A Fresh Look on Instincts and Life Quality
I’ve been doing a lot of thinking about instincts. I hate agonizing (too much thinking) over decisions I have to make. Over thinking is a terrible habit but I don’t know what to do about it. It gives me a headache and I waste a lot of time in the decision making process. I wish I could give my brain a vacation and just do whatever “feels” like a good idea. I wish I could “trust my instincts” and blindly believe that they will naturally make the right decisions for me. There is only one problem. My instincts often suck!
I don’t know about you, but my instincts often tell me to stay up super late, eat a lot of junk food, drink too much beer, and watch countless hours of hilarious TV. I “know” it’s stupid but it “feels” like a good idea. That’s why it’s so tempting. Our logical brain is always arguing with our emotions and desires.
It’s hard to lead a “balanced” life. If I notice one day that I can’t fit properly into my jeans because my butt and stomach are a bit too big, I’ll “pull a 180″ (which means to do the exact opposite of what I’ve been doing) and start exercising and dieting like a madman. It’s all I can think about for several months. Of course I’m exaggerating a bit, but you know what I’m talking about.
After several months, my physical health is great and I realize that my business, or something else, is sucking. Then I start going overboard with that. It seems hard for me to focus on more than one thing. If I’m working hard at business, I seem to almost forget that eating pizza and drinking coke everyday will have me looking like a cow in only a few short months. The problem continues…..
It’s such an easy trap to fall into. It’s hard to balance being healthy, learning new stuff, having enough fun with friends, sleeping enough, working hard but not overdoing it. Everyone can understand what they should do but very few people can do it. It’s so easy to be failing in at least one major area of life. Humans are great at failing. We don’t even have to try. Failure is our natural gift. (If that’s really true than I’d have to say that I’m incredibly gifted) We only have 24 hours in a day and it’s not enough. I honestly have no idea what I do with most of those hours…..
It’s actually not very difficult to be great in one area of life. It is however almost impossible to be just good in all the major areas. This is at least true in my own life and what I’ve noticed with other people.
Let me share a true story with you.
I know this guy who used to love to party. He would always go out and have a great time with his friends. His whole life was about having fun. He succeeded big time. People liked him. He was great to be around. He was interesting to talk to and he enjoyed his life. Of course his health and money situation sucked though because of his lifestyle.
He decided to pull a huge 180. He totally stopped drinking, he started getting up at 6:00 am everyday. He worked like a maniac. He’s been doing this for over 5 years now. He wanted to prove to himself and to the world (especially his girlfriend and father) that he wasn’t a loser and could succeed if he wanted to.
He now drives a super expensive European car and owns several houses. He’s rich. The self-discipline paid off. It worked. But there was unfortunately a huge price to pay. He’s BORING! It’s easy to see on his face that he’s working too much. His stories are no longer funny and he’s really sensitive. He wanted to succeed so badly that he lost his sense of humor. Everyone around him has noticed it. Even some of my friend’s parents commented on what happened. (It’s a bad sign when your friend’s mother says that your friend has become boring)
It’s not my life so I can’t judge whether or not those decisions were worth it. I just know that he used to just do whatever his instincts told him to do and then he changed into some guy who followed every possible little rule he could think of to make his life more boring.
I know that “the answer” is living somewhere in the middle of these extreme behaviors, but it’s hard. I’m still working on this kind of “balanced success” and I still don’t know the secret. If anyone has any advice, I’d love to hear it. Please be honest though; are you able to actually follow your own advice in your own life?
April 9th, 2011 at 8:03 pm
Hi Andy
I fully agree with You that this is difficult to get appropriate work- life balance as well as avoidance this thinks what we know that’s bad and ill for as but we really like it.
But with regard to the story about the gay who become boring I have to say that I actually know several gays who work really hard and earn a lot of money and at the same time they remained a funny and interesting one.
