Alone but Not Lonely

There's a saying: "Getting used to it" is a very poignant phrase that can replace all the unspoken words.

Whenever someone asks you, "How have you been lately?" You can always subconsciously reply with, "Just like that, getting used to it."

Getting used to it, is the bitterness that almost slips out but is silently swallowed back; getting used to it, is wanting to rely on someone but having to hide the vulnerability.

Many times, when we say we're used to it, we're not really used to it, but rather, what else can we do?

Some words, no matter how much we say, are not heard by those who don't care about us; some emotions, no matter how deeply described, are not understood by those who don't care about us.

Slowly, we all learn, to handle things ourselves, to swallow our own bitterness.

I know, there are times when you're really tired. Like when you come home after a day's work and still have a pile of chores to do; like when negative emotions have been suppressed for too long without release; or like when you're facing all sorts of troubles alone.

You must have eagerly hoped that when you couldn't bear it anymore, someone would stand behind you and gently support you.

But as the saying goes: there's nothing too difficult, the standards adults set for themselves are always to get through it.

Of course, you know there are people in this world who love you, care about you, but you can't bear to let them share your burdens.

Perhaps, everyone has such thoughts.

If it's something joyful, I'm willing to share it with you first. If it's something sad, I hope to bear it alone, I hope you never know.

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"Laziness is your body's best signal."

In life, I've found that many people who aren't doing well often encounter this dilemma: they have many ideas, but their motivation always lags behind. They often have many things they want to do, always ambitious and making many plans, but in the end, they fail to complete them for various reasons. Over time, people become frustrated and lack confidence. Some even feel like they're just lazy, destined to waste their lives. In fact, motivation is the key factor that sets people apart. On a smaller scale, it affects the achievement of one or two things; on a larger scale, if motivation cannot keep up in the long run, people will develop self-doubt and become more self-conscious and withdrawn in the face of repeated setbacks. We usually think that the strength of motivation depends on willpower and perseverance, and those without motivation are simply lazy.

But in psychology, the key to improving motivation lies in building good relationships, which involves two aspects:

1. Relationship with tasks;

2. Relationship with oneself. A person who always lacks motivation may not necessarily have a problem with themselves but because they haven't built good relationships.

1.Relationship with tasks: Why do you want to change?

"Building good relationships" may sound abstract at first, but it's actually closely related to our lives. I once had an interesting job: providing psychological support for people trying to lose weight. In my daily work, I needed to understand their emotional state, progress in weight loss, and effectiveness, etc. After a while, I found that I had inadvertently acquired a skill: predicting whether someone would succeed in losing weight (with an accuracy rate of about 80%). I didn't need to know their physical indicators but to understand their motivations for losing weight. I would ask everyone the same question: what happened that made you decide to lose weight? Different answers reflect different understandings of weight loss. The first two types of people have the shallowest understanding of weight loss and are just making impulsive decisions. This means that there is only a weak connection between them and the goal of "losing weight," and the motivation they can stimulate is also very limited. So, it's easy to become enthusiastic for a short time, but once the initial excitement wears off, it becomes difficult to have motivation again. The third situation is slightly better. Some older friends who are in poor health often suffer from illness and hope to lose weight to become healthy and reduce pain. This means that their connection with "losing weight" will be deeper, and they will have more motivation to keep going. Therefore, even though their metabolism is lower and losing weight is more difficult, because their motivation is stronger, their motivation is also stronger, and they are more likely to succeed. Of course, this motivation is still not the highest, after all, they are urged to lose weight by a doctor. However, it's easy to see that the degree of motivation shown by different degrees of connection with the goal will be completely different.

2.The strongest motivation comes from the deepest relationships

In fact, weight loss is like a metaphor for many things in life. We often make many plans, such as reading, taking exams, going to bed and getting up early, eating a balanced diet, learning new skills, etc. Everyone knows that these things are "good" and worth doing, but when it comes to action, they find themselves with more will than strength. That's because the understanding of "good" at this time only stays at the level of the mind and lacks experience. Conversely, when a person has a deep understanding and experience of what they are doing, they can generate tremendous motivation.

