Growing Real: How to Tell If You’re Living in Alignment With Reality

Published on

Integration/Life Philosophy/Mindset/Shadow Life/Spirituality/Trust

Real Always Works So Tap Into Your Realness

There’s a reason life feels heavier when you’re out of step with it:

When you’re not aligned with reality, life becomes a grind and so things never quite ‘click’, problems multiply, and a low-level hum of frustration or anxiety constantly lingers in the background of your life as you find yourself in the Void.

To make matters worse, the harder you try to force things into place, the further they seem to slip away and the more unreal your life seems to become.

Here’s the secret ingredient that’s missing from most people’s lives:

Life only ‘works’ when you live it in a REAL way.

“Real” in this context doesn’t mean the Instagram brand of ‘authenticity’ or sloganeering your way through another self-help trend – it means living in a way that’s aligned with your actual nature, rooted in humility, and flowing with the natural drive towards wholeness that’s built into the very core of existence itself.

In other words, when you start to grow real, life stops being a tug-of-war and becomes an adventure.

Let’s dig a little deeper:

Psychological patterns show you how to find reality. Growing real is about facing reality.

The True Secret of Fulfilment: Be Real, Not Ideal

So many people spend their lives chasing ideals in the form of perfect careers, perfect bodies, perfect relationships, and perfect versions of themselves but the trouble with all this is that ideals are fantasies and fantasies are, by definition, not real.

If you want to find fulfilment in life, then, it isn’t about perfecting yourself but about learning to live in a way that’s aligned with reality.

This requires the humility to recognise that you’re a human being – not a god – and so you’re not omniscient or omnipotent but don’t need to be. It’s also about giving up the illusion that fulfilment comes from attempts at controlling life and embracing the truth that it comes from connection.

When you stop pretending you’re independent, fixed, and separate, and instead recognise your interdependence with the world, life begins to open up and everything becomes more real.

You don’t have to ‘become’ something to be whole because you’re already part of wholeness itself – you just need to stop resisting it so you can grow more deeply into it.

Growing Real & The Natural Drive Towards Wholeness

Here’s something crucial to understand if you want to find your own realness:

There is a natural drive towards wholeness always at work in reality – you can call it evolution, call it growth, or call it God – whatever name fits your worldview – but the point is that life wants to unfold, expand, and bring things together and it’s always doing this whether you ‘like’ it or not.

When you align yourself with this drive, you grow, evolve, and become more integrated, more alive, and more capable of handling life’s challenges because you stop getting in your own way.

The opposite is also true which means that when you resist this drive – because of fear, shame, or egoic attachments – you shrink and hold back instead of living. This means that you put yourself in survival mode and ten instead of joy, you get friction and instead of progress, you just circle the same old drain for most of your life.

The choice is simple:

You either move with reality or you fight it and suffer.

The Ego, the Shadow, and the Comfort Zone

The ego is always what keeps you stuck because filters reality, distorts truth, and insists you’re separate and in control of everything (when you have some control but not total control because of the natural drive towards wholeness). It spins stories and identities that feel safe but keep you caged.

Behind ego lies the shadow self – the parts of you you’d rather not face because they’ve been deemed as unacceptable somewhere along the line:

Fear. Anger. Shame. Vulnerability. Your love. Your Joy. Your relationship to something higher. The unresolved fragments of your past – all of these things are uncomfortable, which is why ego exists: to protect you from looking at them.

This is unfortunate because real growth only comes when you leave your comfort zone and face your shadow – if you don’t, the ego keeps you locked in loops of denial and self-sabotage that keep you circling that drain.

The irony is that once you face the shadow, it loses its power and what originally looked like a monster turns out to be a wounded child that simply needs acceptance.

When you get to this point, the energy you once wasted on resisting reality and upholding the ego and its illusions becomes fuel for wholeness and real life.

Signs You’re Growing Real

So how do you know you’re actually aligned with reality and not just fooling yourself at some level?

Here are three unmistakable signs that can serve as a compass:

1. Things Bother You Less

You stop being rattled by every minor irritation:

Life still throws challenges your way but they don’t define you and you’re no longer at the mercy of egoic stories about what things ‘mean’.

Instead, you develop a quiet trust in yourself and life itself and just keep moving with that natural drive towards wholeness.

2. You Find Your Flow

Instead of forcing everything, you start to move with life:

You notice opportunities, synchronicities, and moments where things just ‘click’ into place and so things like work feel less like a slog and more like being in the zone.

This is joy – not fleeting pleasure but the joy of harmony that lasts and permeates your days.

3. You Get Real Results

Reality is where results live and so, when you’re aligned with it, your actions bear fruit.

Projects complete, relationships deepen, your health improves, and you see tangible progress instead of endless frustration.

This is EVIDENCE of your realness because results don’t lie (which also means if you’re not getting them, you’re not rooted in reality).

Signs You’re Not Aligned or Growing Real

Of course, it works both ways and so if you’re not aligned with reality, you’ll know because:

Everything bothers you: Your ego projects stories onto every event, making you anxious, stressed, or resentful and you’re constantly on edge because you’re busy defending an illusion.
You feel stuck and forced: Nothing flows and everything feels like a battle as you push and push but the door never opens.
You don’t get results: Life feels like Groundhog Day. You’re hitting the same walls over and over because you’re recycling the same old outdated patterns rather than stepping into reality.

