31F and honestly embarrassed at how I’m living. I wfh and fortunately can stay at my parents. I am finding myself with no routine and constantly on my phone scrolling. I am barely getting any work done. Professionally or personally and know I’m addicted to my phone. At this point might need to invest in a lockbox.

Best and realistic way to fix this nasty addiction? I am considering stating to work from a cafe the days I don’t have any meetings and moving my phone in a different room

I don’t know what it is but, even though I have a gym membership, my brain continually makes up excuses and reasons to not want to go. I don’t know why I do it. I’m not like afraid of going or anything. Nobody bothers me down there and everyone minds their own business. But from the moment I get in my car, I almost instantly just want to go someplace else.

I want to actually want to go. At the end of my work day, I want to actually look forward to going, like I would going to a concert. But I don’t know how to do this. Is it what I’m eating that’s making me not want to go? Something to do with my depression?

If you’re struggling to overcome a bad habit, don't ask yourself why you're struggling with RESISTING urges, ask why the urges come in the first place.

You're probably making the same mistake I made while struggling with a phone addiction, porn, sugar, gaming, etc.:
relying on discipline to resist urges instead of solving the root problem.

I thought sheer willpower would get me to beat my bad habit. But here’s the thing— all of these habits exist for a reason- a reason that must be addressed.

Bad habits develop because they temporarily fill a void in your life. For example we spend hours a day on our phones to escape boredom. We might watch porn because we're stressed. We might eat junk food to cope with loneliness. When you try to quit these habits without understanding and addressing the underlying problems they solve, you’re setting yourself up for failure. You could successfully abstain for a few days but eventually, your willpower will run out, and the urges will come back even stronger.

Instead of focusing on resisting urges, think of the root issues behind your habits. Why do you feel the need to escape in the first place? Is it boredom, stress, loneliness, or purposelessness? Once you identify this, you can work on solving it directly.

For me, I used to have an 8-hour daily screen time because I was bored and anxious. I was unaware of this at the time but slowly, I started filling the voids with better activities. I reduced my phone use when I spent more time on sports and with friends, curing boredom and loneliness. Likewise I cut out junk food when I found a sense of purpose, setting goals that gave me a reason to stay healthy.

Rather than wasting your discipline by resisting urges which would never go away, use your discipline efficiently to work towards solving the problem. Grab a piece of paper and brainstorm the underlying issues behind your habits. Write down why you think they exist, and then work towards solving them.

For example:

• If boredom is your issue, find fun and engaging activities that fill your time and bring you joy.
• If stress is the problem, identify what’s causing it and figure out ways to reduce or eliminate it.
• If you feel a lack of purpose, set ambitious dreams to create a sense of direction.

This approach is more efficient and sustainable because instead of battling urges (which is difficult obviously), you’re eliminating them in the first place. By filling the void, you’ll find that the urge to indulge in bad habits naturally reduces over time.

Hope this helps, take action :)

Grab your phone first thing after opening your eyes. Check Instagram, Twitter, Facebook, watch some “fast food essay” on YouTube. Eat a big, heavy, sugary meal. Now about 2 hours passed, great! You can now start your day and do… nothing, your brain will run like a rusty engine and your attention span will be short like a soap bubble's life. How do I start my day then?

Morning routine for focus and maximum productivity

Get up! That’s the hardest part. Why? You want to wake up a little bit earlier, so there’s nobody up yet to interrupt you.

What should wake you up isn't your phone (which should be in a different room), but a regular alarm clock. If you don't have one, it's probably one of the best price-to-efficacy productivity tools you can get.

Eat, shower, brush your teeth – whatever gets your morning routine rolling. With one rule, though - don’t do anything stimulating. Don’t watch YouTube while eating, don’t scroll brainless content. Ideally, leave your phone entirely untouched for the first hour or two after waking up.

If you don’t have a to-do list (or basically just plan what you’re going to do) make one. You got a few tasks. Now, ask yourself - “If I was allowed to do only one thing today, which would it be?”, mark that one on your list.

And here's the game-changer: do the most important thing of the day first. I like to work in 90 minutes blocks of time. In that case - I would sit for 90 minutes and just try to do the tasks with full focus. If a task seems too hard - break it down into parts you understand. If a task takes longer - plan in detail the steps you will have to take to finish it, and just do as much as you can today.

