12/7/2021
I just turned 31. Hard to believe! Here are 31 lessons I picked up this past year 😃
1 To be in true connection with another requires you to take their worldview seriously
2 Saying that you don’t have time for something is disempowering. You are in control of your time, and choose to make time for what you want
3 While chemistry has its place, any relationship can become magical and fulfilling if both people commit to feeding it and to telling the truth. In fact, telling the truth in relationship – even sharing disgusts, repulsion and judgment – can be transformationally connecting if both parties are committed. Such a mutual commitment to truth-telling will lead any relationship to its ever-changing true form
4 The law of attraction probably does something, but it doesn’t do everything. It’s one tool in a toolbelt to achieve goals. Other tools include focus, strategy, prioritization, follow through, resilience, and learning from past mistakes.
5 The following types of attraction are all distinct and vary depending on the sex and gender of the other person: ability to take sexual arousal from viewing their body; desire to engage sexually via genital touch; desire to engage sexually without genital touch; desire to cuddle; capacity to share a heart connection; desire to engage romantically; desire to open partnership; desire to play with kink; desire to intimately play with energy (via dance, eye gazing, tantric practices, etc)
6 A hugely effective meditation technique for mitigating burnout is the ‘do nothing’ meditation. Where any time you notice the intention to control your attention, you drop that intention — essentially letting your mind travel where it needs to without obligation. Other critical burnout prevention methods include: checking your calendar before accepting any social offers, taking a week off all media-ingestion, taking a break from to-do lists, and vay-fucking-cation!
7 The usage of ‘sacred masculine and feminine’ tends to carry unconscious patriarchal messaging
8 Psilocybin is not just a drug, it is actually a spirit. It’s a world, an entity. Almost like an alien. To venture down that plant medicine paths requires great reverence
9 The world is complex. Everyone has their own reality. And it’s possible to hide in complexity to avoid deciding your belief on what is true
10 There are many people who have clinically died in hospitals, and then come back to life. These people report a similar range of experiences. It seems highly plausible that after a physical death, one’s soul lives on in some way
11 Family time is great. Though in high enough doses, it’s easy to slip into young, disempowered patterns. Thus family time is best supported by strong intention
12 Fuck retirement. I want to be working on my life’s work until the day that I die!
13 If you’re not building deep, meaningful relationships with other humans, you’re doing something wrong in your life
14 Money can be viewed as a spirit. Doing so brings new meaning to the pains and pleasures that money provides
15 The best way to get what you want in social situations is to consistently monitor your internal state, and when you notice desires share them aloud. Then you can trust the other person to honor their boundaries – and say yes, say no, or further negotiate. If it feel like your desire triggered the other person out of their empowered boundaries, talk about it
16 People who are billionaires think differently than everyone else. It’s useful to study these beliefs
17 Your soul is that which goes downward into the earth, and looks backward into history. Your spirit is that which goes upward into the sky, and looks forward into the future
18 Eating palm oil contributes to the destruction of the Amazon rain forests
19 Eating vegan is one of the most (if not the most) effective actions you can personally take to decrease your negative impact on the environment
20 Life becomes wayyy easier the more you ask for help and lean on your friends and community
21 Life goes in cycles of ups and downs. When at the down, embrace it and cherish all it has to teach. But you need not tank into a burnout to reach or appreciate the down
22 I don’t know why or how it works – but if you truly imagine that reality is a benign simulator that you are a part of, and you sincerely ask the simulator to interact with you, weird shit seems to happen
23 The things you desire for yourself and your life aren’t random or accidental. In the same way that a cohesive outfit would only contain clothing articles under a unified umbrella of aesthetic, so too your desires are unified under the umbrella of your soul. In other words, you can have what you really want, and it’s part of your life mission to actualize it
24 Flow requires bounds. Your creativity and life will flow within the commitments and decisions you’ve made. Shaky commitments will hinder your flow
25 The most effective way to dislodge shame is to join/create a culture whose norms and beliefs actively accept that about which you feel shame
26 One tool to move through and integrate challenging emotions is to bring them into your self pleasure practice, and eroticize them through fantasy or embodied pleasure. Bringing deep pleasure to a part of your experience is one of the ultimate forms of permission, and permission lets energies express and move
27 If you’re in a group space where one person isn’t in their ‘yes,’ it will noticeably hinder the entire group’s ability to drop in
28 The softer the clothes you wear, the more people will pet you 🙂
29 Your whole human journey is one big mirage. It’s possible to let go of all the identifications that make it all feel so real and dire (and death will eventually do this for you). It’s equally important to be able to step back from the whole thing and sigh a breath of relief as it is to dive in with both feet and suck out all the marrow
30 We are all called to pursue different paths in our life. On each path, you’ll reach intermittent crossroads that will call you to either deepen your commitment to that path, or to step off it
31 I’ve found the following 9 questions to be valuable in helping me reflect on my relationships: 1. How much does this person inspire me towards my purpose? 2. How supportive is this relationship? 3. How much laughter, fun, and play do we have? 4. How natural, organic, and flowing does the chemistry feel? 5. How much love is there in the connection? 6. How much growth does this connection bring me? 7. How much honest communication exists in this connection? 8. How embodied is the connection? 9. How much can I trust them?
❤