Everyone is highly individualistic and your year will be too. This is not a technical “how-to” but rather a collection of suggestions that – depending on your strengths and weaknesses, where you are and where you want to go – will serve you in different ways in the year to come.
But regardless of where you find yourself right now, for each and every one of you reading – 2016 can be the best year of your life.
I promise you that, and I certainly plan to make it mine.
So.. let’s get started shall we?
Re-establish a strong connection with your own body
Western society has conditioned you to identify with your thoughts and to ignore your physical body. There is a mass of information – crucial information about your health, preferences, what you should or shouldn’t do – that can be found simply by getting better at feeling what is happening in your body.
Have you ever done work you really don’t like? You don’t like the work itself, or you don’t like the idea of it. Or even worse, you don’t like both.
Doing work you hate is one of the worst feelings in the world. It’s not just your mind saying “This sucks” – you can feel it in your body.
It really feels like your soul is dying!
Conversely, things that are good for you usually feel good in the body. Exercise, eating healthy food and drinking green juice are some easy examples.
But have you ever conquered a fear? Approached a girl after being scared out of your wits? Had a long and fruitful conversation with a good friend? Created something tangible you’re proud of – then shown it to the world?
You feel exhilarated, immensely grateful, full of energy, at peace. And again it’s not just your mind saying “You did a good job” – you feel it in your body. That feeling is a good indicator of whether you’re doing the right thing.
You can learn to feel the difference between deep satisfaction or wellbeing [fulfilment] and the fleeting pleasure of instant gratification – there is a big difference. But the only way to know this in yourself is to experience it firsthand.
How to get in touch with your body
Try this bioenergetic routine below, and notice what happens:
Wim Hof’s breathing and cold exposure methods are another great way to go – I have incorporated this into my current morning routine and it’s been very effective at waking me up immediately and providing energy for the day.
Cut limits on your thinking entirely – (100% of the time, no limits at all, none whatsoever)
We’ve all heard of “limiting beliefs” – beliefs people hold about themselves or the world that hold them back in some fundamental way. This is usually along the lines of
- “I can’t do ________”
- “I could never ________”
- “I’ll never be good at ________”
and so on.
People cut themselves off from the possibility of success before they’ve even tried. Worst of all, most of the time they don’t even realize this is happening.
I had coffee with a friend over Christmas and she told me how she wished she could make a living as a novelist.
“I fantasize about being a writer” she said. She’s a smart girl – no reason she couldn’t be – “You could” I said, but she laughed it off and said “Let’s be real”. She felt sure she had to stay on her path to becoming a lawyer.
“Ok” I said, and I didn’t push it. But in my head I was thinking “Why would you cut yourself off like that?” Crazy.
“Be realistic” people say. Ok, be realistic. But let’s also be realistic about how much you actually know about what’s going to happen in the future.
You have a pretty good idea of what will happen tomorrow, and the day after. A week from now your guess is a little less accurate, but still close to reality.
But what about a year from now? 5, 10 years? Who knows what could happen?
For example, it is within the realm of possibility that you could become a millionaire.
Will you be a millionaire tomorrow? Probably not.
Will you be a millionaire one year from now? Maybe, but probably not.
Will you be a millionaire in 10 years? Who knows!
No one in the world knows what is going to happen in 10 years. And you don’t know any better or worse than anyone else.
So yes, be realistic, in the short term. There’s no reason to delude yourself (I will be a millionaire tomorrow)
But in the long term.. why would you close off any of the truly infinite possibilities with your own thinking!
Pay closer attention to the details of your experience
In the movie The Prestige they keep repeating the line: “Are you watching closely?” I would turn that question to you:
Are you watching your own experience closely?
There’s a lot going on here!
All kinds of sensory phenomena are passing through your awareness, and everything is changing, all the time.
Consider:
What does the passing of time feel like? Isn’t it weird that you remember some things and not others? Is there a difference between an event happening and not remembering it, and it not happening at all?
Look at the colours around you. Why does the world look like that? Notice the sensation of the inside of your mouth. What’s your posture like right now? How’s your breathing?
