Hi, I'm A.M for now, I'm in my mid-20s and want to share my story with working and facing this thing called life after I watched a lot of YouTubers like Thomas James "TomSka" David Brown “boyinaband” and many others who have very openly shared their hardships, they have inspired me to write this….. Whatever this is.
I don't consider myself a good writer so bare with me here.
To try to keep this post organized and make sense I'll highlight the point I want to talk about and tell the relevant part of my story, you can connect the pieces all together at the end.
First how am I?
I grow up in the countryside I went to normal school when I was yang, because I was the quiet introvert and wasn't from the town I was in I got bullied a lot for most of my time at school, I got through school time knowing just two friends, I was OK with it.
I genuinely lost interest in school when I was in the ninth grade It seemed more like a memory test than a way of learning so I started looking for ways to make money, "why waste time learning things irrelevant in real life if I can make money now" my naive 16 years old self said, don't get me wrong I didn't think I was done with learning I just wanted to learn in my own way, and I didn't stop school, now I'm in part time Business school, so back then I started looking for any way to make money in the last 5 year I tried: working in sales for over 2 years, selling products online, becoming instructor online, worked as SEO & social media consultant, tried starting my own business for 4 times, and for the last year and half I taught myself how to program and how to use Unity game engine and now I'm working on my first game, I can easily and proudly say that I didn't succeed at any of what I did so far, but I've learned a lot every time and I would do it all over again if I had the chance.
The process of picking myself up every single freaking time was a living hell and I got desperate many times.
because I saw a lot of people feeling relevant to what David said in his video I want to share how I managed to keep my sanity and my opinion about some point he brought in his video.
Not thinking your work is good enough:
Is that really a bad thing? not being satisfied with what you just accomplished is a sign that you always look forward to what you still can do.
I remember after I published my first course on Udemy I got invited to a hangout and I went for it I thought I'll give myself some slack, while I was there someone shouted out "this guy here just published his first course let all give him a clap shall we" for some reason he thought that was a good idea, I don't think I can blame him his intentions were good, I never tried to put a smile as hard as I did that moment I guess I just didn't want to look like a selfish prick, but the truth that I wasn't happy about what I accomplished I was thinking about my bad English poor structure of the course and was I being a sellout for trying to sell my knowledge? halfway of creating the course, I was already thinking about 5 other things I wanted to do next.
I think there's nothing wrong about not being satisfied with what you finish, I think It's a good sign of an ambitious creator.
When you first make the decision to accomplish something It looks like that godly thing that you think It would feel good to have or do, but when you start turning that big sexy thing to a small to-do list somewhere the appeal you had to that thing will disappear to a certain point, it's not that godly sexy thing you thought about before it's becoming a part of your routine now you know the process of doing that thing It's not a mystery anymore.
I think that's why they say: "It's about the journey, not the destination".
Not taking care of yourself:
It's hard to keep taking care of yourself to others people standards, whether it's about looking ripped putting makeup or buying the latest clothes, instead find your own save point and move forward from there if you feel the need to.
When I was working in seals I had to look my best most of the time's which was exhausting more than the work itself and what made it worst is that some coworkers starting hinting that I need to start working out to look sharper and more confident.
Because I was desperate for results from my work I started going to the gym and I got stuck at joining for a month or two then giving up for half a year couple of times, every time I stopped going to the gym I over beat myself saying that I need this for my work, I need more money to do a lot of things, if this work didn't go well what else Am I going to do, eventually I usually took it out on food, I don't even want to start thinking what would have happened to me if my body was able to store fat.
Trying to take care of yourself to others standards can be very exhausting, I felt down because I was putting so much effort in things I don't really care about to get others approval, I genuinely don't care about having a ripped body, it would look cool sure but I'm not willing to put all that effort into health and looks at least for now, who knows maybe in the future things will be better and I'll be willing to put the effort necessary to have 6 pack abs (wink wink ladies).
Nowadays I eat better than I used to, I still eat some junk food but things are much much better than they were 2 years ago, when I fell down I still go buy and drink a liter of Pepsi but at some point that was my morning coffee, as for my looks I cut my hair very short so I would have one less thing to worry about in the morning, I shave my beard once every couple of weeks I change my cloth every two or three days even if I didn't go out.
The point is I take care of myself for my own sack, It was much worse before and I'll always keep working to improve pit by pit.
It's about building habits not getting motivated for a couple of weeks then beating yourself for not being able to keep up.
Not mastering one skill:
I worked in sales, instructed online, worked as SEO and social media consultant, self taught myself how to program and make games but I don’t think I’m the right person to talk about this, all I’m saying that if you didn’t find that one true call that is right for you, you might be a “multipotentialite” if you want to know what exactly does this mean I urge you to watch Emilie talk at TedX
And check the blog too if you want to know more
http://puttylike.com/
Everything happens for a reason........ or does it?