Regards
Hubert
April 9th, 2011 at 11:05 pm
That’s life. We all have mixed feelings all the time. I think is easier to give any advice than to follow it in our own daily life. I have been looking forward to this kind of “balanced success” between enjoying life going out with friends on weekends and eating healthy food. Let me explain myself. If I stay at home I get bored but I prepare and eat a healthy salad. On the other hand, if I go out to any friend’s party, what I enjoy so much, I am definitely going to eat junk food. That is one of my biggest dilemmas. In fact I am fit but I have had to pay a huge price for it, I have been fighting against temptations most of my life.
So guys, Thanks a lot for your great work. You’ve got me the opportunity to practice my Written English. …Waiting for the next blog…
Atria
April 10th, 2011 at 10:21 am
I’ve never thought about the relationship between instincts and quality life before I read this story. In my opinion, it is a kind of contract. If we make process just based on our instincts then it is unsure that our decisions can come into effect cuz human beings are still filled of different sorts of desries including the right and the the wrong. It is better to firstly together our instincts and the real situatuons then to make process. It can do a little help on balancing our life!
April 10th, 2011 at 4:54 pm
I’m addicted to Over Thinking. This is kind of obsession and although it is annoying, it has its own benefits. Whenever i am going to make a decision, i study all the possibilities, the goods and the bads and review theme over and over. It reduces the error probability and protects you from wrong decisions. So i am okay with that. My advice is to trust your instincts only when an idea pops into your head. After that, do not let those instincts to rule. Put them aside and use your logical mind to develop that idea.
April 10th, 2011 at 4:55 pm
(Instincts)Gosh, Unless, I have a solid information about the subjects what I am doing it I would never follow my instincts. As you say your instincts suck, same here my instincts suck a big time.
In my experiance, if I have a decent job and strong bank balance, I can be very comfortable and be around people plus funny too. On the flip side, I feel worthless and low selfconfident to be around people. I won’t have the guts to talk to people too.
April 10th, 2011 at 9:13 pm
Hey Brian,
Nice writing and great use of words. I just wanted to point out one thing that might help a lot of you guys. When you said “the goods and the bads” of a decision, I know exactly what you mean but the way to say it is “the pros and the cons”. Pros are positive things and cons are the negatives.
I hope that makes sense. A classic example sentence would be, “People should always weigh the pros and the cons before making a major decision”.
April 11th, 2011 at 4:21 am
I wanna ask you something, I know it might sound like it’s got nothing to do with this blog but I’ll ask you anyways. I’ve been following you for a long time and once or twice in the past (I think more), you did some videos in the free-section (wich were pretty cool by the way), I was wondering, What happened to that activity? I mean, It were great if you continued doing them… Are you thinking of doing more videos? or Don’t you want to do any videos anymore?
Me.
April 11th, 2011 at 9:35 am
Wow, It sounds like u tried to fight againt your instincts but u were in a dilemma. But u’re not alone. I delt with this situations several times and I sick of all the ideas comming out of my brain but I seemd to have nothing to do with them. I was as lazy as u when for some reason I decided to procrastinate a little bit. Instead of doing something reasonable I was acting really aimless. I can’t agree u more that it’s some kind of human natual, it’s gifted in bad way. How about making a medium 90? Try not making yourself to be overboard with your job, diet and the way u think. It’s good to have a self-displine but not way too much. We should measure our life from happiness than material wealth, right? These words were coming from your mouth u forget it, do u? Anyway, I like reading your blog and enjoying all the positive way of thinking that u gave us. There is chinese saying, even though it is hard but I’m still working on it and I’d never fall back because I knew I’ve been on the road ever since I decided to do it.
“不到最後一刻,決不輕言放棄”
Anyway, I guess I’m getting out of theme a little bit. I made this phrase of my own by the way. haha
Cheers
Mardy.