When you’re on a plane and you see the mountains and the clouds and the sun from way up high – you’re seeing something that maybe 1% of human beings in history have ever seen. Isn’t that incredible?
What do you like best about fucking? How does it feel to be energized by music? Or caffeine? What about running or lifting weights?
Think about taste – isn’t that interesting? You put something on this muscle in your mouth that you also use for talking and you get different sensations… where? Is taste happening on your tongue or in your brain? Both?
Where do thoughts come from? What the fuck is consciousness? Look at your hand and move it around – that’s a miracle! How this is all happening – nobody knows. The whole thing is wild – it shocks and amazes me every day… but welcome to the mystery of life.
You have the opportunity every minute – as my friend Nic often says – to give your gifts back to the world.
Are you taking advantage of that opportunity? Have you discovered your gifts and the best way to give them back?
If not… it helps to start paying very close attention to what’s going on.
Start Meditating
Longtime readers will know, I talk about meditation a lot. Here I am not telling you – I am asking you, for your own sake, please start meditating.
At least try it.
If you are serious about your life, you must try meditation for at least a few weeks. The potential benefits are just too great to pass up.
For me personally there are a few things that are completely necessary to function well in life. These are 1) eating nutritious, healthy food, 2) sleeping enough and 3) exercising regularly. Barely, barely below that is regular meditation.
People who start meditating and work on expanding their consciousness often describe themselves as having been ‘asleep’ before. They were sleepwalking through life, and now they are awake.
(It sounds exaggerated, it sounds pretentious, it sounds a lot of things – but that’s really the difference it makes)
On Tim Ferriss’ podcast he interviews highly successful people in all different areas – entrepreneurs, athletes, hedge fund managers, best selling authors, doctors, scientists and so on. There are over 100 episodes and over 80% of those people have some form of meditation practice.
Again I’m not telling you to do it – I’m asking you. In 2016 please start meditating.
There are many ways to learn. You can listen to guided audio meditation on Headspace or Fragrant Heart. You can try walking meditation, or transcendental (chanting/mantra) meditation.
Click here for a simple body awareness meditation – another great way to get started.
Put yourself out there to find your ‘tribe’
I’ve met some really amazing people, entirely because of this website. I didn’t anticipate it at all when I started writing, not one bit. But it’s turned out to be one of the best things about this whole thing.
I met Nic Gregoriades and showed him this post – he shared it on social media and then contributed a fantastic guest post on meditation without asking for a single thing in return.
I met Cam Adair, who runs an excellent website about quitting video game addiction, through a mutual friend who introduced us because I wrote about how to quit a masturbation addiction.
Phil Hawksworth got in touch because he was a reader of this site – we’re now friends and he’s a great guy.
Most of my friends are pretty cool people – that’s not a brag, just the truth – and I’m extremely grateful to have them in my life. But at the same time, I recognize that putting myself out there has had a lot to do with it.
Another quick example:
Another friend of mine recently took up a prominent position in a club at his university advocating drug policy reform – basically letting everyone know he is ’pro-drug’. This is a somewhat controversial/risky position to take in a modern academic setting.
Right away though, he told me, people he knew started coming out of the woodwork about their positive drug experiences – “coming out of the psychedelic closet” as he put it. He was able to connect with these people on a deeper level than before, and meet new people with similar interests as well.
These are just two examples of what happens when you put yourself out into the world – you attract people who are like you, you form stronger and deeper connections with people you care about, and you open yourself up to greater opportunity in the future in a whole bunch of different ways.
So – get out into the world in 2016! Life doesn’t happen in your bedroom, in your apartment, or in your head. It happens out there, over the cliff, on the other side of your fear. It’s up to you to make it happen.
To wrap up..
So as maybe you can tell.. I’m pretty excited for the year to come.
I will continue to use this platform to support you on your journey in any way I can, as you continue to follow me on mine.
Here’s to a great 2016 for all of us.
Aaron
If you liked this post, you’ll probably also like my book Self Improvement in Practice – a concise, practical guide to positive and constructive personal development