These are all symptoms of resistance – they’re not punishments from life (which the ego might tell you they are)…they’re just signals telling you to course correct and return to reality.

The Path Back Home: Awareness, Acceptance, Action

So, how do you get real again when you’ve drifted off course?

It always comes down to three simple stages (the stages I build my coaching containers around when working with clients on all this ‘stuff’):

1. Awareness (Deconstruct Ego)

You can’t change what you won’t acknowledge and so the first step is always to notice where you’re resisting reality.

Where are you forcing, projecting, or pretending? Awareness is painful at first because it strips away illusions but it’s also liberating because it gets you moving again.

2. Acceptance (Integrate Shadow)

Once you’re aware, accept what you see and embrace whatever it has to tell you about reality.

Acceptance doesn’t mean resignation – it means aligning with truth so you can stop wasting energy fighting what is and start redirecting it towards what can be.

3. Action (Trust Yourself and Life)

Finally, take real action by trusting yourself and life.

This doesn’t mean frantic busywork for the sake of ‘doing’ something – nor does it mean resorting to control-freak tactics and trying to omnipotent.

Real action means doing what is necessary (trusting yourself) and letting go of what isn’t (trusting life).

It means facing your shadow when needed, stepping outside the comfort zone, and trusting the process of wholeness to carry you forward as you keep learning, evolving, and going deeper and deeper into wholeness.

Read my book Trust: A Manual in Becoming the Void, Building Flow, and Finding Peace if you want to go deeper into your own realness than you’ve ever been before.

Practical Steps to Grow Real

Here are some practical ways you can start aligning with reality and growing real:

Do a Reality Check Journal: Each evening, write down one area where you were resisting reality (through control, denial, or avoidance) and one area where you flowed with it. Over time, patterns emerge and you can strip anything unreal away (the key is to train yourself to discern real from unreal).
Shadow Spotting: Notice emotional triggers. When something bothers you, for example, instead of blaming the situation, ask: What is this showing me about my shadow? Drop the projection (story) and lean into the discomfort rather than running from it.
The 90-Second Rule: When a strong emotion hits, give it 90 seconds to move through your body without attaching a story. This simple practice builds resilience and stops ego from hijacking your day.
Daily Trust Reps: Each morning, ask: What is the most REAL action I can take today? Then do it. Build your trust muscle with consistent reps of real action.
Comfort Zone Stretch: Once a week, do one thing that pushes you beyond the ego’s protective cage – it might be a difficult conversation, trying something new, or sitting with silence instead of distraction.
Let Go of One Illusion: Identify one belief, identity, or story you’ve been clinging to that no longer serves you. Release it and then notice how much lighter you feel.

Growing real is about letting reality be reality and then working with it.

Growing Real Means Growing Whole

At the end of the day, growing real and aligning with reality is about living from wholeness rather than fragmentation:

It’s about letting go of ego’s illusions, facing your shadow, and aligning with the natural drive towards wholeness that’s always at work.

When you do this, life doesn’t magically become ‘perfect’ but it does becomes real and that’s better than perfect because it leads to being unshakeable, finding flow, and getting results. It’s fulfilment without the fluff.

If you really wanna know whether you’re living in alignment with reality, don’t look at your fantasies—look at your results, your peace of mind, and your flow.

Reality is always trying to bring you back to itself and your only job is simply to say “Yes” instead of running away and hiding.

Stay real out there,

Oli Anderson, Transformational Coach for Realness

P.S. If you’re ready to grow real then book a free coaching call with me and I’ll help you start moving right away.

How to Gain Respect as a Man: Stop Wasting Your Time, Energy & Attention

Published on

Integration/Life Philosophy/Men/Mindset/Personal Revolutions/Relationships

The Simplest Way to Start Being Respected is to Start Respecting Your Own Time

Every man wants respect.

It doesn’t matter who you are, where you come from, or what stage of life you’re in – one of the deepest drives that sits at the core of being a man is the desire to be respected.

Not feared. Not pitied. Not laughed at.

Respected.

The problem, of course, is that many men don’t have it and they don’t know what to do about it:

Instead, they feel walked over, ignored, or taken advantage of and so – when that happens – it’s easy to lash out, get defensive, or try to force respect out of others.

Naturally, these kind of tactics never work because of the universal law that if you chase something it runs away and so, the more you demand respect from the outside, the more it tends to slip through your fingers.

If you’ve ever wondered why people don’t take you seriously or why your relationships, your workplace, or even your mates sometimes treat you as if your presence doesn’t really matter then you should know that here’s one simple shift in perspective that can change everything.

It goes like this:

If you want to be respected by others, start by respecting your own time, energy, and attention.

Let’s dig a little deeper:

Respect from others starts with respect for yourself and that begins by respecting your own time.

Why Respect Starts With Respecting Yourself First

Respect isn’t given but recognised:

People respect you when they can see you respect yourself and the easiest way for them to see that is by how you treat the most valuable resources you have:

Your time, your energy, and your attention.