Once, I met a lady named Lee, who showed amazing execution in losing weight. In her past life, she had always been chubby and had never seriously tried to lose weight. But after starting a strict exercise and diet plan, she hardly ever missed a day and rarely complained. I was curious why she was so good at it, so Lee shared her experience with me. All along, her attitude towards life had been perfunctory; she just got by at work, wasn't invested in relationships, and handled conflicts with her boyfriend coldly. She never thought there would be any problem with this. Until last year, she was suddenly fired from her job and broke up. The two blows struck her suddenly like lightning, and she realized the problem and felt unprecedented pain. Lee wanted to change, but she felt powerless and felt a huge sense of powerlessness and loss of control. Just when she was feeling hopeless, she accidentally ran into a high school friend she hadn't seen in years. In her memory, her friend was just like her, chubby, timid, and lacking in confidence. But now, her friend had almost completely changed. Not only had she become thinner, but she also seemed confident in her speech and demeanor, appearing poised and confident in everything she did. Lee deeply admired her friend's state, and her friend shared how she had changed little by little. Lee listened intently and also had a thought in her heart: maybe I can change myself and take control of my life. Not long after, Lee celebrated her 30th birthday and made a wish: to change herself and take back control of her life. One of the first things she did was to take control of her weight. For Lee, losing weight was not just about becoming beautiful and healthy, but also about helping herself overcome the anxiety of losing control and regain confidence. Therefore, she had an extremely deep connection with the goal of losing weight, which naturally kept her motivated. Lee’s state has since improved, making others envious. So, is it certain that as long as you establish a deep relationship with what you are doing, you can persist? Not necessarily.

Because there is another influencing factor: the relationship with oneself.

3.Relationship with oneself: Is change motivated by "self-love" or "self-hatred"?

Observing those around you, you will find that many people are indeed determined to do something but still procrastinate or even give up halfway. The reason is that they often do things in a state of "self-hatred." You may feel puzzled: isn't growth and change about making oneself better, isn't it "self-love"? Not necessarily! Sharing a personal experience: At the end of last year, I resumed my habit of running, but before that, I had procrastinated on running for almost half a year. I often encountered situations where I would set my alarm clock the night before to remind myself to get up early to run, but the next day, I often woke up but didn't want to get out of bed. Or, I would finally go out, but after running for less than 10 minutes, I wanted to give up. Why would this happen? Later, I realized that it was because I would set a series of invisible high goals for myself, such as: I must start running at 6:30; I must run more than 3 kilometers continuously; I can't run too slowly... These goals may seem ordinary, but for someone like me who was used to sleeping late and hadn't exercised for a long time, they were actually quite difficult. Why would I set such high goals? Later, I realized a deeper truth: because I didn't like myself. During that time, I was very dissatisfied with myself, thinking that I was performing poorly in all aspects of work and life. Therefore, I hated to see this annoying self and wanted to change immediately. Therefore, when setting goals, I wasn't considering whether the goal could be achieved but was immersed in a state of self-disgust, setting unrealistic goals. Deep down, I would think: only by reaching such high standards can I prove that I'm not bad, and only then can I be satisfied with myself. However, unrealistic goals only bring continuous setbacks. I would become irritated by small things. For example, if I woke up late or ran slowly, I would judge and deny myself: "Why am I so bad!" And the subconscious mind tends to seek benefit and avoid harm. When running each time meant enduring the pain of criticism, unconsciously, I would become procrastinated. After all, as long as I didn't do it, I wouldn't have to face the bloody setbacks. Therefore, in an atmosphere of self-disgust, people are destined to become exhausted when doing things, and naturally, motivation will decrease.