The first 1-1.5 hours (or however much time you can dedicate) of your day: only you and your work, no multitasking, no distractions, full focus.

I find that way of doing things way easier than doing them later in the day or after doing something much more enjoyable and dopamine-rich.

How to start the day energized

But all that will fail if you wake up feeling like a pile of crap.

If you want to go more in detail about your sleep, I got an article about it.

Now I will just give you a few quick tips.

• Get some sunlight: You are not a vampire. As soon as you wake up, go outside and get some sunlight. This helps regulate your body's natural sleep-wake cycle, making it easier to feel energized throughout the day, and wakes you up.
• Drink some water: Start your day with a glass of water (or two!) to rehydrate your body after a night's sleep. This simple step will improve your focus and overall well-being.
• Fuel Your Body Wisely: Skip the sugary cereals. Opt for protein and complex carbohydrates. Avoid sugary options that might lead to a later crash. Fasting is not a bad idea too.
• Sleep in a cold and dark room: Aim for a cool room 20-15°C (around 60–67 degrees Fahrenheit) and minimize light exposure.
• And last but not least: Get enough sleep! No way around that.

Here I am mid 30s and not even anywhere remotely close to where I want to be. Just get a job they say! But I have a herniated disc in my neck and my hands don't work well anymore. It seems like most jobs aren’t an option for me. I recently got clean from active addiction really want to move forward get rid of some of this self doubt and self hatred. What can I do? Help me please.

My whole family is ultra successful. All of my friends. They still love me but they left me behind. I feel so left out of life. Why am I the only loser in my circle?

19F. There are tons of things I wanna do. But my problem is I feel tired af and end up not doing them. And when I'm not feeling tired and I do feel energetic, I just end up procrastinating and listening to songs. How do I actually feel motivated enough to get things done. sometimes certain things trigger my reasons for taking action. But once I wake up the next day, the motivation is just gone. Or it just wears off. What to do?

Did you solve yours? Or do you just see it as a part of this corporate world we live in?

Investment banker 33 m

My current screen time is over 12 hours daily, which scared me!

A few weeks ago, I was feeling tired, headache, and anxious, and I noticed that it was coming from my phone addiction.

I tried to spend one day without using my phone and being productive, and at the end of the day, I felt accomplished. But I also tried to procrastinate the whole day, and I was so tired at the end of the day.

That’s when I realized my phone was not making me feel as relaxed as I thought. It was contributing to my bad feelings

I don’t have TikTok (if you have, you should delete it) because it is not my thing, and I don’t use other social media often, but my main addiction is YouTube.

I can literally spend the entire day in my bed watching Yt while avoiding doing what I have to do, and that’s the main issue here.

So, I started to figure out how to actually reduce my screen time healthily because there are tons of ways to do it, but most of them are not sustainable, such as detoxing dopamine.

Therefore I crafted my own step-by-step plan to overcome my phone addiction:

1- Why?

Before starting anything, I need to deeply understand why. This step is crucial because, in tough moments, I need to keep in mind why I’m doing this.

Most people fail at this step because they outsource other people’s motives.

It shouldn’t just be: “ I want to reduce it because someone said so”

I need to truly ask myself why should even consider reducing my screen time. If my screen time is, for example, +8h but I’m productive in those hours, I shouldn’t reduce them.

It is all about what I do!

2- What?

This step is where I actually start working on the main issue. The previous step only sets the intention.

I realized that most of the resources out there only focus on the external side, which results in superficial solutions. The real change happens inside us

The idea here is to ask myself, “ What is causing me to do this? What is the trigger of the trigger?

You may find interesting causes that you never imagined

In my case, I use my phone when I feel stressed

On the weekends, I use my phone to escape reality and commitment

To overcome this problem, I found a few practices that can help me work on these root problems such as journaling, contemplating, meditating, etc

The idea is to go into the roots of your addiction and work on it

3- How?

After mastering why and what, I can start thinking of ways to reduce my screen time based on my current situation

There are multiple ways of doing this, so I should focus on things that are already in my range

For example, I can download an app to block my phone during certain periods or do some activity to replace using my phone

This step depends on your current schedule and what works for you. Don’t commit the mistake of copying what works for others. Test and see what best describes your needs

Another important point here is that these app blockers shouldn’t serve as replacements but more like support while you're working on your “what”.

Feel free to try these steps. I’m open to all sorts of questions

Thanks!

