know distraction all too well but still not recognise it as such. They deeply care for people, for their betterment, and for being there for them. They constantly give of themselves in pursuit of helping others, but in doing so take away from their own life. They distract themselves with the drama of other people, instead of focusing on their own betterment. I am not saying to not be there for others but you have to know the difference between being there for others and possibly ending up as their dumping ground, and being there for yourself. You read that correctly: When are you there for yourself? When will you finally show up for yourself? It is easier to forget about yourself when you help someone else and focus on their problems. But for the empath this is tricky because you can feel their pain and you can see their suffering and you want your loved ones to feel better, and to be better. You even struggle to distance yourself from the stranger and their suffering because you can feel it deeply. It is such a good personality trait to have to care so much for others, but the “helper”- syndrome people sometimes don’t know how to draw a boundary to their own detriment. Unfortunately, you may try to help people that don’t even want your help. And this may sound harsh but is often what actually happens. The other people may just want us to buy into their stories, or they want us to agree with them and why they should be a victim, and they may just use us. When you agree with people on why they should feel a certain way, you help them validate their situation and validate why things are that way instead of evoking a sense of why they should be helping themselves. You may actually end up enabling them by excusing their behaviour.

So instead of trying to help people that either just use you or don’t want to help themselves, why don’t you stop distracting yourself and help yourself. I know it is not as simple as that but there is a difference between caring for someone and carrying someone and most people mistake the former for the latter. You absolutely can care for someone and help them when they genuinely need your help. But you have to know which one is which and you have to stop carrying other people’s problems around and take away from your own life. Everyone has their own journey to sort out and so do you.

Distraction can come in many different ways and is often disguised as something else and in ways we don’t see. It can be simple and subtle and we still miss it. Anything really can be a distraction, but you have to know when something is or isn’t. You have to know when someone genuinely wants and needs your help. You have to know when baking is something you thoroughly enjoy and it balances you, or whether you use it to take away precious time to do other things and work on your business idea. Maybe baking is your gift and the business you want to work on, but maybe it is just distraction. It comes down to examining your life and whether you fill the time that you have with things or people that take away from you. Know the difference and help yourself and your journey. Cut anything that doesn’t serve you and be careful of distraction. It will try to weasel its way back into your life when you least expect it and in the most unexpected ways. Life is so precious and so is time, so love yourself enough to stop taking away from yourself.

There is a lot that could be written about worthiness and self-worth but there is only so much space and only so much that can be explained with language. None-the-less, we have to talk about it. Whilst there is many angles to look at this topic, the following is how I look at it.

Worthiness is most often sought in places that can never actually truly give us that. We constantly seek it and strive for acceptance by external forces. And it is not really our fault to begin with. From the time when we are little, we are being told that we are either good or bad. We know that if we do something that is pleasant to someone else, we are more likely to be liked and accepted. We know that if we behave well in social settings, and demonstrate good manners, we may receive a reward. We know that if we have achieved something and our parents say that they are proud of us, we are more likely to do the same again, to get the same results. We grow up, striving for approval and acceptance not only from our parents but as we go through the years and different social groups, we also seek the same from friends and other relationships. We don’t want to be excluded now, do we?

We even strive for approval from our parents when we are adults. We hope that by what we are doing we make them proud. Sadly, for some of us, regardless of what we do, our parents will never say out loud that they are proud and we keep doing things we don’t want to whilst feeling unworthy. Likewise, we could be living a life that we absolutely tread because our parents keep saying that they are so proud of what we have achieved. Saying the words “I am proud of you” can be quite complicated and instead of encouraging a person, these words could evoke feelings of stress. A person may absolutely hate the life they are leading but do it so that their parents keep being proud of them. They keep living this life because they think that if they are not doing it, their parents won’t approve of them.

I recently learnt that parents these days often use the language of “you should be proud of yourself” instead of “I am proud of you”, which moves the focus away from validation of the parent and enables the child to validate things for themselves. This way, the child has the ability to assess its success for themselves and understand that it doesn’t matter what the parents think. It encourages a child to seek acceptance and worthiness of themselves by themselves and not be reliant on what the parent has to say about it. This is not an attack on parents, their parenting style, or blaming our parents for our issues with self-worth but understanding that it is complicated and can come from all angles. I also want to stress that generally being proud of someone and communicating that comes from the right place, with the intention of encouraging someone. Unfortunately, it just doesn’t always work that way and can have the opposite effect.