April 11th, 2011 at 12:55 pm
Hello,
I can’t give you any advice. Actually I was expecting a advice from you. In my life I have the same doubt’s and I have to think a lot about anything before choose what I need to do. I work everyday to improve my life and my skills, I try study English at least 1 hour a day, but sometimes I want to watch a movie firstly, and after watch the movie I find another activity more interesting to do. I know what I need to do, but my “instincts” says me to do another things.
In my opinion, if you are a sedentary person, your brain and your body always will induce you to choose the easy activity to save energy. You need to condition your brain and your body to hard activities, and that takes time. The big problem is that is much easier to miss along the way and go back to square one, then you need start all over again. It suck! People lose motivation and fail to get out of this vicious circle.
April 12th, 2011 at 11:12 am
You should trust to your instincts but don’t think about it too much. You might become an indecisive person. In other hand, if you don’t think about result of your movement, you’ll have a bad end. Where we can find the golden mean. Be rich and unhappy as this guy or have nothing and be happy.
April 12th, 2011 at 12:27 pm
Hi. My name is Ken (27 years old) from Japan and this is the first time I’ve come here.
One month ago I bought an iPod and began to listen to China 232, and I find it pretty interesting!
—That’s why I am now commenting on your blog here.
Browsing this website, I’m now wondering if I should pay $37 (don’t know it’s expensive or cheap for what I will actually get). Maybe I will join.
Oh, before I leave, I think I have to give you an answer to your question: “Incrementalism”, which Lindblom proposed, could work for you.
April 12th, 2011 at 2:48 pm
Hi,
)
I’m a rational kind of person, thus I follow my instinct very rarely.
Anyway, I find it very difficult to take decisions, any kind of decisions. I usually spend a lot of time weighing the pros and cons, and at times it’s quite a frustrating experience. I would like to be more instinctive, but I simply cannot help overthinking.
The problem is that I often put off the moment of taking a decision, I simply wait and think, wait and think, and eventually I end up making the wrong choice (well not always.. but sometimes
Ps you’re making a very good job with your podcasts, I’ve just discovered them and they’re great!
April 12th, 2011 at 4:08 pm
Hey Andy
Thank you, and thanks for the correction. It takes a lot of work to make englsih our “Second Native language”
April 13th, 2011 at 6:39 am
Hello guys, I was thinking about how we can be in touch with each other with emails! Andy is there any possiblities that you can adjust comments in a way that we can see each other’s mail address? I have a few awsome files about learning english that I think can hit the spot.
you guys agree with me?
April 15th, 2011 at 5:32 am
hello!
I accept Hadi’s suggestion, good Idea!
Because I’m looking for a partner with good English and i see every person in this blog is good. We are from different countries, so we can sure interesting subject and improve our English efficiently.
Thank you Andy for your interesting articles. Your writings are so sweet.
April 15th, 2011 at 7:52 am
Thank you Mehdi for supporting me but we have to wait and see what Andy’s gonna do.
April 15th, 2011 at 9:23 am
Hi Hadi,
Thanks for the idea. We’re working on making both the free section and the VIP section much better. The emails are personal so I don’t want to just give them away to everyone because some people won’t like it. Also, the spam software will steal people’s email and send everyone a lot of stupid messages.
Our plan with the VIP is to make it way cooler (we have a ton of surprises we’re working on). Because it’s private, there will be no spam. All of the VIP members will be able to have a whole community of high level people talking together. Members will share emails, skype, and anything cool or interesting. This will be great for anyone who wants to join it. Add and I will also be really active in this new and awesome community too. I hope this makes sense.
April 16th, 2011 at 10:58 am
Woow, I don’t know where this feeling comes from when I read your response to the commen I put it here the other day.Anyway It really makes sense and I’m going to join VIP section this summer coz I’m passing my university courses now.They really suck!
Thanks again Andy. Cann’t wait to join VIP section but I need to stick it out for the next two month.