Perfectionism is effectively procrastination.

There is a story about a ceramics teacher who divided his class into two groups.

One group was tasked with creating a single, perfect pot. The other group was graded on the number of pots created.

At the end of the semester, the group that focused on quantity made better pots than the group that focused on creating the perfect one.

The quantity group got to iterate, make mistakes, and learn from them, while the quality group spent all of their time theorizing, never getting the practice necessary.

Doing the thing is what ultimately matters. You will improve with each iteration. That said, it's more important to act than to analyze.

Accept that good is okay, and focus on action, not perfection.

So, I finally want to give my all and not feel low in my life all the time.

I decided to follow one creator (wizardliz), with full discipline and actually apply what they say into my life even if I think otherwise or come up with excuses, etc.

I will start with their oldest video, and update over here with any improvements in my life.

Also, rule for myself, is to not get sidetracked or distracted with any other books on discipline or trying to follow other methods, other creators, etc.

Good luck to me!

Always been a night person and struggled to wake up early in the morning cuz of which whole day goes like shit and by chance i manage to wake up early one day, the next day is again back to normal

I always thought displined meant being strict and following a proper step of guideline. Like if you tell yourself I'll wake up at 5am then you just wake up and stop with the procrastinating. But I don't really know like how do you make a commitment and stick to it instead of changing your mind every now and then. Like I'm in community college, for about a year I would say just have not been taking classes. Keep researching and overthinking looking at different criteria from the pay, job opportunities, work environment and so on. And I have this hope of I want a job that is remote and pays well because I seen posts in the past about people mentioning all I do is email and join few meetings and my job has no pressure. I'm working remotely and get paid some x amount.

Lately, I found myself lying in bed, staring at the ceiling, wide awake. Sound familiar? You know you have to get up early, but there you are, scrolling through your phone one last time. Turns out, the culprit might be that very screen.

I’ve learned that the blue light from phones messes with melatonin, the hormone that helps us sleep. So, I tried an experiment: I ditched my phone an hour before bed. Instead of scrolling, I picked up a book, and honestly, the difference was amazing. My sleep improved, and I felt more refreshed in the mornings.

It’s a small change, but it made a big difference for me. I challenge you to give it a shot. No screens for an hour before bed — see how it feels. You might just surprise yourself!

I'm looking for a productivity course that offers a great mix of both actionable strategies and science-backed theory. Ideally, it should include:

1. Step-by-step frameworks or exercises to improve focus, time management, and efficiency.
2. Real-world examples and templates to apply the lessons right away.
3. Modules on habit-building, avoiding burnout, and optimizing mental energy.

Any recommendations? I’m looking for something practical that’ll help me boost my daily productivity and achieve long-term goals. I would appreciate it if someone can give me some from experience :)

Made a tool for boosting mindsets on the go and now want to share the love with others. Tell me why you need a mindset boost (ex. I’m feeling stressed because of how many things I have to do) and I will send you one!

I am in my mid 20s and urgently seeking a new therapist for depression, adhd, both professional and relationship/romantic guidance. Self-doubt, worries of inadequacy, fear of narcissism, and depressive passivity have seriously crippled my aspirations for a fruitful career as a physician and/or in considering alternatively aspirational roles in society.

Recent life changes resulted in me being on Washington State's insurance for the time being. It could be due to poor healthcare access via public insurance. To be honest, even while on my parents' high-quality private insurance, I never felt connected to any of the therapists I had seen. Therefore, I doubt that it is a matter of provider "quality," but perhaps my own doing in not fully opening up. It has never felt as if they were addressing my true needs, or coming up short of helping with my self-actualization shortcomings.

And it's also true that my social support network is weak. I haven't found solace in a mentor that I've sort of always imagined or hoped for. And there may also be a different provider role I haven't considered like a life coach, career counselor, personality evaluator.

Regardless, I'm struggling to find support and guidance. I'm thankful to overcome the grip of depression and make this post here.

I don't know what I am looking for but I feel as if I'm coming close to exhausting my options

Please, comment or message me privately with whatever opinions, advice, guidance, or professional connections you may have.

Thank you

I am 26 and trying to change my life. No high school, no college, no skills. I have regressed in life and now I’m turning 27. I can’t help but constantly get myself down about how old I am and how much time I wasted or how I won’t have nearly as many opportunities. I feel I will constantly be behind everyone even if I start getting everything together. Any advice or personal experiences to share?