Even if we never had an issue with self-worth or worthiness growing up, we know that if we are agreeable, we can avoid conflict and there is a more pleasant outcome. If we go along with everyone’s idea and not challenge others too much, we are more likely to fit in and have an easier time. But do we? By never speaking up, by always trying to fit in, we effectively never change the status quo and nothing changes. We keep living a life where we depend on external validation to be worthy of something or someone, but then wonder why things don’t work out or we have to keep pushing sh*t uphill. And even worse, we have a midlife crisis every three weeks for years on end and don’t know why.

Seeking worthiness from external variants can be dangerous. Take a workplace for instance. We strive for doing things to please people, to get the gold star performance review, to impress the boss, and we go above and beyond to be seen as the eager, enthusiastic person. Sure, to an extent we get acknowledgement, but at some point, this eagerness turns into expectation. And your manager and colleagues expect you to work late, to go the extra mile every time because you have created this expectation. You have to keep this up when you have already been sprinting on the wheel for weeks. Eagerness/enthusiasm turning into expectation means that you don’t get the pat on the back anymore. And you wonder what else you possibly can do to become that person again and receive the employee of the month award. You start sprinting more when you have nothing else to give just to get that meaningless award. In the process you give yourself away and work yourself into the ground. And what for? For approval that you may never receive. And what happens when you lose your job? A lot of people think they are a failure when they lose their job, but this couldn’t be further from the truth. You may have failed at a job, but you are not a failure. This thinking is a common problem for people who have placed worthiness outside of them and they confuse English grammar where a verb becomes a noun. In essence, what you are really doing is giving away your own power. You enable your employer to hold worthiness hostage over you. Yes, you read correctly: You give your power away by seeking validation from external sources, because you have failed to cultivate it yourself. You may not want to hear this, but the buck does stop with you.

The same goes for intimate relationships and friendships. If you seek validation from your friends, you are more inclined to do things that you don’t want to do. You go along with things that are against your values. You keep saying yes to things that you hate doing. When relationships break down, you feel unworthy of love, of people and ultimately of yourself and your own love. In order to prevent things from breaking down and feel that way, you let people walk all over you, you try to be agreeable, go along with things and be nice. But what does nice even mean? Nice in my world means mediocre, uninteresting, a push-over and someone who just slots in. Nice people don’t upset other people and they are nice to be around, but I don’t ever want to be known or described as nice. Neither should you. If you genuinely agree with someone, then do so, but otherwise stop being so nice. I guess if you need some validation though, you will try to fit in, but sooner or later, the people that you are so scared to lose, will be lost. Either you tire of pretending to be someone you are not, or they see through you. Sooner or later, something has to give. And if it doesn’t, all you do is lead a life where you betray yourself constantly. Let that sink in for a second. If you keep pleasing others by doing things you don’t want to, you betray yourself and your own needs. By avoiding external disagreements, you create internal conflict that eats away at your soul, bit by bit, which eventually leads to you yourself sucking the life out of your soul. You may think it is other people doing that, but really, it is you doing it to yourself.

I say, f*ck the pleasantries (but don’t be an a*se either), let people go, that only like you when you behave a certain way, speak your truth, take your power back, and know that you are worthy of everything you desire. True worthiness means you have to be willing to do the hard work. You have to be willing to resist the temptation to fit in and betray yourself. You have to stop pleasing people, eat junk, read junk, hang out with the people that hold you back, and stop looking outside of you for validation. True worthiness comes from doing the difficult tasks, from teaching yourself that you are worthy of good things in your life. You have to be willing to stand alone and know that even when no one is around and you lose everyone, you still have you. You can rely on you, but you can only get to that point when you do all the hard things and teach yourself that. No amount of parenting can get you there either, you have to learn that for yourself. You have to cultivate that for yourself. You have to do all the things that get you to where you want to go, from doing the work, when you don’t feel like it, to having the hard conversations with your significant other. At the end of the day, only when you are true to who you are, can you live a fulfilling life. And it is never too late to start living and stop existing only.