Yours truly
April 16th, 2011 at 7:38 pm
Hello Andy and Hadi and my other friends in this blog
Thank you Andy for your answer to comments. I hope you succeed in your great work on VIP section. I’m pretty sure it works even better than now.
Most of the time you start your emails or blogs with sentence Like this :”I did a lot of thinking …”. I always ask myself what does it means exactly?!! I hardly remember that I had sit and think about something for a long time like this. I’m an electrical engineer and do not think except I’m going to solve a mathematics problem. Now I decided to experience your thinking activity and see what does it like.
When I want to practice writing on a specific writing, the first question is: what I’m going to write? there always is no answer and it SUCKS! ( I learned this phrase of you Andy and Hadi) Now I think here is the answer: I cannot think effectively.
sorry for my long comment. I know you succeed in your work Andy, because your main goal is helping others.
April 21st, 2011 at 4:32 pm
Hi Mehdi, I don’t think that you’re not able “to do a lot of thinking”. Maybe you just find it hard to concentrate on things which are not related to your job. Everyone spends a lot of time thinking and reflecting, the process is so innate that most of the time we are even unaware of it.
April 22nd, 2011 at 10:41 am
Thank you dear Federica for your attention and your helpful comment. I agree with you. It is hard for me to concentrate on my work specially when there is another interesting thing to do. Concentrating on a work for a long time make me feel exhausted badly. However, I’m concentrating right now on writing a good comment for you. It may be a good practice to improve both my English and my concentrating ability. Forgive me for any mistake you see in my letter.
Have a good time Friend.
April 22nd, 2011 at 12:14 pm
Just one thing to wrap up Mehdi’s issue:
We’re dealing with evil situations and people that affect our sense and decisions most of the times but now, here , we have china232.
Love you Andy and Add
April 22nd, 2011 at 12:33 pm
Hello Guys, I hope everything is doing well with you.
First of all, I’d like to say THANK YOU for the great job both of you have been doing. I’ve been learning a lot with your tips, not only about learn English, but also about how to become a better human been. Talking about the topic: I guess these kind of staff concerns a lot of people, including me. Nowadays society is cruel with us, You must be great in personal life as well as in professional life. It’s extremelly hard and people are under so much pressure. Talking about me, I have a “Spatarna” schedule, I wake up 4 am, take 2 buses to go to work, then I go to college and arrived at home around 12 pm. I’m married and – as you probable imagine – I have to carefully give attention to my wife and my beatiful son. To make things worse I work every Saturday which is not common here in Brazil and to finish the week I usually play soccer at sunday’s morning. That’s my every week battle and let me say something, I’m happy with all the things I do. I mean, the most important thing is not do what people think you should do, I do believe the KEY is to do what you have do to be successful and spend time with people who you love. That’s my point of view to balance personal and profiisional life.
I hope heard a lot about “The Canadian Brothers”
See you around,
from Brazil,
Roberto Geronimo
April 24th, 2011 at 10:11 am
Happy Easter to everybody!!:)
April 24th, 2011 at 2:39 pm
Hello Roberto
I hope you graduate soon and spend more time with your family.
In my opinion, these days, there are many people all over the world (specially in developing countries) who are under pressure in order to have a proper standard of living. Some people have two jobs simultaneously.
April 24th, 2011 at 2:43 pm
Happy Easter!! However we do not have Easter ceremony. I would be glade to know about it.
April 27th, 2011 at 3:12 am
Appreciate your work and I like what you two are doing for us ,thank your for your sharing and good luck ,I am always supporting you guys!
April 27th, 2011 at 11:05 am
hi,
I totally agree with. it’s a nice article.
April 27th, 2011 at 10:04 pm
Hello Mehdi. I’d like to say THANK YOU for your words. I have been searching for someone to share tips, skills and everything related to learn English.
I was reading your comment and I realize that you have the same goal. So, If you want we can try exchange some ideas be e-mail.
What do you think?