When I was young I was fortunate to know a good old religious man, I don’t know about your perspective about religions but hear me out this isn’t a sermon, I still remember when he tried to teach me that everything happens for a reason I was like “WHAT……. Oh really, then what is the reason for this and this and that” my question didn’t stop and I wasn’t asking nicely either yet, somehow he was calm about it like some kind of monk, I don’t know if I ruined his day or not but I feel bad for taking the world misery out on him that day, he was just a simple man who was doing what he think is good for others, his intentions were good but unfortunately for him I wasn’t a simple person, I overthink everything and everyone, it’s my blessing and my curse, later I told my family about him and I was surprised that they knew him, apparently everyone knows each other in the countryside, they told me about what he was facing lately personally, financially, and emotionally, I didn’t believe that someone who is facing all that isn’t depressed or angry and even trying to do good for others at least by his believes, I wanted to know more about him he got my interest, I wanted to know if he’s an imposter who is just putting a good face or not because a part of me didn’t believe how can he be that good, I kept asking about him from time to time and sometimes I even went to his “lessons”, eventually I went to face him with what I know about him like a detective facing a criminal, the crime of being that simple yet trying to be better than me, It’s pathetic I know It’s just how my brain works sometimes, because I used to take pride of being logical about everything and not believing in anything without questioning it, it bothered me how can he be at peace with his life and I’m not even that he’s facing a lot more than I’m, I faced him and told him everything then asked how can you be this calm about everything that is happening in your life, he had a faint smile and said “I don’t know the reason for everything that is happening right now but everything happens for a reason” I remember holding my fist hard and walking away, maybe I was holding my fist trying not to hit him for not being realistic like me or probably not to beat myself for not being half the man that he was.
I don’t know about your perspective about religions and I’m not here to tell you about mine but I respect that some religions teach that everything happens for a reason, is it the truth? Does everything happens for a reason? I don’t know, I don’t think that is even the point, It’s silly to even get in an argument about this because no one can be sure about it, it’s simply just a belief, it’s simply teach you to not overthink about the reasons for everything around you, just learn from it if you can and focus on what you can do, it’s kind of funny for me to tell you not to overthink about somethings because I’m sure my 19 year old me would punch me right in the face, but it’s just too draining and exhausting to try to find a reason for every bad thing that have happened to me or to others.
In the last three years two of my best friends died, the first one I knew for about nine years and the other one for around five, both killed, both in a way they didn’t deserve to, each time I had to force myself to focus on the 0.0000001% full part of the cup or else I would have lose my sanity.
I would hate to think what would be my thought process if someone tried to sell me religion like a product, some of them would be like “Hi son, you should follow my beliefs because I’m 100% sure that I’m right and everybody else is wrong and if you don’t, well you’re FU**ED” that would have disfigured some of the beliefs that helped me get better.
Controlling your stream of thoughts will be the hardest thing you’ll ever have to do in your life, but if mastered it you’ll become unstoppable.
I’ve been getting into the game industry for around year and half now, I don’t have any experiance in the field but I’ve other experiences that many don’t, working in sales made me learn a lot about people's motivations and incentives, I saw a lot of people jump to make purchase while other chicken out last minute, you don’t get to learn about this in a book or an NLP course, you only get to learn this experience by working in sales first hand, working as an SEO and social media consultant made me care about the little details like posting in the right social medias that is more relevant to your audience, more isn’t always better, choosing the right words colors and timing for best result, sometimes modifying your content for a better marketing or not going into a certain niche even if there’s an audience for it because it doesn’t suit your brand, teaching online made me learn that the selling point isn’t the end goal, helping and mentoring students even after they have purchased the course was way more important than I thought, the feedback I got about the course was crucial to take the course to the next level and some student even helped me with some marketing.
If you know anything about the mobile game industry you can see how these experiences can be helpful, I can imagine the kind of journey I want to create for the player because I can build the motivations and incentives I want for him, while I’m building the player journey I’ll always keep in mind to put the monetization and ads the right way so all of them can work seamlessly together for a better player experience, and taking care of existing players and community will always be a priority, I wasn’t happy and cheerful when I had to learn these experiences the hard way, I thought I was just failing, I even remember crying myself to sleep every time I decided to pull the plug on something I was working on, but eventually It worked out somehow I think.
“you can't connect the dots looking forward, you can only connect them looking backwards. So you have to trust that the dots will somehow connect in your future. You have to trust in something - your gut, destiny, life, karma, whatever. This approach has never let me down, and it has made all the difference in my life”.
Steve Jobs
I want to share some of the tricks I used that helped my in general to get my life together:
Music
listen to cheerful music, even if it might not be exactly what you listen to usually but try them for a while, my favorite type or music is Rock and Metal it’s loud and make me feel empowered but sometimes it's not what I need to change my mood so I started listening to electro music mostly Drum & bass, I didn’t like it at first, I’m human I don’t like to change, but forcing myself to listen to it for while change my perspective about it and I started listening to it while I’m working, and it worked.
habits not motivation
We’re slaves to our habits, it’s exhausting to do something that’s you’re not used to for quite a while, so invest your effort and time to build your habits pit by pit no matter how slow it will take, measure your progress and celebrate your success no matter how small they’re, it’ll make all the difference in your life in the long term.
work in a group
No matter how introverted person you think you’re, you’re still human at the end of day and you need your dose of human interaction so try to work in group if you can, if you don’t have that luxury (like me) work out side from time to time, library, coffee shop, parks all works, changing your surrounding and environment can change your mood, you can try changing your room\office decor every couple of weeks too.
warm-blooded pet
Get a warm-blooded pet it helps, I tried fish and turtles but didn’t really work for me they just stared at me with their empty eyes, I have a cat for two year now and It helped, maybe it’s having the sense of that there is a creature that needs you to look after him, it’s helped me not to feel completely unworthy in some bad day.
Finally I hope this help you in any way it can, and hope it will find its way to all who needs it.