And I will leave you with this: You are only ever as worthy as you think you are, not what other people think or place on you. If you don’t think you are worthy of a good life, you probably won’t have one and will manifest things into your life that reflect that. But if you think you are worthy of all the good things, then you will do the hard things and do everything possible to make that a reality. So, start seeing your own worthiness because you are so worthy, but it is up to you. Only you can determine that.

No one will come and save you from nothing, especially not yourself. And let me tell you, you, like most people, probably need saving from yourself, from your junk thinking and your junk habits. You need saving from your excuses, from your unhealthy obsession with your past, and the reasons you give yourself and others to justify playing small and why you are not going after your dreams. And in case you think people care, people don’t. No one does. Most people couldn’t care less about your problems, or your progress. Most people have their own stuff to worry about. So instead of worrying about what other people think, do or don’t do and getting upset about it, why don’t you start worrying about your life and start living the life you want?

I get it, life throws us a curveball and things are difficult. And we want to tell our friends, family and possibly the world about it. We want everyone to know how hard-done by we are. The world is against us and life isn’t fair. Well guess what? Life isn’t. It never was and never will be. And the sooner you accept this, the better. Of course, there are things and issues that should be talked about; the real problems in our lives so that we can find meaningful ways to tackle them. But most things we talk about are trivial and no one cares. No one cares that Mary had too much sugar in her drink. No one cares that Jim came in late again. No one cares that Karen got the order wrong and instead of a Latte you got a Cappuccino. Guess what? It is the same thing. Sure, one could argue the ratio on frothing is different but at the end of the day it is the same damn thing – a coffee with milk. So get over it because no one wants to hear about it.  And if you really care about it and have to make a point, maybe it is time you ask yourself some deeper questions. Do you not have bigger fish to fry than worry about some stupid coffee order that got mixed up?

Those that do care about your ‘little’ problems, care for selfish reasons. Those people like to hear about our ‘misfortune’ because it makes them feel better about their lives and easier for them to complain about the same issues. And, as we all know, misery loves company. Talking about our shitty life gives people permission to talk about their shitty life, instead of doing something about it. Somehow, we love seeing other people’s drama, buying into it and even feeding it, instead of building ourselves up and cheering each other on to be better versions of ourselves. This phenomenon can often be witnessed amongst girls. They like to encourage their friend by way of validating their feelings instead of considering that maybe the girlfriends may have fuelled a situation. Maybe they are the culprit at work and not the colleague. Maybe they overreacted and not their partner. This failure to examine can lead to all sorts of problems and poor advice but they rather be seen as a supportive friend and help to validate how they feel. In a less crucial setting, this can also be observed when a group of girls goes shopping. They rather encourage their friend to wear ill-fitting clothes than tell her the truth that she may want to choose a size larger. Sad really.

If all we do is talk about stuff that is trivial, creates more problems than good, and we don’t action anything (even on our bigger problems), then no one wants to hear about it over and over again. And even those that actually want to help us and suggest a different way forward, can’t actually help us. Because the only person that can truly help you is you and you are standing in your way. No work colleague, no boss, no friend, not even the waitress that got the coffee order wrong is in your way. Only you can help yourself. And if you finally get to a point where you know that it is you, you can get out of the way.

Some of the ‘getting out of the way’ is complex and challenging and some initial assistance may be required. When you know you need to make a change and you don’t know where to start, getting help from someone else and outsourcing to an expert is a good thing. Let’s say you are new to fitness and you don’t know the correct technique to lift weights. Absolutely; you should get a professional to show you how it is done, not only to reap the benefits of hitting the right muscle groups, but to prevent injury. Likewise, if you want to be a piano player, taking lessons would make sense. If you had something going on in your life that holds you back and you want to work through that, getting help is great. But what it comes down to is understanding that you still have to do the work. No amount of helpful suggestions will change anything if you don’t follow them. No amount of sitting in therapy for years on end will help you if you don’t do the work. What counts is what do you do when these people that try to help you are not watching? Will you lift the weight when your coach isn’t yelling at you? Will you eat the healthy food when there are also cookies floating about? Will you follow the instructions your piano teacher gave to you and sit at your keyboard outside those hours you pay for?