Best Regards, from Brazil
Roberto Geronimo
April 28th, 2011 at 6:16 am
hello Roberto, my friend from Brazil
Your English is excellent and I would be proud to be your partner. I’m pretty sure that I will learn a lot from you, if it is possible. Unfortunately we can’t release our email address because of spam software. So I tried to find your name on facebook, but there was so many results. If you are a user of this site, you may want to search me with the name ‘mehdi deilamani’ (a profile with picture) and add me as a friend. The site will offer a more comfortable place to communicate.
hope to see you anyway.
April 28th, 2011 at 7:10 pm
Helllo Mehdi, I hope you are doing well. What a such good idea you had! I’m in Facebook and as soon as possible I will add you as a friend. For sure facebook is a perfect place to us share comments and tips about learn and – why not? – improve in many aspects.
Whitout doubt, see you pretty soon.
Best Regards,
from your new Brazilian friend
Roberto Geronimo
May 3rd, 2011 at 8:50 am
I totally agree with you. I think there is an instinct inside all of us that guide us to do the things which we are good in and in this way we can keep our confidence high . When we need to risk and do a new thing , we focus on it to prove we can and thus, we forget the other sides of our life.
I belive we should know what we want from our life , what make us happy in our life and in where we want to be in next 10 years , then make a plan . I’ve already started this way 6 monthes ago . I write a plan each month and check if I’ve succeeded to do so in the last day of month before making a new plan for the next month … now it’s more easier than the early monthes and I feel satisfied when I can do my plan … I belive, if I persevere, finally I will do it instinctly… I suggest you try it
August 11th, 2011 at 1:01 am
I think there is no magic solution. It’s simple, easy to say but hard to apply: choose one and enjoy your choice, enjoy the benefits of it and minimize the negative aspects of your choice. You can’t be everything.
October 3rd, 2011 at 1:36 pm
what’s happening, outstandin g blog on blubbery loss. this helped.
January 27th, 2012 at 12:12 pm
Agreed, NYB …
January 30th, 2012 at 8:09 pm
hey there and thank you for your information – I have certainly picked up anything new from right he…
April 9th, 2012 at 6:10 am
Utterly pent written content , thankyou for selective information .
April 19th, 2012 at 1:40 pm
Very intriguing points you might have observed , thanks for posting .
April 24th, 2012 at 11:33 am
There are actually some videos of the inside of this plant and some GM plants on Youtube.. The camera workat times is not very good, and you’ll want to turn the volume off, but in these videos you’ll see how well built the buildings are/were and the images of the facility from the inside out to the grounds is rather awesome in that you’ll see the breadth and depth of the footprint on which these building stand. You’ll have to be patient with these amateurs as some of them are..well.. thugs.. who broke into the buildings and shot some footage because they could.. There is a video of the Packard Plant in particular, that is broken into three separate segments.
June 13th, 2012 at 9:05 pm
Little Dave says I thank you for this.
June 16th, 2012 at 2:26 am
The design for your web site is a tad off in Epiphany. Even So I like your website. I may have to install a normal browser just to enjoy it.
June 17th, 2012 at 2:47 pm
Oh man! This blog is sick! How can I make it look this good .
July 12th, 2012 at 12:35 pm
Sorachi is spelled wrong. Do I win?
August 31st, 2012 at 3:48 pm
hi Andy and Add!
Having a balance in everything does really make sense. too much work will wear off your body. over thinking of something like problems of daily life, sometimes the thing you only need is to take some rest, eat a good meal and enough sleep and you’ll find yourself being more effective and efficient at every task you are going to do the next day especially decision making..
Thanks for the story, it happens to many..
September 30th, 2012 at 5:56 pm
hey hi, guys, its really an interesting topic that one, my point of view about the story above is that its worth it. I particularly dont want to live my live being a clown and not being successful, so if i have to pay that to become a millionaire, i’ll do it. but anyway, i think we can be both interesting and successful.