Record Keeping SRHI = 53
Fixed Meditation SRHI = 16

I’m keeping a running tally of my continual meditation/emotional redirecting throughout the day and see what works with recording. I’ll also do an SRHI of that starting tomorrow.

I’ve also isolated additional issues I have - yesterday I talked about Fear, Anxiety, and Depression. To that I’d have to add Pessimistic Thinking, Anger, Guilt, and what I call That Gaping Hole.

Pessimistic thinking is my habit of going down the most negative avenues for trivial things like email - as soon as I’m about to open my email my habit is to think “what fresh hell awaits me now” when I could just as easily think otherwise. Hypnotica mentions an exercise where he thinks of three things that are likely to happen, stops, then thinks up three things that are highly improbable and ludicrously awesome. This starts to train the mind to think flexibly when it comes to reframing situations.

I tend to get angry and stupid things - if I mess up something while cooking, I get angry and frustrated, and there really is no reason. I want to train myself to redirect that energy.

For Guilt I include “maybe I should have done this” sort of thinking, which is something I always do. There are many times I go down that avenue for, again, amazingly trivial stuff. What’s done is done, the way to success is by looking forward instead of constantly supplicating to the past. 

Lastly, That Gaping Hole is that feeling of incompleteness - the need in my gut that needs to be filled by anything - it could be video games, going out, drinking something, eating junk food. The comedian Louis CK in one of his standups talks about how many of us do not have the ability to just sit by ourselves - to just be. It’s almost like looking into a void. And if you are not truly comfortable with yourself, it is a disconcerting experience that you have to fill with something else, which is why, according to him, we are so enamored with smartphones. We always have something to do.

I feel this is very much the case for me - I get this odd sense of restlessness, of getting cabin fever and wanting to do something crazy, or the need to be distracted. I think this too needs to be dealt with head on.

Now for some of these I’m not sure what the process will be. I’m hoping that after a few days of just monitoring and experimenting I’ll be able to discuss this more. I also realize this is A LOT to handle for one habit, and it may need to be broken up. But we will see.