4.When motivation is lacking, it is even more important to love oneself

Indeed, when changing, people often have both feelings of "self-love" and "self-hatred," but be careful not to let the latter dominate. Careful observation will reveal that many people seemingly set positive and upward growth goals, but many of them are venting their dissatisfaction with themselves by setting high goals. For example, some people change their profile pictures to "won't change until I lose ten pounds," or make a New Year's resolution to "read a book a week"... These goals not only are difficult to achieve, leading to self-doubt, but they also disrupt the rhythm of action. And many people are addicted to self-blame because of the influence of wrong ideas, thinking that the more cruel and demanding they are to themselves, the better they will become. But that's not true. While self-blame can sometimes generate short-term motivation, fundamentally, it's a state of being hostile to oneself, which only consumes energy in self-struggle. Therefore, to obtain sustainable motivation, we need to change our relationship with ourselves. Later, through continuous awareness and adjustment, I redeveloped the habit of running and summarized three steps. If you encounter similar difficulties, you may want to try it.

a.See the real self

Bad relationships often stick to "as I wish," while good relationships accept things "as they are." The former disregards the actual situation and focuses solely on that ideal goal, while the latter sees and accepts the true self. I remind myself: although life may not be going well right now, and I haven't exercised in a long time, planning to start moving now is already good. It's inevitable that I can't run or run slowly at this time. When I think like this, my self-blame decreases, and I can see a few things about myself that are worthy of praise. In fact, everyone is like this. Behind the dissatisfaction with oneself also means that we are in a trough, and the difficulty of change is the greatest at this time. But we are still determined to salvage ourselves, and this intention alone is worthy of affirmation and recognition. When we can realize this, self-acceptance will increase, and the insistence on high goals will decrease.

Lower the goal and rebuild the "relationship" I remind myself: now, my main task is to reduce psychological burden and find a way to make running a less stressful activity for me. So, I readjusted the goal of running, focusing not on how fast or how far to run but setting a minimum standard: to go out. As long as I run, I achieve my goal, and that is a victory. Therefore, my stress was minimized, and I successfully turned running into a habit. Actually, when you find it difficult to act, you might as well lower the standard, get yourself moving, and continue before there's a chance for progress.

b.The worse the performance, the more support you need for yourself

Later, when my running state recovered, I could run more than 8 kilometers each time, and my requirements for myself also unknowingly increased. But once, perhaps because my condition was really bad, it took me 30 minutes to "run" just 3 kilometers. This is a very slow pace, and at first, I felt embarrassed and didn't want to post on social media. But then I realized: am I running to prove it to others? Of course not, I'm doing it for myself. At the same time, even if I perform poorly, I accept this imperfect self. When I think like this, I don't feel defeated but feel a kind of power connected to myself. I am no longer an enemy with myself but a friend fighting side by side.

In conclusion

Actually, when you find yourself always having the will but lacking the strength, don't rush to doubt or deny yourself. Those things that have shallow connections with yourself don't have to be forced, try doing goals that you are more willing to do first. And on the road to growth, everyone will have moments of poor performance. The more difficult the time, the more we need to avoid adding insult to injury to ourselves, support and understand ourselves more. Only then can we rebuild our relationship and truly improve our motivation.

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Middle Age Minimalim: Stop Doing These 5 Things When You're Broke!

Some friends say they earn just a small monthly salary and don't have any side gigs, so they can't save any money at all! For ordinary office workers who follow the same routine every day, it's indeed difficult to save a large sum each month without any additional sources of income. However, the advice on saving money has always been: it's not about being frugal to the point of stinginess, nor is it necessary for everyone to start a side hustle; it's simply about avoiding wasteful spending.

In daily life, if you can consciously avoid wastefulness, while you might not save big bucks immediately, you'll certainly be able to save some pennies.

Many people might think, "Since I don't have much money anyway, why not enjoy life to the fullest?" Forgive me for being blunt, but this is not the mindset of someone who's living life well. Particularly with these 5 things, the sooner you stop them when you're broke, the better!