At some point, you have to realise when that initial help is becoming more of a crutch. No piano teacher, no psychologist, no healer, no fitness trainer, no one will get you to where you need to go if you are not willing to do the work. And even if you are making great progress, at some point you have to stop relying on others and trust in your own ability to do the things. At some point you have acquired the knowledge of how to lift weight. At some point you have learnt what healthy eating is. At some point you know what keys to hit to make a song come together. At some point you know which tools to use to not get so worked up about it all and you can put things into action. Just knowing things is not enough anymore. Just contemplating things in principle will not get you there. You have to put them into action and you have to do so when no one is watching.

At some point you need to stop relying on other people and start relying on you. Just as much as you have to do the thing when no one is watching. Doing the thing when people are watching, is easy, but will not get you anywhere. What counts is what you do when No One is watching, when No One cheers you one, when No One says “good job”. It is the time when you go for a walk when the weather is crap, when you meditate even though you don’t want to. No one can do the work for you, and no one will. No amount of support can get you there if you don’t do what is required. So, get out of your way and start working. Get support to start if required, but understand that you need to do the work. No one can get you to live the life you want but you.

And finally, let me ask you this: Who are you when no one is watching?

Death is not particularly a topic that most people are interested in talking about as it brings up all sorts of feelings. I have spent several years researching and studying death, how different cultures perceive death, prepare for death, mourn and celebrate death. It is most fascinating considering that some cultures undertake certain customs to free the soul or prepare the soul for the ‘afterlife’ and the differences in belief of what happens after one dies. I guess none of us actually know what really happens after life, and this is also not what this post is about, but rather, how bringing death closer to our consciousness can make us lead a better life.

As humans we go through life thinking we are invincible. When we are young, no one wants to talk about death. In teenage years, 20s or early 30s especially, we think nothing can hurt us. Statistically speaking, nothing should because life expectancy is somewhere in the 80-year range, depending on country. The older we get, the more we may ponder about life and death, however, not to the point that our own mortality is at stake. Even if we brush up against death through an accident, illness or disease, we have nothing better to do but to throw the kitchen sink at whatever it is that plagues us. If we actually recover from it all, only a few of us have it in them to change their lifestyle. Most of us don’t consider the abuse and use of our bodies and minds and fill it with junk and want the system to bail us out but what for? To do the same thing all over again?

Aging, which is something that happens in the run-up to death, assuming we are not dying before-hand, is not something that is celebrated in our society. Rather, we try to cheat aging and prolong life as much as we can. When we see the first sign of wrinkles or the first few grey hair, we try beauty products to hide and make our youth last forever. In the pursuit to make ourselves immortals, we don’t consider quality of life but only think quantity. The only explanation I have for all the ducking and weaving and for not talking about death, is that either we don’t want to face the fact that at some point we will lose someone that is close to us, or we fear our own death itself. Yet, we still don’t consider quality over quantity.

Generally, death gets a bad reputation as it is associated with hurt and unpleasant feelings of anger, loneliness, confusion, heartache, and even guilt of the things we didn’t say or do. And I would agree that Death and mourning can be tricky. Death can be cruel. It can rip us into pieces and leave us with insurmountable pain. It is often only when someone so close to our heart departs this world, that we realise not only what we have lost but how deeply we have loved. It is often the pain of deep heartache that lets us know we are even alive. And as much as it hurts, that pain is a reminder that we are still here and have a chance at life; we are still breathing.

The fact is, nothing is permanent, and death is part of life. The more we consider someone else’s mortality, and our own for that matter, the quicker we can lead a better life instead of wasting it with crap that doesn’t matter. There are people on their death bed right now, begging to get another chance to have a crack at life, but yet we are wasting our time because we think tomorrow is guaranteed. Nothing is guaranteed and time does not owe us anything. It is later than we think and sooner or later death will also knock on our door.

