A short story

Original post

Do not prepare for moments of doubt for 2 reasons:

- Moments of doubt need a new perspective, you will never be completely ready for it anyway.

- If your plan fails, you will feel like you've done everything you could. When it's not the case.

You have to acknowledge the fact that slow periods and doubtful moments are a blessing in disguise. They allow you to recollect and restructure. They allow you to fix your problems and keep going forward.

But if you fear them, and do everything to be "ready" for them, all you do is set it to last longer or force yourself to stay in the wrong direction.

You have to accept that things won't always work exactly how planned without being too fearful of it.

Look forward to it, as new obstacles and challenges are what makes you grow.

No matter how painful it can be, it is still the pain of growth.

And that is priceless.

Do you expect it to be easy?

If yes, I have another question for you...

Are you stupid?

If the answer to both questions is No, then you do realize that there is no alternative for putting in the reps and being consistent.

With time, what once seemed too hard and impossible will become too easy and nothing but a formality.

But the trick is to never get complacent, never feel like you've got it all.

You have to constantly keep pushing yourself for more.

All while being grateful for what you've achieved so far.

But that comes later.

What you first must do is lay out a plan to follow, a vision, a North star.

You need something to guide you or else you will cave in to temptations too easily.

And that's not easy feat.

We live in a time where everything is tailored to stimulate you and capture your attention.

You need to be smart enough to get your priorities straight.

You need a clear enough plan so you don't get lost along the way.

You need a strong willpower to be patient and trust the process.

You need enough self-awareness to realize that the long term game is where the gains at.

And you need to maintain those things every day.

Or else?

You're no better than the average man.

Is that what you want?

I'm sure it's not.

So let's start with the right questions...

What is it you truly want?
What's stopping you from getting it?
How can you get past that?

You see, just like you will understand people better by asking them questions, you will understand yourself better by asking the right questions.

As cheesy as it may sound:

You won't get the answers if you never ask.

I know it's hard to get unplugged from the routine and stress of the daily life.

But it has to come from you.

Do you want it bad enough?

If yes, you will save some time to work on your future.

You will stop living on autopilot and simply react to what life throws at you.

Start building, stop experiencing.

You were meant for way more than just being a spectator in other people's game.

Become a player.
Make moves.

You know it's the right thing to do.

I will start writing on Substack.

No paid tier, it will be completely free.

It's still ugly and I haven't set it up yet, but subscribe here to get my first posts (should roll out next week).

Egodriv.substack.com

Will still write for Basedonia, don't you worry ❤️🥂

Stop confusing yourself. Stop committing to a thousand thing and finishing up none.

In order to create tunnel vision, absolute focus and relentless pursuit:

You MUST reduce the distractions, you must make sure nothing disturbs your attention.

And that can only be done if you have a proper plan.

If your vision is weak, the instructions unclear then your mind is vulnerable to distraction. That will lead you to only one thing: Giving up.

Make a precise plan, follow through it religiously, adapt when faced with challenges and do that for a considerable period of time.

Long enough to have enough information to know if you're on the right track or not.

If you are, keep going.

If you're not, take a moment to analyze where it went wrong and learn your lessons before moving on to something else.

It's a win-win deal, just trust the process enough to get valuable lessons or undoubted results.

Don't get distracted, don't try to do too many things at once, just put all your attention into one thing and fucking do it the best way you can.

You can do this.

Have a blessed week.

It gets hard to break the cycles and patterns you’re in.

Consistent actions form this negative loop that constantly feeds off your willpower and joy of life. And before you know it, you feel powerless and out of context.

Way too many people, men especially, feel that the world has no meaning. That life has no meaning. That THEY have no meaning.

And it’s not easy to break out as I said.

It is hard to see the light when you’re surrounded by negativity.

But that’s because you’re looking in the wrong direction.

The negative feedback loop forced you into a vicious cycle that limits your perception.

But if you could think out of the box for one second; put things into perspective, you’d be able to understand that your fulfillment is your own responsibility.