1. Stop staying up late

I know quite a few people who stay up late either to work and earn money or to self-improve in hopes of making more money. But if staying up late to earn money compromises basic health, won't it lead to even more financial strain when your health deteriorates? During a period when my children were very young, I tried to improve myself as quickly as possible by working super hard and being extremely disciplined (often staying up late to finish tasks). However, that was also the time when my immune system was at its lowest, and I frequently had to visit clinics for injections and medication. Not only did I not make any money, but I also spent quite a bit, not to mention the suffering. Eventually, I came to a conclusion: Regardless of whether you make money or not, prioritize your health, stop staying up late, and take care of your body first.

2.Stop impulse shopping

I truly understand the impulse to buy things. Just last weekend, I bought a pair of jeans myself. However, jeans are a necessity because the ones at home are either very old or too tight (okay, I admit I might have gained a bit of weight in middle age). But did you know? At that time, I also really wanted to buy a top to match the jeans. I tried on about six or seven options, and there were two that I really liked: one was a light green striped linen shirt with 3/4 sleeves, and the other was a cream-colored long-sleeved T-shirt. I was truly tempted to buy them all. However, after a moment of thought, I realized I already had two shirts at home and several white short-sleeved ones. Thinking of this, I controlled myself and left without making any purchases. Thank goodness for that moment of reflection, which prevented me from making an impulse purchase.

3.Stop being idle

From childhood to adulthood, I've always been aware that without any special resources or innate talent, hard work is the key to success in both learning and life. After all, isn't living about finding things to do for ourselves regularly? I've always had a somewhat biased view: once someone becomes idle, trouble follows. So, you see, wherever there are many idle people in a household, things usually don't go well. Many years ago, there was a young man who hadn't studied much. Later, through a referral, he got a job at a mobile phone repair shop and has been working there for many years. It's said he's still there now. Yes, people aren't afraid of you earning less or lacking big ambitions; they're afraid of you being idle all day and drifting aimlessly. Don't ever try those shortcuts to make money; sooner or later, you'll land yourself in trouble. If you're broke, find a decent job, work diligently, and enjoy the warmth of family life!

4.Stop complaining about being poor

I truly can't understand why some people keep complaining about being poor. Complaining about being poor doesn't solve any problems or earn any money. So, remember, don't cry poverty in front of others because they won't give you any money; they'll just laugh at you. Also, don't often think to yourself that you're just like this and will be poor for the rest of your life. I believe that in life: you must often encourage yourself, keep yourself energized, and then work hard to make money. This kind of outlook on life may not make ordinary people rich and prosperous, but living a stable and comfortable life shouldn't be a problem. Look around, those families that were once very poor but kept quiet about it later turned out fine. Parents' hard work is seen by their descendants, who then tend to be more capable. I think this is how most individuals, through self-motivation and effort, achieve family transformation. So, never cry poverty; strive and work hard at all times.

5.Stop comparing

Comparing yourself to others brings nothing but frustration. When poor people compare themselves to rich people, it feels like they've fallen from heaven to hell. When I was young, my family was really poor. Our family squeezed into two small rooms. At that time, I envied classmates who had their own houses. My mother probably sensed what I was feeling because she said: "You're students now, so don't compare what you eat and wear with others. Instead, compare who studies better. If you study well, you'll get a good job in the future and can have whatever you want." Looking back now, those words might have been a bit crude, but there was nothing wrong with the values they instilled: don't compare what you don't have with others; create what you want for yourself. So, whenever I hear about who's rich and what they've bought, I'm almost indifferent, and I don't feel any vanity or jealousy. Because I know: what others have is what they've created, and what I want, I'll create for myself.

Some friends might think, "We work so hard every day to earn money, isn't it for spending?" I admit, it's for spending. But, the key is how you spend it: I have no hesitation when it comes to: buying books for myself, buying jeans (I try them on in stores rather than endlessly comparing options online), signing up for lessons with experienced teachers when I want to learn a new skill… These are non-negotiable for me. What people see might be my frugality and simplicity, but only I know: this is my abundance in life, and I find joy in it.

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