Ultimately death is inevitable. Bringing death closer is not about drowning ourselves in the painful memories of having lost someone, but celebrating the time we had with them. It is about how we choose to love and ultimately, how we choose to live. Bringing other’s death closer, helps us treat people better, and bringing our own mortality closer is about truly living and making the most out of the time we have left; those precious breaths we unconsciously take every day without noticing. This does not mean we should quit our jobs tomorrow and sit on a mountain meditating forever in the day, but about finding joy in every day. Whatever you decide that needs changing, this does not mean to make a drastic move, but considering where you are and where you would like to be in the future. If you do not like to be where you are today, then look at the actions of yesterday and the past days, weeks, months and maybe even years. It is the choices of your past that got you to exactly where you are right now. If you don’t like what you see, you have to change something here and now because the same actions will not magically produce different results. If you want to live a different life tomorrow, then you have to do something about it today and not wait for Monday or next year, or when you have the house, or lost the weight, or the car. Guess what? You may not make it there. So whatever it is that you want out of life, start doing something now because it can be over any moment.

Death is about looking at our life and asking ourself that if we died tomorrow, can we honestly say that we have lived a great life? Have we given the best of what and who we are? Have we loved enough? If not, why not? What is holding us back to live our best life? The buck stops with us and we are the only ones who are holding ourselves back. Every day that we are alive, we get given a new day. A day where we can decide how we view the world, how we go about our day and how we live. I am not here to tell you how you should live, because I would never want anyone to tell me how to live mine. All I am saying is that it is later than you think, and you don’t know when your time is up, so make the most of it. Stop worrying about the things that no one actually cares about, and start living the life that you dream of. We do not know when we draw our last breath. Death is the only thing that reminds us to make the most of life and making sure that we live life to its fullest. At some point, our bodies will give in on us, and it is all over.

For me, thinking about death makes me come alive as I know that my time comes sooner or later and I want to make the most with the time I have left. So, consider your own mortality and do the things that get you to living your best life, even if you have to make sacrifices along the way and do the uncomfortable things. Or don’t. For me, I do not want to lie on my deathbed one day thinking about all the things I didn’t say or didn’t do, the chances I didn’t take, the adventures I didn’t embark on. I want to live everything, even the things that are challenging at times. It is called life for a reason because the point is to live it and not to just exist.

Have you ever stopped and thought how amazing your body actually is? All the functions it performs on a daily basis without us noticing. Most people probably haven’t. We take the body and its functions for granted, and don’t pay much attention to the whole cycle of life that happens with every breath we take. It is only when we are plagued with a physical ailment that we start paying attention to our body. Unfortunately, at this point we don’t care about how incredible it is, but instead, are annoyed and frustrated at our body and want the pain to go away. We don’t even want to know why it is hurting, we just want to move on with our day.

For a second though, let’s look at this amazing machine called our body.  Every time we take a breath, we supply our lungs with oxygen, and the oxygenated blood is transported to our heart which gives life to us. Consider taking a deep breath, feeling the lung expand and your chest lifting. Isn’t it incredible? Think about your eyes looking at a screen, reading these words your brain understanding what these words say. Think about the sense of smell that evokes some memory. Every organ serves a function to not only help interpret the world, but to digest, transform, and protect the body. There is this incredible network of nerves and a system which has the ability to send signals to the brain and spinal cord from all over the body to interpret and accordingly action something. Think about you touching a hot stove and before you even string the thoughts together that the stove is hot, your hand has already been moved by your body’s intelligence. Think about when you cut yourself and how quickly platelets rush to the open wound to try and form a clot to stop the bleeding, and you watch over the next few days or weeks how your body rebuilds your skin. You would have to agree that the body is quite incredible. It eliminates the things we don’t need; it keeps and converts the things we do need. It just knows what to do.

When the time comes, where we feel pain or suffer from a disease, we get annoyed, frustrated and even angry at our body and/or ourselves. Sometimes the discomfort is so severe that we question what we have possibly done to deserve this. We get too caught up in how inconvenient our ailment is, instead of considering why this happened in the first place and ignore the possibility that the body might be trying to communicate with us. It also never crosses our minds how we abuse our body daily by not only feeding it junk food and leading mostly sedentary lifestyles, but also feeding it negative thoughts for most of our days. We read the news, we listen to news (which are mostly negative), we listen to people complain, maybe we even complain, we even tell ourselves that nothing good is happening in our lives and we wonder why our bodies are falling apart.