That all it takes, is one pattern-breaking action, done consistently.

Just do it once.

Go to the gym once.

Draft out business idea.

Go talk to that girl.

But just, for your own sake, break that pattern.

Pick up the habit of going out your way and experiencing life from different aspects.

This one time, will open the door for new possibilities.

And as you iterate and repeat the process, you become better at whatever it is you’ve started doing.

That’s where joy happens.

Once you realize that one small decision, repeated over time, brings you results that you’re proud of.

You’ve picked up momentum.

The beauty of embracing a virtuous cycle.

Let me explain:

The idea of "embracing a virtuous cycle" refers to the process of establishing a desirable behavior pattern that leads to increasingly favorable results. The presence of a positive feedback loop, in which one positive action leads to another and, eventually, results in a number of positive consequences, is one of the defining characteristics of a virtuous cycle.

This results in the creation of a sustainable cycle of development, progress, and achievement that ultimately leads to ongoing success over the course of time. The objective is to establish a pattern of good occurrences that reinforce and build upon one another, which will ultimately lead to unending development and success.

This can only be done if you decide to stop pitying yourself and break that pattern of discomfortable comfort. That illusion of security that makes your life boring.

Spice it all up.

Break patterns. Take more risks.
Actually live your life.

Losing motivation means you're losing touch with your vision. You're not grasping it as well as you did at the start. Such bottleneck points are necessary, they allow you to adjust and reconsider your choices and decisions. This adaptability allows you to deal with new given parameters that you couldn't have foreseen until you start following your initial plan.

I often talk about the importance of having a plan, but what I often forget to mention is that your plan is there to be adjusted and questioned. Being open to change allows you to not limit yourself as more opportunities multiply before you. It allows you to limit what you're missing out on while your plan helps you filter what will simply waste your time.

But there is a very thin line to walk. Where you seize the adequate opportunities without straying away from your main goals. This is why you must take into consideration these low moments where doubts increase and the end goal gets blurry.

As I've said before, you don't have to prepare for them. You'd ruin the joy of solving out unpredictable problems. But at the same time, you should make sure to make those moments count. To help you reassess and learn, so that you reduce the likelihood of the same problems occurring again.

In short, you need to have a plan and be ready to adapt to it. Give yourself a north star and keep figuring it out on the way.

Maintaining this important balance is how you keep learning while you're taking action towards your goals. Or else, you'll miss out on important lessons and risk never getting where you wanted to get in the first place.

You have been lied to: There is nothing wrong with being competitive.

What is wrong is envy and cheating.

But being competitive in the sense where you demand the absolute best from yourself is definitely good for you.

Of course, as in anything else, it should be a conscious desire to improve yourself and not a malicious intent to be superior to others.

You see, the why I like to put it is:

I don't want to be better than you, I just want to be the best.

Because I only accept excellence from myself.

If anyone can do it, then I can also do it.

Not because I envy them, but because they inspire me.

This mental shift goes a long way. This genuine & healthy sense of competition leads to higher competence for everyone involved.

All competitors will surpass themselves and do all they can. This increases the standards of the whole competition. It makes everyone better.

There is a reason the words "Competition" and "Competence" have the same etymology: Compete.

The act of "striving (alongside another) for the attainment of something"

Alongside and not against.

And when that something is competence not prestige or comparison, then your sense of competitiveness is in fact healthy.

Do not settle for participation trophies.

The 4 Aces of Ego

My first Substack post is up.

Check it out here:

https://egodriv.substack.com/p/my-opening-statement-ego-is-not-the?sd=pf

I'm 18, just moved to Casablanca to study. I had never lived on my own before so this was all very new to me.

The university I decided to enroll in was known to be extremely hard. I had great grades in high school so I definitely had what it takes to succeed there.

But, as much as I was a good student, I already have a tendency to fuck things up and I was already getting mixed with the wrong people and taking drugs.

My move to another city was my opportunity to walk away from teenage debauchery and take my life seriously.