Think about it in the most basic possible terms:

Life is finite which means that you’re not going to be here forever – this being the case, every single day, you’re running out of time.

Your energy isn’t infinite either and you only have so much in the tank each day before you burn out.

As for your attention? It’s the steering wheel of your life and so wherever it goes, your life follows.

In short: what you CHOOSE to do with these resources affects the course and condition of your whole life and so – at the end of the day – if you don’t respect them and what they can do for you then why would anyone else?

The harsh truth is that most men don’t get respected because they waste their time, energy, and attention on unreal things that don’t serve them:

They distract themselves with entertainment that doesn’t elevate them; they pour their energy into relationships that drain them; they obsess over problems, gossip, or the endless noise of the news cycle instead of focusing on growth and serving others.

The end result of wasting these most precious of resources is that they end up passive, weak-willed, and frustrated and nobody respects that…least of all themselves.

Opportunity Cost: The Hidden Price of Every Choice

Here’s a key idea that can help you to digest all of this ‘stuff’:

Everything you do comes at the cost of something else – something that economists call an opportunity cost.

If you spend an hour of your time scrolling on your phone, the opportunity cost is that you didn’t spend that hour building strength in the gym, learning a new skill, or being present with your family.

If you pour your energy into pointless arguments, the cost is that you don’t have that energy to put into your career, your craft, or your mission.

If your attention is constantly hijacked by distractions, you miss the chance to invest it in something real- something that grows you into the man you’re meant to be and carries you towards you vision.

When you don’t make conscious choices about where your time, energy, and attention go, you’re not just wasting them – you’re also sacrificing your future and making life more unreal for whoever you end up becoming down the line.

The Three Big Wastes: How to (Literally) Waste Your Life

Let’s break this down even further by looking at exactly how you can waste your life by wasting the beautiful and powerful resources that you’ve been gifted:

1. Wasting Your Time

Time is the most obvious because once it’s gone, it’s gone and you can never rewind it or claim it back (though you can invest it so you get more out of it).

Despite this, so many men waste hours, days, even years of their lives on activities that are nothing more than escapes like gaming, binge-watching, doom scrolling, drinking excessively, or whatever else.

Now, of course, there’s nothing wrong with rest or fun in moderation but if your life is mostly about killing time, then you can hardly be be surprised if nobody respects you.

Why should they if you don’t respect your own life enough to use your time well?

2. Wasting Your Energy

Energy is subtler – so much so that you might not even realise you’re giving it away:

Every toxic relationship, every pointless argument, every act of people-pleasing, or every time you worry unnecessarily about things that can’t be changed bleeds your energy dry.

You know those people who leave you feeling drained just by being around them? Or those situations that suck you in and leave you feeling like you’ve lost hours of your life?

That’s energy being wasted and most of the time it’s completely unnecessary because you can remove yourself from the situation (if you set healthy boundaries and say “No”).

The harsh truth is that a man who wastes his energy becomes weaker over time – physically, mentally, emotionally, and even spiritually.

On the other hand, a man who protects and builds his energy becomes stronger.

It’s really that simple.

3. Wasting Your Attention

Attention is the most powerful of the three because of the simple rule of nature that says:

What you focus on grows.

(Read that again if you haven’t heard it before because it will serve you greatly).

If you obsess over problems, drama, and fear, your life fills up with them. If you focus on a vision, growth, and truth, that’s what you get more of. Attention is like sunlight: whatever you shine it on, that thing grows.

The problem is that most men let the world hijack their attention:

Social media, endless bad news, gossip, pornography etc. etc. etc. – it’s all designed to pull your attention away from your real life and into someone else’s agenda which causes you to lose FOCUS on what really matters: your own real vision and growth.

In short: every time you give your attention away to some kind of BS, then you’re basically saying: “I don’t value my own mind enough to guard it”.

The Shift Back to Realness: Reclaiming What’s Yours

The ‘good’ news is that you can stop this cycle at any time because the moment you realise your time, energy, and attention are yours and that they’re priceless, you can start treating them with respect.

When you do this, everything changes:

You stop wasting time on distractions and instead invest it in things that move you forward like building strength, learning skills, creating, and serving others.

You stop wasting energy on empty relationships or toxic dynamics and instead pour it into people, projects, and practices that give back as much as they take.

You stop wasting attention on noise and start focusing it like a laser on your real purpose.

This where the ‘magic’ begins because when you respect your resources other people can see and sense it and so they naturally start respecting you more.

Why might this be?

It’s because:

They see that you have a real purpose and you know what you want.
They see that you can set boundaries and say “no” without guilt.
They see that you’re growing and evolving instead of staying stuck.
They see that you’re facing your ego, integrating your shadow, and taking real action.
And most importantly, they see results because when your time, energy, and attention are invested instead of wasted, your life produces fruit – creative works, businesses, families, or whatever path is real for you.

Respect Is Earned By Results

At the end of the day, this all brings us to a simple truth about life and human relationships:

Respect comes down to results.

Not just money or status, but the results of living with purpose, the results of building something real, and the results of refusing to waste what you’ve been given.

If people don’t respect you, it’s time to stop blaming them and start looking at how you’re using your time, energy, and attention.

Chances are, you’ve been giving those things away way too easily.