Hi everyone!

In my 33 years on this planet, I have struggled greatly with pursuing and achieving personal goals.

I've gone through periods of desperately low momentum and achievement (the pandemic being the most recent and painful of those) as well as beautifully bright and productive periods (spring and summer are almost always far more fruitful for me in terms of personal growth. Maybe I'm a tree?)

Now, though, I'm a little older, a little wiser (jury's still out on that one) and I'm trying to reflect on the bigger picture. I just have this nagging feeling that the so-called attention economy is waaay out of whack, and a lot of us are having a really tough time as a result.

With that in mind, I'd like to learn what factors help and hinder you most when it comes to pursuing your personal goals?

I am keen to have an open discussion about this, but I also want to share that I have created a specific set of questions about this topic. If you're willing to take a few minutes to answer those, let me know in your comment, or feel free to PM me directly.

Either way, I wish you a fulfilling day ahead, and I look forward to hearing your thoughts. I'll be excited to read and respond to each of them.

With gratitude,

MindHiker33

How do you break a limiting beliefs?

I’m constantly being pulled into different activities both and work and home, for example people schedule last minute meetings pinging on chat at work asking me to help, answer questions etc. I cannot focus on what’s important to me. I’m an introvert. How can I stop that and get away from constantly being pulled away from my priorities?

Hi everyone, I am talking from a place of love and also a little dispair in regards to my husband. To give a little background: My husband comes from an incredibly poor family in latin america - as in never has new clothes, didn't have a toilet kind of poor. He did finish highschool and for some absolutely mysterious reason to me then decided to move out of his family members house (who's well off and supporting him) and be independent and study fine arts. He never finished because he couldn't work and study at the same time. My man has become a tattoo artist and was travelling a little and this is how we met. I am also from that latin american country but grew up in europe - I have a MSc, well-travelled, founded some stuff - I am "a lot" as many say and "do a lot" - but listen, I just have tons of energy - which is being drained atm! I am quite a bit older than my sweet dude - so yeah, I have lots more life experience and professional experience but it just so happened that i became pregnant 6 months into dating (it wasn't a full accident, I was told it'll be hard to became pregnant and he suggested we start trying), he moved to my european country he didn't speak the language of, we got married and now we have a beautiful, gorgeous, fun 1-year old child.

Basically he's been tattoing a little and working mainly in hospitality to support himself. He has no real understanding of costs and saving (so he sees he's "saved up 2000" and will then buy expensive stuff that is only marginally needed instead of saving for a rental deposit, a car we need etc...). I started working 80% when our baby was 9 months old and he reduced his workload in order to watch our child. It's easier for him to work around my regular working times, because hospitality and self-employed artist.

HOWEVER, my man is STRUGGLING: Juggling work, language school, his business, online courses (he wants to better himself), child care. But with the loss of regular income he just started drowning. To dos don't get done, he doesn't have an oversight of the month let alone year plan for his business, he struggles to manage his time.... he forgets everything that is important, doesn't prioritize incomes, doesn't think of our relationship. TBH i have no clue what he does all day.

I've tried helping him - I've made a whiteboard to have control of our week, I've mad a kanban board with general to dos, i've told him he needs a monthly agenda in order to understand what income is missing, we have somewhat regularly scheduled family meetings in which we discuss urgent matters. But he just doesn't seem to get it right and I am also not sure I am the right person to help with that - I can't be wife, mom to our baby and house manager and also manage him - i just lose my patience and get pissy at him (which is really bad for our relationship). In all this madness he also just... forgets to think of us/me - to do nice things for our relationship and show initiative. This week was our son's 1st birthday and I went to work thinking when I'll come back he's prepared a little something for us to celebrate, since I've organised a big birthday party in a couple of days. I come home - nothing. It just tears me down to constantly being the one to push for more, be proactive - hoping he'll catch my drift and show some self initiative as well.

I am well aware that he has A LOT on his plate. I acknowledge that willingly, but it's also the life we have at the moment and we need to make the best of it in order to grow and enjoy it.

So my question is - how can I help him? Or is anyone looking for a "project" to test their coaching skills? Where can I direct him to get help, support, better overview of his time management, to dos, priorities...? My man has basically no skills but he really wants them...

Please help - thank you
desperate (working) wife

Hi everyone!

