Identity exploration

Some of our common 'demons' are:

• Procrastination
• Laziness
• Self-loathing
• Comparing yourself with your peers, leading to envy
• Loser mentality.

Our inner demons lead us to negatively judge ourselves, further leading to avoiding that judgment, and eventually starting the internal self-destruction, if the negative downward spiral is left unchecked.

In a public situation, we present a different version of ourselves than from the one at home. Every profession has unspoken agreements about which manners are acceptable, and which are not.

It is then the purpose of the persona to suppress the impulses and emotions that are not considered socially acceptable. The difficulty is when one becomes so identified with his persona that he loses all sense of self. The result is an inflated persona with excessive concern for what people think and a lack of courage to endure conflict and refuse others' wishes.

The 'shadow self' is everything a person has denied in themselves, such as spontaneity, aggression, cowardice, carelessness, passion, enthusiasm. It embraces all the thoughts and moods for which we feel guilt and shame.

The shadow is emotional, for it must oppose the rigidness of the ego. It is prone to psychological projection, where we attribute to others the inferior qualities we do not want to admit are in ourselves. When we perceive a moral deficiency in others, we can be sure there is similar inferiority within ourselves. If we take note of our resentment towards ourselves and others, we have the opportunity to bring the shadow into consciousness.

Zipf's law is a mathematical probability that states that in a given set, the most frequently used data value (or word) is used twice as often as the next most common value. This is true in various statistical sets like income distribution in companies, internet traffic, phone calls received, and language.

One of the implications of this law is there are unconscious network forces and mathematical patterns governing our lives, with human beings just being nodes exchanging information.

When six to eight people are conversing at a dinner party, it is easy to focus on one conversation, but if the number is higher (say 15), then two-way conversations are more likely.

When groups get larger, the change is exponential, not linear, affecting one's social experience.

Most of us just incorporate the values of our parents or the dominant cultures (for example, the pursuit of materialism, power, and appearance). This is risky, because these values may not feel authentic and can lead us to live an unfulfilling life.

Not having a consistent sense of identity will lead to uncertainty about what one wants to do in life. In contrast, people that live fulfilled lives stay true to their values and pursue meaningful goals.

You can be a teacher, a mother or friend. Each has its own sense and assumptions that are internalized as identity.

A major mission of self-development during early adolescence is the separation of different selves as a function of social context with an awareness of the potential contradictions.

• Confidence is an amplifier of quality and success. 
• Confidence is essential to influence and leadership.
• Confidence isn’t just about style. It’s also about substance.
• Confidence protects us. It's one of the greatest weapons we can develop.

Confidence is expressed most profoundly through our bodies. No matter how well we speak, the way we feel about ourselves will always manifest in our posture, our hand movements and our facial features. 

So commit to strong, positive body language and make a conscious effort to form habits that make your nonverbal communication automatic.

Reading connects us to people across time and space.

• Research shows that those who read the Bible more tended to have a stronger sense of purpose.
• Reading fiction also seems to make a difference. By seeing purpose in the lives of other people, we are more likely to see it in our own.

Finding purpose is not just an intellectual pursuit, it is something we need to feel. That's why purpose can grow out of suffering.

The current pandemic has us facing one of our biggest fears: staying alone, dealing with our own emotions and thoughts. However, this situation has also a great deal of advantages. While in self-isolation, we can use this time to improve ourselves by discovering new hobbies or just developing skills we have already gathered, cultivating our mind through reading. In fewer words, we finally have the time to learn how to deal with ourselves. And this is always a good thing.

As difficult as it may seem, self-isolation has its benefits. When spending your time alone, the key to handle this situation is to find a purpose in your suffering. In other words, focus on why your suffering is doing good to others as well as to yourself. Furthermore, the fact that you stick to a certain routine or that
everybody is doing the same thing provides you not only with a meaning, but also with a sense of belonging.

Life is full of paradoxes, and anything and everything that we hope for or desire only leads to more anxiety and stress, creating new problems for us.

We can be content. But it's not simple. To understand why we seem to be constantly dissatisfied with ourselves and the world, we must understand some basic psychological principles.

Our behavior, contentment, desires, expectations, and body clocks are set differently, and this may lead to conflicts and problems with others.

Jordan Peterson observed that virtues aim for balance and to avoid the extremes of the vices. Cultivating judgment about the difference between virtue and vice is the beginning of wisdom.

Modern relativism asserts judging how to live is impossible, because good and virtue are relative. Thus relativism’s version of “virtue” is “tolerance.” This leads to people broadcasting their tolerance as a form of self-promotion, and secret vice, which is also known as virtue signaling.

Order is where the people around you act according to the established social norms, remaining predictable and cooperative. Society is simultaneously structure and oppression.

Chaos is where the unexpected happens. 

“Construction and destruction alike satisfy the will to power, but construction is more difficult as a rule, and therefore gives more satisfaction to the person who can achieve it."