Check out Personal Revolutions: A Short Course in Realness if you want to go deeper into making the most of your life and gorwing real.

Practical Steps: How to Start Respecting Your Resources

Here’s how you can put this into action today and start changing your life and getting more respect over time (it’s not gonna happen over night – you need to stick to it):

1. Audit Your Time

For one week, track how you spend every hour and be brutally honest with yourself.
At the end of the week, ask yourself: “What did I invest my time and where did I waste it?”
Cut at least one obvious time-wasting activity from your life and replace it with something that moves you forward in a real way (exercise, learning, creating, connecting).

2. Guard Your Energy

Identify people, habits, or situations that drain you. Write them down and, again, don’t hold back.
Decide where you need to set boundaries. This could involve saying “no” to someone, quitting a draining habit, or leaving a toxic environment completely.
Start small – reclaiming even just 10% of your energy will feel like a power boost.

3. Master Your Attention

Start each day by asking: “What’s the most important thing I want to grow today?”
Limit distractions by putting your phone in another room when you need to focus on what needs doing.
Practice attention training by meditation, breathwork, or even just sitting in silence for ten minutes. Your ability to focus is like a muscle.

Giving yourself a regular ‘Wilderness Day’ is a great way to start reclaiming your attention: Wilderness Days: Why Saying “No” to the World Helps You Say “Yes” to Yourself

4. Create a Vision

Write down what “real growth” looks like for you – physically, financially, spiritually, relationally and in any other category that’s important to you.
Every day, make sure your time, energy, and attention are moving you closer to this vision (if they’re not, adjust).

5. Say “No” With Confidence

Remember: every “yes” to something unreal is a “no” to something real.
The next time you feel pressured to waste your time, energy, or attention, pause and ask yourself: “Is this moving me towards who I want to be?” If not, say no without apology and move on (as the sacred mantra says: “Gimme something real or GTFO“).

If you want respect then learn the value of your life.

The Final Word On Gaining Respect: Stop Wasting Your Time

If you’re sick of being disrespected, here’s the hard truth:

Respect starts and ends with you.

The world will never respect a man who squanders his time, energy, and attention but the moment you reclaim them and treat them as the priceless resources they are, you become the kind of man who commands respect without even asking for it.

In short:

If people don’t respect you, it’s time to stop wasting your time: Disrespecting Time = Disrespecting Yourself = Others Won’t Respect You

Stay real out there,

P.S. If you’re ready to start respecting yourself and your time, energy, and attention then book a free coaching call with me and I’ll help you to figure out the best way to use them.

Wilderness Days: Why Saying “No” to the World Helps You Say “Yes” to Yourself

Published on

Creativity/Integration/Life Philosophy/Mental Health/Nervous System/Psychology/Shadow Life/Spirituality

Wilderness Days Allow You to Face Yourself and Life Head-on & Make the Unconscious Conscious

There’s a peculiar irony in modern life and it looks like this:

We’re surrounded by more convenience, more stimulation, and more opportunity than at any other point in human history but – despite all this – many of us feel restless, fragmented, and burned out.

It’s almost as though the busier we become, the further away we drift from ourselves.

The world applauds productivity, hustle, and action which means that the ‘busier‘ you are, the more ‘successful‘ you’re supposed to feel but – deep down – we know that being busy for the sake of being busy is often just a clever way of running away from the truth that leads to us becoming “human doings” rather than human beings.

That’s where the idea of Wilderness Days comes in:

A Wilderness Day is not about escaping life but about re-entering it on realer terms in order to accept it unconditionally and to learn from whatever life has to show us:

It’s about saying “no” to everything external for long enough to be able wander into the inner wilderness – of solitude, silence, and the unconscious mind – so that we can face what we’ve been avoiding and restore our flow into wholeness over fragmentation.

It might sound simple, but the act of deliberately withdrawing for a day is an antidote to the distractions, noise, and ceaseless productivity that the modern world demands from us.

Let’s dig a little deeper:

A Wilderness Day is about turning away from the world to face reality.

The Trap of Being ‘Busy’: Real Work vs. Running Away

Let’s be clear from the get-go:

There are two kinds of ‘busy’: ‘good’ busy and ‘bad’ busy.

Good busy happens when you’re working on your purpose, expanding into your realness, or creating something meaningful and it’s the kind of work that leaves you energised rather than drained because you’re in flow with something bigger than yourself.

Bad busy, on the other hand, is a form of distraction:

It’s when your diary is full but your soul is empty, when you’re doing tasks to avoid yourself, and when you’re filling every waking moment with noise so that you don’t have to listen to the silence that’s screaming for attention from within yourself.

The modern world actively encourages this second kind of busy because it equates productivity with worth and reward us for being constantly available, constantly posting, and constantly moving without actually moving forward or getting anywhere.

This is unfortunate because when when our lives tilt too far in the direction of busyness for the sake of itself then we lose sight of the real path we’re meant to walk.

The truth is is that growth doesn’t only come from doing:

Sometimes it comes from not-doing...and that’s exactly what a Wilderness Day is designed to restore.

Yin and Yang: The Forgotten Balance

The language of energy gives us another way to frame this:

Our day-to-day lives tend to be drenched in yang energy which is active, outwardly-focused, fast-moving, and linear. This kind of energy is necessary if we want to get results in life and it’s what allows us to achieve things, make progress, and build things.

