TL/DR:

Comparing levels of happiness, or otherwise, at different points in your life, looking at your current mindstate now, and the use of mindfulness in your everyday life.

Introduction:

Today, I caught myself comparing my current level of happiness to that of before the red pill, and I thought of some interesting things that may be useful to you all.

I use mindfulness in my day to day life, every moment I can think to. I assume there is a weird stigma associated with those that practice mindfulness. I also assume that many people in the world think of meditation as some weird mantra that hippies practice, maybe, especially, the younger crowd here. I assume this, because I once did and did not understand the total picture. To any of you that do not practice meditation or mindfulness, or do not understand the benefits associated with it, I hope to elaborate for you. Additionally, I want to explain how something as simple as your mind state, or comparing that of your current self to your past self, may not always be beneficial, and how mindfulness can show you how to correct your own mind state.

Body:

For me, mindfulness outside of meditation goes something like this;

"Notice your thoughts are occurring, and make yourself aware of what exactly is going on as often as possible."

And someone may come along and ask;

"Well, what's the point? I get what you're doing, but why? What are you achieving?"

And I may answer something like this;

"It's not something you achieve, it's something you practice. It's similar to deadlifting; you don't achieve a deadlift, you just do a deadlift. And after you do deadlifts over and over again, eventually you get better at them. As a benefit, you get stronger, more fit to fight, and you relieve tension... just as you do with mindfulness."

In other words, mindfulness isn't something you do to achieve anything, it's just something you do. As a result of your doing, sometimes certain aspects of you get better. For example, it's very in line with stoicism, and you'll inadvertently get better at coping with life's curve balls if you practice one, or both, hand in hand. You will also learn how to handle your emotions better, since you'll figure out your triggers or irritations, and then quickly work to focus on your breathing and realize the thoughts are not you.

I've had several points in my life where I've had a hard time coping with anger. I'd get extremely frustrated, when what seems like, sub par individuals, have a hard time grasping extremely easy concepts. I also would get frustrated when people by the million would probably agree with me on a certain point, yet this persons ego was so far up their ass, they were unable to step back and look at themselves out of principle. And this isn't women I am talking about, I will never take them serious, this is grown up men I am speaking on.

But with mindfulness, you're able to step back... not only from anger, but frustration and sadness, and see that they are not the issue, you are. And I DO NOT mean that you're wrong in the way you may think I do; I mean you're wrong for not realizing you're not your short lasting thoughts, and in any situation, a calm and collected you is always better. In other words, there is no situation, at any point, where any emotions can genuinely help you. Because when there is a positive emotion (shit, anger and stress can even be positive.) there are negative emotions trailing behind in the event that things don't turn out the way you've intended. This is when you can really learn to apply outcome independence to your entire life. Does this mean to live life like a robot and not have reactions to things? No. It means to notice these reactions are occurring.

If I sit behind a sane person who isn't quite fond of me and poke them with a stick, they may think it's slightly humorous. If I continue to do this, the person will start to get agitated. But mindfulness allows you to see your thoughts as if they were graphed. As the slope of the graph starts to increase, you point it out to yourself, "look, the graph is rising, I am becoming frustrated." Doing this allows the graph to level out. Don't believe me? Try it. The next time you have a thought occur (especially that you do not enjoy.) , notice it. Say to yourself, "I am getting XXXXX." And whatever it is, say it. Watch how your noticing the emotion, causes any momentum behind it to trail off. It is because you never allowed this emotion to gain momentum. You didn't allow your thought to gain speed and change your mind into a battlefield of reason as to why you should skip the gym, or why you should cancel a date. The thought just is.

ONE HUGE aspect to remember; do NOT force the thought out of your mind. It took me a couple months to get out of the habit of pushing thoughts away. This is much worse. Those thoughts that we do not want in our minds, the ones we force to exit our minds, usually fight back by becoming more MEANINGFUL. That's right, our brain realizes the thought must be significant, otherwise we wouldn't have assigned it such a magnitude (one of significance since we do not want it to exist.). Don't force, just notice.

So I hope this helps you on your life's path. Couple mindfulness with meditation and notice lasting effects. Do some research and you can see that meditation actually changes neuronal pathways in the brain (pre and post fMRI confirms.) for the better.

Lastly, today I realized I was thinking of life before The Red Pill, and whether or not I was happier. And that moment, I was able to point it out to myself. I didn't find out if I was happier before or after... because now is now. I don't know if I will be happier tomorrow, because tomorrow never actually comes when everyday you say, "tomorrow." The only thing you have is right now. This does NOT mean for you to do everything at once, or nothing at all. It means that you need to be doing something, anything you enjoy or that makes you better, and remain engaged in the present, in that something. Do not let fear, procrastination, past resentments, or worry of future outcomes take away from the seconds that tick today. Just notice these emotions are occurring, and they will never gain enough significance to cause discomfort.