Let’s talk about it…

If you’ve read my last post, you are probably wondering what the hell is wrong with this girl. Didn’t she just praise David Goggins for being like her hero?? If you don’t know what the hell I’m talking about, you can catch up on this post

Can’t Hurt Me :

How did we get here??

Can’t hurt me is a book I’ve never thought that I’d ever read. I’ve known that it exists for a long time but I knew that I wouldn’t like it cause the author and I don’t view the world the same way.

I first heard about David Goggins on YouTube and it was not good stuff. They were basically saying David goes out of his way to make himself suffer and to hate his life. I was like no thank you.

I don’t how it happened but it happened. I finished reading the book and I somewhat liked the book, which is scary.

Taking Action :

I did not only read the book, I lived the book.

This was the first book that has had such a drastic impact on my life. I was reading the book while simultaneously following his advice. When I say I lived the book, I mean I lived the book.

I became a fan of David Goggins and I changed my mind about him. He doesn’t go out of his way to hate his life, he loves the way he’s living his life. Yes, he intentionally puts himself in situations that are almost physically and emotionally unbearable but he only does that to show himself what and how much he can achieve. He is constantly trying to push his own limits to show himself that nothing is impossible and we love that for him.

I always say that it doesn’t matter what you do, all that matters is why you are doing it. And as Shaina always says you have to love your reason for doing something.

I don’t think David is not that bad anymore and I respect him for making a name for himself.

But…

If he’s so great Avuma, then what’s the problem??

I started liking David so much that he became my mentor. I listened to his interviews when I got ready in the morning and I read his book whenever I found the time to. I treated reading the book as our mentorship sessions.

He advocates holding yourself accountable, stop being a piece of shit, stop the poopy pants mentality, don’t show weakness and get off your ass and start doing something about your life because nobody else will.

So I listened to him. I kept an accountability journal, I continued working out, I sometimes took cold showers. You know the works.

By the time exam season rolled around I was on a motivation high. I was studying harder than I have ever studied before. I still felt like that was not doing enough so I was pulling all nighters left, right and centre. I was doing something that scares me everyday.

It was actually cool. I became more confident. I had a lot of energy. I felt invincible and unstoppable. I felt amazing. It was such a high… For like a month or two.

The Breaking Point :

1. The first strike was my self-talk. It was so off. It went from a sweet, motivating voice to a mean bitch. I became more mean to myself and I started beating myself up.

2. I didn’t feel like myself. I didn’t recognize the person I had become while doing this because I was so out of alignment with my values.

3. One morning when my alarm rang. I was feeling sleepy cause I only slept for three hours. I was like, no way I’m getting up. My brain shouted, she’s showing weakness.

I woke up because I didn’t want to show weakness, no Sir, no. Shortly after that I told myself that I don’t want that to be my first thought when I wake up in the morning. I am very mindful of the first thing I think when I wake up.

4. David said that he doesn’t want friends who give him credit for waking up, you know small things. I was like same so I brought it up with my friends. My friends are like the best kind of friends. They are super loving and extremely supportive. They celebrate small wins and like congratulate you and hype you up about everything.

We’d be like practicing math together and you’d solve a problem and we’d hype you up. Like “Wow, you’re so smart” we’d high five and fist bump you. And you’d respond with a “That’s just how I am”. If you get a mark you are not happy with we give you reasons why that is a great a mark and why you should appreciate it. We are like that.

So I asked them how they feel about that. Essentially how they feel about raising our standard of what should be celebrated. They said bullshit and gave me a lot of reasons why that was a load of crap.

5. Like all things, it came to an end. Unsurprisingly the high that was driving me ended. I was so exhausted cause like my habits were unsustainable and I couldn’t keep up with them. I couldn’t keep running on three hour sleep, do one hell of a workout, take a cold shower, study for a million hours and expect to be sane at the same time.

So one weekend I took a nap and actually slept. My body was sore and my self-talk was terrible but the weird thing is I felt happy. I felt content and at peace.

I decided that that was great but it was not me. It’s not how I want to live my life.

Just so clear, David Goggins DID NOT tell me to do all those things. He told me to push my limits and I decided to push them that way.

In conclusion :

Can’t hurt me is not the worst book I’ve read. It’s not bad actually but if I didn’t have this much self-awareness I’d be well on my way to a journey self-destruction.

The book did help me wrap my head around the fact that my potential is limitless. However that is just my opinion because at the end of the day no two ever read the same book.