But when yang is not balanced with yin which is stillness, reflection, inwardness, and rest then our nervous system burns out and we can start living in a perpetual forward lean, chasing one task after another without ever grounding ourselves.

A Wilderness Day is about deliberately tipping the scales back toward yin by switching off the motor of endless doing and dropping into the slower, deeper rhythms of being. In practice, that means solitude, silence, and simple presence with ourselves.

And while the idea may sound counter-cultural (because it is), that’s precisely why it’s so powerful because the world is not reality.

Yin Qualities	Yang Qualities
Stillness	Dynamism
Passivity	Action
Receptivity	Assertiveness
Introspection	Outward Focus
Darkness	Light
Cold	Hot
Feminine	Masculine
Contraction	Expansion
Rest	Activity
Softness	Hardness
Subtlety	Intensity
Reflection	Pragmatism
Quietness	Noise
Surrender	Control
Sensitivity	Strength
Intuition	Logic
Nurturing	Protection
Calm	Passionate

What Actually Is a Wilderness Day?

Put simply: a Wilderness Day is a day that you dedicate to solitude, stillness, and flow.

It doesn’t require a tent, a backpack, or a trek into the actual wilderness (though you’re welcome to take it there if you wish) – instead, the wilderness in question is the inner one: the Shadow Territory of your unconscious mind, the real emotions you’ve been avoiding, and the truths about yourself, the world, and reality that you’ve been too ‘busy’ to face.

In short, a Wilderness Day is a day where you say “no” to the world – no to commitments, no to screens, no to the pressure to be ‘productive’ – so that you can say “yes” to yourself.

There is no rigid plan required to dive into this kind of ‘wilderness’ – in fact, imposing a plan on a Wilderness Day is missing the point.

The essence is to allow whatever is real to surface:

That might mean journalling, resting, meditating, walking in nature, playing music, or simply sitting quietly with your thoughts.

There’s no right or wrong – only real or unreal.

My Own Wilderness Practice

For me, Wilderness Days tend to fall on Saturdays. After a week of coaching, writing, content creation, and the inevitable bustle of modern life, I need a deliberate reset and so on those days, I let myself step out of the current of the world and into the ocean of reality instead.

I might spend the morning reading a book that’s been waiting patiently on the shelf, pick up my guitar, or bake bread. I always do some kind of yin yoga in the evening and, sometimes I just journal and allow thoughts to spill onto paper unedited.

The important point is that it doesn’t really matter what I do:

What matters is that I am not forcing anything or filling the day with noise – I’m simply letting myself be guided by whatever feels real in that moment.

The result is always the same: I end the day grounded, balanced, and reconnected and it’s a bit like returning from a personal retreat but without having to leave home.

The Wilderness Within: Facing the Shadow

Here’s the uncomfortable truth: most of us spend our lives avoiding our own shadow.

The shadow is the ‘part’ of us that holds our repressed feelings, our inconvenient truths, our shame, and the memories we’d rather not look at.

Most of the time all of this ‘stuff’ is buried out of sight in the unconscious and so we can simply pretend that it isn’t important – this is why we can become human doings: because it’s easier to distract ourselves with activity than to sit still long enough for the unconscious to surface.

But a Wilderness Day invites exactly us to face the unconscious and allow it to become conscious (so we can become more integrated):

It’s not about wallowing – it’s about allowing and so, when we create space for silence, the unconscious naturally begins to reveal itself and emotions rise, insights emerge, and what has been avoided can finally be faced.

This is where integration happens:

Instead of living fragmented lives – half in truth, half in avoidance – we start to gather ourselves back into wholeness and the foundation of our own realness.

As Blaise Pascal famously said: “All of humanity’s problems stem from man’s inability to sit quietly in a room alone.”

A Wilderness Day is one way of becoming part of the solution instead of contributing to the problem.

The Benefits of Solitude and Stillness

Why put yourself through this, though? Why not just keep grinding, stay ‘busy’, and keep distracting yourself like everyone else?

Well, basically, because the rewards of a Wilderness Day are immense:

Grounding: You reconnect with your body, your breath, and your real self.
Clarity: When the noise dies down, inspiration emerges and see your life with fresh eyes and ideas for your way forward.
Integration: You process the emotions and thoughts that were buried down there under all that busyness and so you become less divided within yourself and more energised.
Creativity: Stillness clears space for new ideas to arise and some of the best breakthroughs of your life will come after a Wilderness Day.
Presence. By becoming more real with yourself, you become more real with others, because relationships deepen when you’re not running away.

In short: solitude makes you more human and more real.

How to Take Your Own Wilderness Day

Here’s the good news: you don’t need to fly to Bali or book a luxury retreat to do this – you can start this Saturday if you want.