When we are struck with an illness, we think that our body must be against us. We go as far as hating a particular part of our body or all of our body because it is not behaving how we want it to. This way of thinking can be so detrimental, especially when we consider that our body is simply just trying to communicate with us and let us know that something is not in alignment; that we are out of alignment. Even looking at the word disease, or ‘dis-ease’, means something is out of order, not in flow, not in ease. Our body’s system is smart and let’s us know in various ways that things are not going well. The body is simply trying to say “hey, listen here, this way of living, this food, this exercise, this inaction, this running around, this way of thinking, this ….. you name it, is not working for us and we need to find a better way”.

Sometimes the way our body communicates is the result of thinking and it could be argued that we have manifested an ailment. I know this sounds far-fetched. But is it? Think about it. Think back to when you didn’t want to go on this school trip and all of a sudden you got stomach sick because you were anxious about something. The anxiety which is a mental thing, created a physical response. Think about that time you were so nervous about a meeting, that all of a sudden you had unexplained stomach pains. Think about every time an old injury plays up. Is that because you have some stressors going on? People have heart-attacks because of stress, stomach ulcers because of anger, headaches because they constantly overthink. We absolutely have the ability to manifest illnesses or injuries. Is it because we are attached to always having something wrong with us and it has even become our identity and people know us for it? People say “oh there is just always something wrong with you”. Maybe we subconsciously try to live up to that. Maybe we have even learnt that this is the only way how we get attention and so we keep reinventing the same or even different ailments. Sometimes, when the flu strikes, at most often at the most inconvenient time, it could be as simple as the body trying to tell us that we need to rest. Sure, there could be a hundred different reasons for it too but we never contemplate that maybe we just need to listen within.  Sometimes it is just an unfortunate event, but other times it is absolutely us ignoring our bodies’ needs and also playing out some unresolved internal issues on our bodies.  

In truth, the body does not want to hurt. It wants to be healthy. It wants to function and it wants to be in homeostasis. It does not want to go against us, it just tries to communicate with us but somehow, we are still not listening. We still try to push through. And when the body stops us in our tracks, no amount of getting annoyed and no amount of outsmarting the body will help with healing. We have to stop that and we also have to stop feeling sorry for ourselves when something bad happens. By us turning against our body and ourselves, we just create more of the same. Instead, we have to facilitate the healing process. We have to feed the body what it craves and that is very unique for each one of us. So let go of whatever you think the body needs to do and give it what it actually needs; sometimes that is discipline to awake at an odd hour and exercise it, and at other times, it is deep rest to reset. Know the difference and explore the pain. Explore what truly pains you. Is it some emotion, is it the shitty thoughts you think, is it that you keep running around non-stop? Whatever it is, find a way to let go. Some ailments are more complicated than others and may require some assistance, but don’t turn against your body. Understand that it is an intelligent way of letting you know that something is not in alignment and you have the power to change that. It is within your power to heal yourself if you dare to explore what truly pains you. Find the courage to look within and love your body because it loves you.

Life is complicated and often we are not sure which direction to take or what even is the right decision. We consult our partners, families or friends, or even strangers to help us make decisions. Whilst I would agree that some things are more complicated and life is complex at times, especially when life throws us a curve-ball, this is not always the case. We, as a species, have managed to complicate the simplest tasks; the tasks that are actually straight forward. We have made life and decision more complicated than they need to be.

One of the reasons for complicating life is probably the fact that we have more choices these days than we have ever had. A lot of the advancements are absolutely incredible and make life more efficient or easier in some way, but the number of choices can be overwhelming. Think about it: Your partner asks you to get some milk on the way home. Which one will you get? It is not as simple as just getting milk or a matter of full-cream or skim anymore. We now have all sorts of different vitamin varieties and different options of reduced fat milk. Not to mention grass-fed, organic, free-roaming, and we still haven’t decided on the brand yet. I don’t know what happened to normal milk, or what normal milk is anymore. And if you think this is confusing, try being a Barista when someone orders a half-strength decaf, lactose free, three-quarter latte. And then there is a Magic? What even is a Magic? Did someone shake a fairy to sprinkle some magic dust on it? Will a unicorn jump out of the cup? What happened to just simply ordering a coffee?