That was before I knew I had a validation seeking problem.

You see, at this point, I've already had my more than fair share of drug use. I had tried and experienced and it was time to move away from all that shit.

All the people in my class knew each other, I was one of the few people coming from another city. So I felt like I had something to prove.

I'd behave in a weird way just to show that I was a cool guy. So I met this guy, one of the worst people I've ever met. But for some reason I admired him.

He had this carelessness about him, but I failed to see how dangerous and irresponsible he was.

He was not an example but I put him on a pedestal.

I'd look up to him and I'd do whatever he would do but twice, just to impress him and prove that I'm like him and even better (but according to the wrong standards).

I trusted this guy blindly, and I considered him as a brother. But he was deeply troubled and he'd take me down a road I should never have taken.

We'd end up missing class, getting drunk and high at 8am.

Those are not the proudest moments of my life, I’ll admit.

But they taught me a lot.

I wasn’t fully aware of the consequences of my choices and behaviors.

I was on autopilot, letting my insecurities run the show.

This period of my life is what opened my eye to the necessity of a strong ego, not one based on insecurity and external validation.

It’s also the period of my life where I realized that there were more manipulators out there than “good” guys.

I understood that people do not always have your best interests at heart.

I’ve talked many times on here about some life mistakes I witnessed, but today I wanted to share with you part of my own background and fuck ups…

Just to tell you this:

Do not be naive.

Do not live to impress people.

Do not forget to pursue your goals.

Take the time to truly chart plans for yourself.

Plans that aim toward your own growth and improvement, not toward fitting in a group or being liked by someone.

I hated myself back then. Because as much as I didn’t realize it, I was living through the eyes of others.

I didn’t take the time to think about what I thought of myself.

Detach yourself from people’s opinion, the only person you need to prove shit to, is yourself.

For those who missed the 4 emails or simply want a document that groups them all, I'm attaching a PDF to this email with all the parts that I covered this week.

As promised, I will also expand on it and post the reviewed version on Substack.

If you're interested in the concepts of Self-Actualization and bringing order & clarity to your mind, you may want to check out the White Pill Program.

The Program is tailored to help you beat procrastination, organize your time, feel more confident and set goals for yourself, along with an action plan to actually reach them.

It lasts 3 weeks, so the commitment is short, but it lays down the foundation of a structured and organized life, driven by goals and intentional effort.

The White Pill is a set of various tasks and templates, so it really just feels like a game.

So if you're interested, check it out here.


E-go

We talked last week about finding your Ikigai and how to reach self-actualization (read full article here), but there is more to it than just planning it out.

As much as having a specific vision and a plan help you find your direction, there remains an important aspect that we tend to overlook: Your Inner Strength.

If you read last week's series, you know that your level of self-awareness and internal clarity is what fuels your growth and journey.

If that internal satisfaction is negatively affected by external factors, in other words, that results take time, many of us tend to give up or withdraw.

You stop desiring the things that you once wanted.

Not due to a change of heart, but due to the frustration of not getting what you want.

For the longest time, I thought the answer was to become obsessed with whatever I wanted to achieve.

Just full focus on it and you'll get it.

While this is half true, it's also half wrong.

When you're obsessed with results, you forget to enjoy the process.

Everything feels like a chore.

Even though you have a specific plan and idea, it will simply not feel natural.

And the moment you stop enjoying it, even that obsession you had will start fading away as frustration enters the room.

A balance of passion and obsession.

Passion for the process.

Obsession with the results.

Both passion and obsession entail intense emotions and attention, yet they differ in their motive and impact on your life.

The truth is, as in everything in life, there has to be a balance.

If you're passionate but not obsessed with getting results, you'd be playing the short-term game.

Instant over delayed gratification.

On the other hand, if you're obsessed but not passionate, you risk losing interest when results take time to come. So just as in the other case, you're still playing the short-term game.

Your passion is only worth something if it can get you results.

Your obsession will only be fulfilled if you're passionate about the process of it.

The rules are simple: Always keep balance.