Here are some practical steps:

Block out the day: Treat it with reverence. Put it in your diary and say “no” to social plans, chores, and distractions. This is non-negotiable time for you.
Switch off the noise: Ideally, keep your phone off or on airplane mode. Disconnect from emails, social media, and news. The world can wait.
Create solitude: Spend the day alone if possible – if you live with others, explain what you’re doing and carve out private space.
Let go of agendas: Don’t plan every hour (or even really have a plan at all) – the whole point is to allow flow, not to recreate your busy schedule in quieter clothes.
Do what feels real: Journal. Meditate. Walk. Nap. Stretch. Read. Cook. Play music. There’s no checklist and the only guide is your intuition.
Face what arises: If emotions surface, don’t push them down; if boredom creeps in, sit with it. The wilderness is not always comfortable, but it is always worthwhile and you will be stronger in the long-run for facing it.
Reflect afterwards: At the end of the day, jot down any insights you’ve picked up in the wilderness and notice how you feel. More often than not, you’ll find a sense of peace you didn’t realise you were missing.

Check out my book Trust: A Manual in Becoming the Void, Building Flow, and Finding Peace if you’re ready to go deeper into wholeness and to build a solid foundation of realness in your life.

The Wilderness Sweet Spot: Once a Month (At Least)

One Wilderness Day here and there will help for sure but the real magic happens when you make it a practice.

Ideally, aim for at least one a month and think of it as essential maintenance for your soul:

Just as you wouldn’t drive a car endlessly without stopping for fuel or a service, you shouldn’t drive yourself through life endlessly without pausing to refuel inwardly.

Personally, I find a weekly Wilderness Day keeps me balanced but you may find monthly is enough – the frequency matters less than the consistency and what matters most is that you honour it.

A Wilderness Day is about becoming more aware.

The Real Point: Saying “Yes” to Wholeness

At its core, a Wilderness Day is not about retreating from life but about returning to it more whole – it’s not about avoiding responsibility but about remembering who you are beneath the surface of everything that seems ‘familiar’ to you.

When you strip away the busyness, the distractions, and the noise, you come back to something far more valuable: your REALNESS.

And once you’ve reconnected with that, everything else – your work, your relationships, your sense of purpose – flows with more authenticity and power (because the only power we have is in being real).

So the next time you feel yourself drowning in busyness, or numbing yourself with productivity, remember this:

Sometimes, the most productive thing you can do is sit quietly in your own company and let life catch up with you.

That’s the gift of a Wilderness Day.

Stay real out there,

P.S. If you’re committed to growing more real in life and taking action that allows you to flow with life then book a free coaching call with me and I’ll get you moving. Guaranteed.

Why You Avoid Eye Contact (And How to Rebuild “I-Contact”)

Published on

Health/Integration/Life Philosophy/Mental Health/Mindset/Nervous System/Psychology/Relationships/Shadow Life/Trust

The Psychology of Eye Contact Anxiety & Your Real Path Forward

Eye contact is simple in theory (‘just’ look somebody in the eye) but excruciating in practice for a surprising number of people:

You’d be forgiven for thinking that it’s one of the most natural things in the world – after all, we’re social creatures designed to communicate with each other and eye contact is a big part of non-verbal communication which – as we’ve all heard – is the biggest mode of human communication going.

The fact is that we’re born to look into the eyes of our parents, learn trust through that gaze, and so we communicate more through our eyes than we often realise but, despite this, many of us find ourselves dodging glances, staring at the floor, or pretending to be suddenly fascinated by the wallpaper when someone locks eyes with us.

Why does something so normal and natural feel so hard for people and and what’s really going on beneath the surface when we chronically avoid eye contact?

This article will dig into the psychology of eye contact avoidance, show how it ties back to our inner sense of self, and provide practical steps to move from eye contact anxiety to confidence. Along the way, we’ll explore why I like to call it not just “eye contact” but “I-Contact” (see what I did there?).

Let’s dig a little deeper:

A fear of eye contact is usually a fear of the self.

The Real Role of Eye Contact in the Human Condition

First things first: eye contact isn’t some quirky social add-on that needs adding to your social mix if you’re trying to appear a certain way – it’s a normal, natural, and healthy part of real communication.

When we look someone in the eye while speaking, we’re both sending and receiving powerful signals:

I’m comfortable in myself.
I feel safe with you.
I’m open and ready to connect in a real way.

Without words, we’re broadcasting trust, presence, and authenticity:

In other words, eye contact is the glue of human interaction and studies have shown it increases empathy, improves memory recall during conversations, and even synchronises our brainwaves with those of the person we’re speaking to (because of mirror neurons).

And yet, for many people, the very thing that should make connection easier feels unbearably exposing.

What’s actually going on?

Why You Avoid Eye Contact: The Missing “I-Contact”

Here’s where it gets interesting and a bit more REAL:

Avoiding eye contact often has little to do with other people and much more to do with ourselves.

When we find it difficult to look someone in the eye, it’s because we’re missing something deeper:

What we’re calling for the sake of this article “I-Contact.”

Think of it this way:

If I’m grounded in myself – which means that I know who I am, I accept myself, and I’m not running from shame, guilt, and/or trauma (the Unholy Trinity) – then looking at you in the eye is easy; I don’t fear being ‘seen’ because I’m not hiding from myself.

But when we lose that grounding and become disconnected from our realness because shame, guilt, trauma, or unresolved emotional ‘stuff’ in general disconnect us from our core, then we enter what I call the Void.

In the void, we no longer feel whole and so we start playing roles, adopting masks, or acting from our ego rather than from reality.