Consumerism has made things slightly murkier. We are being told by advertisements that we need to have bigger houses, cars, and certain pillows to sleep on to be happy. We buy things to impress others and don’t even know why we have a house full of junk. It sure sounds like a great deal when they tell you at 3.30am on TV that if you call now you get the second one for free. But if the device was as durable as promised, why do we need a second one in the first place? Consumerism and society tell us that we are not happy if we don’t have something, wear something, do something. So we do it in the pursuit of happiness only to feel more and more empty over time and wonder why we are facing the dark night of the soul. We try to cultivate happiness by external things, instead of creating it internally.

Another possible reason for complicating life could be that some of these advancements have also taken us further from ourselves than anticipated and we don’t trust ourselves. We don’t trust that we can make decisions on our own and start relying on others, or devices to make the decision. This way we can avoid responsibility for our actions all together. If the decision turns out to be a bad one, we can blame the person or equipment that gave us the advice, or did the thinking for us. If we make a bad call, we worry that people may not like-us (typical people pleasers). If we don’t have the device with the navigation system, we may not get to our destination. Some advancements have taken us away from ourselves and turned off our internal guiding system. I am not saying to never seek advice, or drive around aimlessly, but to listen carefully and understand whether the advice resonates, and understand that we are in charge of our decisions. We are the ones that take steps or decide not to take steps and where we turn on our path and understand that we can trust ourselves. And by trusting ourselves we can cut through the noise quickly and keep life simple.

The same could be said about interpersonal relations. We don’t need to catch up with people ten times to sound them out and understand whether we get on with them or not. It actually happens on a completely different level and is quite simple. After we meet someone, do we walk away feeling expanded or constricted? Do we feel open to the world, or closed off. That feeling tells us more than any analysis of the actual conversation ever could. Sure, maybe we want to explore whether we feel the same way a few more times to make sure, but the point is we have learnt to intellectualise things instead of listening to our gut when called for. Deep down in our gut we know whether something feels right or not, we know whether we should hang out with people or not, we know whether something is a good deal or not, we know whether we should pursue an opportunity or turn it down. I am not talking about the “not being sure about something or someone because we have been hurt before and we don’t trust it”, I am talking about the knowing deep down of what feels right and what doesn’t. No amount of advice-seeking will get us there because it still needs to align with ourselves and our path.

At some point we will be faced by decision-fatigue, especially the overthinkers among us. If we are unlucky, decision-fatigue will strike when we have no more f’s to give and are faced with life altering decisions. Don’t we rather have enough in our tank to consider those, instead of wasting time thinking about whether we should buy a wine, jam or mahogany coloured lipstick (yes, they are all a very similar colour red and no one actually notices the difference)? If we are unsure whether we should buy a particular shirt or not, it is quite simple – we probably shouldn’t do it. Don’t we know it all, we buy the shirt that we weren’t sure about and then it hangs in our wardrobe never to be worn. Listening within cuts through the noise and assists in keeping life simple. Listening to your gut also tells you whether your gut actually likes your coffee choice in the first place- it literally will tell you.

When you consider that you are the master of your destiny and simple every-day life can stay simple, you bring simplicity back into your life. Life will throw you enough unexpected challenges, just to keep life interesting, which is a real bummer for the control freaks among us. But keeping life simple frees us up to focus on the important things in life and deal with the big decisions, the decisions that do matter and we trust ourselves to make the right calls. As per one of my previous posts, to live life in consequence is to strip away the unnecessary. Life is too short to worry about the small stuff, and it is later than you think. Stop complicating life for yourself with overthinking and worrying about different shades of colour. Instead of looking for perfection, just pick one. Instead of waiting for some fairy dust to appear or wondering whether a unicorn will trot out of your cup, go out into the world and sprinkle your own magic everywhere.

The German language fascinates me. There are some words that technically are multiple words but have been stitched together to become a singular word. Some of which can’t be translated in other languages without losing some of their meaning, and one needs multiple words to describe these. Take “Sehnsucht”, which translates to “a deep longing for something” (I don’t care what Google-translate or other websites say because ‘longing’/’craving’ doesn’t cut it. One does not have Sehnsucht for cheese, but one has Sehnsucht for a person, a magical place or even a magical mysterious experience). Alternatively, you could also consider “Schadenfreude”, which translates to ‘deriving pleasure out of someone else’s misfortune”. This is not a post about the German language. This post is closely related to a particular word which can somewhat be translated for what it is  – “Hirngespinst”.