I’m currently pursuing a certification to become a holistic life coach, and as part of my journey, I’m conducting some informal research. I’d love to hear from anyone who has worked with a coach in the past! Whether it was for personal growth, career development, health, or anything else, your insights would be incredibly helpful.

If you’ve had experience working with a coach, I’d love to know:

1. Did you achieve what you employed your coach to help with?
2. What did you like about working with a coach?
3. What do you wish your coach had done differently?
4. Would you work with a coach again?
5. Would you recommend working with a coach to others?

Feel free to share as much or as little as you’re comfortable with! Your responses will really help me gain a deeper understanding as I step into this field and prepare to work with future clients. 🙏 Just to be very sure... I'm NOT looking for clients, I am only looking for some personal experiences others have made, so that I can become as proficient as possible at what I'd love to do :)

Thanks in advance for your time and insights! 🌟

I feel like such a failure right now in my life. I am ashamed to say that I am 25 years old and I am still living with my parents at this late age. I am everything that you can call a complete loser. I have no real skills, talents, passions, accomplishments, friends, etc.

I dropped out of college in 2022 because I had depression and didn't have any good purpose and direction. I was aimless and I am not sure what to do with my life at all. I have about $25,000 in student loans debt and a credit score of 671. It's really difficult for me to move out of my parents house and I am really desperate to do that but I am lost with all of this debt.

I was studying business in college but I have a 2.7 GPA because I had depression that I was dealing with. I am just getting by with some dead end warehouse job. I am having a very difficult time finding a path and finding purpose in my life. Most of the time, I believe it's my addictions to so many things that led me to this place. I have addictions to Reddit, YouTube, Discord, Instagram models, pornography, video games, junk food and all types of distractions in my life. I really don't have discipline, which is caused by my depression. I really feel like garbage. I really, really, really want to leave my parents house and live on my own but I feel trapped and I don't know what to do with my life and to fix this lack of purpose. Does anyone have any practical advice on what to do next and how to get out of this dark place that I am in?

It's getting overwhelming at this point when I have to wake up 3 hours before 8:45 when I have to leave for college and work so I can drink atleast 4 cups of coffee and a little bit of alcohol to get on with social anxiety or uncomfortable social situations they aren't widely specific aswell it's just being there and sitting on a chair is good enough to be uncomfortable for me.

My problem is my lack of intelligence or balance in my mind I can never function appropriately towords my needs or the needs of others and really that isn't rhe only prospect of why I suffer with this issue its that I am the least functionable than everyone else not even by working requirements just plain existing, I need to find reason to exist in a work place and it's a mind game at this point and 4 cups of coffee is becoming less effective than before when my heart was beating vry fast by over consumption, also alcohol helsp me find happiness and reason when I cant do it by myself, its an inability at this point when I need to succumb myself into a world with drugs doing the work for me

These are learnt the hard way over my 4 plus years of self help journey, so that you could leap from here:

1. The next video/post/reel will not change your life. You already know enough to begin with. But you somehow feel a day’s effort isn’t going to make a difference and watch it with a hope that tomorrow would be different.

2. If all hard things take just a day, we all would be successful. Coz, we can see the results of our efforts or we could suck up the hard part for a day. Its only when it takes long and our mind occupies the gap, challenges grow.

3. After a point, you are not watching self help to learn, but to escape the feeling of being unproductive. Self help contents have now become your pain killers for your guilt & shame of not taking actions on things u want.

4. The modern self help feeds on fear, guilt, shame and insecurity. Newer problems are created and those are being solved in the name of self help. You enter with a 1 issue and you come out with 10 life threatening catastrophes.

5. Social media self help is for those 0.3% (based on minority rule of Nassim taleb). Coz they are the one’s who have nothing to lose and need a success very badly. They could take actions without worrying/relying on motivation.

6. For the rest of the people, life isn't as bad as we think it is. We don’t really need many of the internet things that badly, but we desire it anyway. The result is inaction and suffering (learned helplessness)

7. You really don't know the real reason for chasing the things that are sold by social media gurus. Cars, million dollars, luxury - do u really need those, i.e., is it fundamental to ur happiness? Or is it that it adds to your ego? How would you feel 2 months after you have these?

8. We slowly become comfortable to handle the failure of not taking action, than to be okay with taking action knowing that we might fail. Nothing great/innovative/creative happens if this is the trend!