In that shaky place, eye contact feels unbearable – but why?

The simple answer is it’s because the eyes don’t lie:

Looking into someone else’s eyes is like standing in front of a mirror and so if we can’t ‘see’ ourselves clearly – because we’re disconnected because of shame etc. and living in the void – then we project that fear onto others.

Suddenly, their gaze feels like judgement, their attention feels like threat, and so we look away.

It isn’t really their eyes we’re avoiding – it’s our own.

Eye Contact: The Psychology at Play

So, what exactly is happening psychologically when eye contact feels difficult?

Here are the most common dynamics that you might want to be aware of if you’re dealing with this issue:

Projection of Self-Judgement
If you’re silently criticising yourself (because of shame), then you’ll assume others are doing the same and so their eyes feel like magnifying glasses burning holes into your perceived flaws.
Fear of Exposure
We all carry parts of ourselves we’d rather hide – especially when we’re locked behind ego and our shadow self is in hiding. Eye contact is difficult when we’re fragmented like this because it feels like someone might see through the mask, exposing the shame we haven’t dealt with, causing us to face the shadow self before we’re ready. This is one reason why shadow work is so important.
Social Anxiety & Hyper-Arousal
In anxious states of being, the nervous system is in overdrive and so eye contact becomes overwhelming because it adds more stimulation to an already frazzled system that perceives threats everywhere instead of safety.
Learned Avoidance
If you grew up in an environment where eye contact was discouraged (e.g., authoritarian households or cultures where deference meant looking down) then avoiding it can feel second nature because you’ve been conditioned to think there’s something ‘wrong’ with it.

Each of these loops back to one core issue: a lack of “I-Contact” which is simply just a fundamental split in your relationship with yourself, the world, and reality itself.

The Consequences of Avoiding Eye Contact

It may seem like a small thing – after all, what’s the harm in looking at the floor once in a while?

But chronic eye contact avoidance actually has consequences that can affect your whole life:

It signals insecurity to others (even if you’re competent) and so this can impact your reputation and the way that people treat you.
It can make you appear less trustworthy in both personal and professional interactions because people pick up on instinctual cues that you might be hiding something.
It reinforces your own inner disconnection, keeping you stuck in the void, and locked within an unreal relationship with yourself.
It can block deep intimacy in relationships, because intimacy requires being ‘seen’ and seeing what’s really there.

In short: avoiding eye contact keeps us locked in an unreal state of being.

The Proven Benefits of Eye Contact

Now let’s flip the script and look at what happens when we reclaim our ability to hold eye contact in a real way.

Research and human experience alike show several benefits:

Eye contact builds trust: People are more likely to believe and connect with you.
Eye contact increases likability: Those who maintain appropriate eye contact are rated as more confident and charismatic.
Eye contact improves learning and memory: Direct gaze has been shown to boost information recall (probably because you’re more present and regulated).
Eye contact strengthens empathy: Looking into someone’s eyes helps us read emotions more accurately so you can understand them better.
Eye contact deepens connection: In both friendships and romantic relationships, shared gaze strengthens intimacy and helps you build a real foundation.

In other words, eye contact doesn’t just change how others see you – it changes how you see yourself and experience life as a result of this.

Rebuilding “I-Contact”: The Three Foundations

So, what can we do if eye contact feels uncomfortable, threatening, or even impossible?

It starts not with the eyes, but with the self and cultivating a real relationship with yourself at the deepest level.

Here are three foundations to rebuild “I-Contact” (a connection to your realness):

1. Regulate the Body

Our nervous system dictates so much of how safe we feel – if you’re in sympathetic dominance (fight-or-flight mode), eye contact will feel like too much.

What you need to do to reclaim your body is to slow down and allow the nervous system to relax:

Breathwork: Try box breathing (inhale for 4, hold for 4, exhale for 4, hold for 4).
Movement: Regular exercise releases trapped energy and grounds the body.
Somatic processing: Learn to feel and release emotions physically rather than suppressing them.

When the body calms, the eyes can open.

2. Regulate the Mind

The mind loves to chatter – often with the same old hamster wheel BS over and over again.

This is bad news for eye contact because unreal thoughts like “They’re judging me” or “I look stupid” amplify the discomfort of looking people eye-to-eye.

Some things that can help:

Thought logging: Write down recurring thoughts and challenge whether they’re real or just fear-based. There’s a free tool for this here on this site: Hamster Wheel Thought Log
Mindfulness: Train yourself to notice the present moment rather than spiralling into imagined judgements.
Self-compassion: Talk to yourself like you would to a friend. As the old saying goes, if somebody spoke to you like that negative voice in your head sometimes does then you probably won’t keep them around for very long.

When the mind is steady, the gaze is steady.

3. Build a Real Vision

Confidence grows from evidence and so when you have a clear vision for your life – and you’re taking action towards it – you naturally feel more grounded in your realness.

Set meaningful goals that reflect your values.
Track small wins to prove to yourself that you’re capable.
Align actions with truth, not ego roles.

When you’re moving forward with purpose, you stop hiding and eye contact becomes proof of your wholeness and belief in yourself.