This word (which is also derived of two words), is often translated to “fantasy” and rightfully so, as it relates to having a crazy idea, or having illusions. It is made up of two words; Hirn = brain, Gespinst = spun yarn. When you think about it, it actually makes sense. We would spin some yarn in our brain to derive at some strange thinking. We keep weaving irrational thoughts together until we end up with a crazy idea and we like to then just run with it. Whilst this word probably is not used in the context of overthinking, not even by the Germans, I like to relate it to that. In some sense it is only one step away from spinning things together in our brain. Or is it?

Overthinking happens when we run our thoughts on auto-replay. It could possibly also be what prevents us from having a crazy idea because instead of weaving thoughts together in one way, we get overwhelmed by thoughts firing off in different parts in our brain. But maybe a Hirngespinst is the result of some overthinking and comes from wiring those thoughts together. Consider this: We find ourselves in a situation where we made a mistake or worry we have made a mistake. We keep replaying the situation over and over again and spend hours if not days thinking about it. We lay awake at night, and try to work out whether we did the right thing, or said the right thing. And it goes on and on.

Overthinking often leads to inaction. We are overwhelmed with the thoughts we have and having to remember what actually happened. The same could be said about worrying about a future project and we either don’t ever start because we cook up all sorts of thoughts about what may go wrong, or we try to plan every aspect of it and it gets all too hard and we abandon the idea or the event. The Project Managers aka Control freaks among us are all too familiar about thinking through when to do what, when to say what and keep other people in check, and even prepare for the off-chance that one of their friends who is coming over for dinner has forgotten to tell them that they are gluten free now. The best course of action is to abandon the party and the dinners altogether and uninvite our friends for a chill afternoon BBQ because we may forget the lactose-free cheese and it will be a disaster. It is best that we don’t go to the gym because we may hurt ourselves with the weights. The loop doesn’t discriminate between a future event or a past event, it just likes to keep on replay, day and night.

Overthinking can lead to creating a Hirngespinst. Spinning unhelpful thoughts together so we keep ourselves stuck and not pursue our dreams, re-living the past 500 times and worrying about things that most often will not happen. Whilst the actual meaning of Hirngespinst is to have a crazy idea or have illusions, overthinking may just be the same. We have ideas about what may or may not eventuate and we latch onto them, and accordingly we have misleading thoughts about ourselves, about others and about situations. As a result we also often tell ourselves that we are not good enough, we are not worthy of anything good, we didn’t handle something right, or we worry that our action in the future may create an unwelcome outcome. We keep ourselves stuck, the moment overthinking turns from simply thinking too much about something, into housing Hirngespinsts (plural).

Overthinking is the one thing that can be so detrimental in moving forward from a situation, or pursuing an opportunity. It needs to be cut out at its knees, and whilst you want to think some things through, some others can just be left alone and for situations to play out how they play out. We don’t need to control them, or think about how to control them, or even worry about them. We need to focus on what is happening here, right now, because we only have this given moment and overthinking takes us away from the present moment. Worrying about things that have a high likelihood of not occurring is wasted time. Even if the bad thought-out situation that we worry about arises, we have effectively lived the event twice (1x when we worry about it, 1x when the event occurs). What a waste of time. And the overthinkers who finally have let go of thoughts and not worry about anything, now worry about not worrying. And so it starts again.   

A lot of overthinking also stems from our constant need to people please, which I will write about another time, but this post would not be complete without mentioning it.

You may wonder by now if a Hirngespinst is at all useful. Well, society would say it is bad, because by definition it means to be having an absurd idea, but there are situations when one should explore the Hirngespinst, that lives in their head. This is especially so when someone has a ‘crazy’, yet brilliant idea.  If someone discourages someone from pursuing a dream or wanting to break away from the norm and do the uncommon in order to become the best version of themselves, and tells them that they have a Hirngespinst, don’t listen to them. Don’t listen to the naysayers and the people that want to keep you from your best self. They will hold you back at every opportunity. Instead, give the Hirngespinst some room to be explored. Spin those amazing, helpful and soulful thoughts together. Who knows, your Hirngespinst could be the best thing the world has ever seen.