Check out my book Trust: A Manual in Becoming the Void, Building Flow, and Finding Peace if you want to go deeper into building a solid foundation within yourself and growing real.

Eye Contact Exposure: Training the Eye

Once those three foundations are in place, you can begin gentle “exposure therapy” with eye contact.

What this basically means is that you start small and build up over time:

Practise with yourself first: Look in the mirror and hold your own gaze for 30 seconds – it may feel awkward at first but if you can’t do it with yourself how can you expect to do it with anybody else?
Practise with safe people: Friends, family, or trusted colleagues. Try holding eye contact for a full sentence or two when speaking. You can even do this on your pets if you like.
Build towards strangers: Cashiers, baristas, or people you meet briefly. A simple “thank you” while maintaining eye contact can be powerful and give you ‘evidence’ that you can do this.

Remember: eye contact is like a muscle and so the more you use it, the stronger it becomes.

Caveats: Don’t Stare Like a Psychopath

A word of caution here: balance matters.

With strangers: Prolonged eye contact across a room or street can feel threatening. Always remember that the goal is connection, not intimidation.
With anyone: Break eye contact naturally from time to time because staring without pause can be unsettling. Real communication is a dance: eyes meet, drift, and meet again.

The art is in presence – not performance.

Practical Steps: Your “I-Contact” Plan

Here’s a step-by-step plan you can begin today:

Body Check: Each morning, spend 5 minutes doing breathwork or gentle movement to get you out of sympathetic dominance.
Mind Check: Keep a small notebook or download the thought log to monitor and manage unreal thoughts. When one appears, write it down and ask: Is this true? Or just fear?
Vision Check: Each week, set one small but meaningful goal and track your progress to build grounded confidence.
Mirror Gaze: Hold eye contact with yourself in the mirror for 30–60 seconds daily.
Safe Practice: During conversations with friends or family, practise maintaining eye contact for full sentences.
Stranger Step: Pick one short interaction daily (e.g., shop counter) to practise holding eye contact when saying thank you.

Over time, you’ll notice not only that eye contact feels easier, but that you feel more like YOU (the REAL you).

Eye contact allows you to communicate in a more real way.

Eye Contact: The Final World

Avoiding eye contact isn’t about weak social skills or awkwardness – it’s about the deeper disconnection from ourselves and how this causes us to be shaken from ourselves.

In short, when we lack “I-Contact,” we fear being ‘seen’, and so we look away.

The ‘good’ news is that reconnection is possible by regulating the body, steadying the mind, and building a real vision. From there, eye contact stops being frightening and starts being freeing.

Stay real out there,

P.S. If you’re ready to build a solid grounding in yourself and to become reconnected to your realness then book a free coaching call with me and help you find your footing.

Psychological Patterns: See the Pattern, Save Your Sanity

Published on

Integration/Life Philosophy/Mindset/Psychology/Relationships/Shadow Life

Why Acceptance and Adaptation of Psychological Patterns Beat Wishful Thinking Every Time

Human beings are pattern-spotting machines:

This is actually one of the main reasons we’ve survived this long as a species without getting collectively eaten, poisoned, or wiped off the face of the earth.

Our brains have evolved to detect patterns in nature, in people, in circumstances, and even in life itself so that we can act quickly and efficiently when needed:

You see those stripes over there in the bushes? Don’t stick around – it might be a tiger (though, probably not if you live in the UK). Notice the same cloud formations before a storm? Time to head for shelter.

This ability has been so finely tuned over millennia that it’s become our default operating system:

We trust patterns because they keep us safe but, still, in the modern world, many of us ignore them – especially when it comes to our relationships, our daily routines, and our personal growth.

Why? Because patterns don’t always tell us what we’re ready to hear.

Let’s dig a little deeper:

Consistently ignoring psychological patterns is a mild form of insanity.

The Beauty and the Burden of Psychological Patterns

Let’s start with the obvious which is that patterns are there to help us navigate life in a real way:

When reality consistently repeats itself, it’s usually giving us a message but the trouble is that sometimes we’d rather listen to the voice of wishful thinking than to the actual data unfolding in front of our faces.

This can cause all kinds of unnecessary problems in our lives:

Take relationships, for example – if you notice that every time you meet with a certain friend, they dominate the conversation and never ask about you, that’s not a one-off – it’s a confirmed pattern.

Even though you’ve already started to become aware of this pattern, however, it might be the case that instead of accepting that this person is relentlessly self-centred, you might find that it’s easier to try and convince yourself that “This time they’ll be different”, or that “This time they’ll listen”…only to end up finding yourself shocked and frustrated when they don’t.

This kind of shock and frustration is always unnecessary because the pattern was there all along.

Of course, the brain isn’t perfect and so, occasionally, it overreaches – this is where conspiracy theories, superstition, and seeing ‘signs’ everywhere even when there aren’t any come in:

This doesn’t mean that conspiracy theories can’t be true, superstition doesn’t exist for a reason, or that signs can’t be real – just that the mind sometimes find patterns where none exist (what psychologists call apophenia).

In general, though, when something shows up repeatedly and consistently, we’re better off believing it than fighting it because it’s showing us something about actual REALITY worth paying attention to.

When Ego and Wishful Thinking Get in the Way

So why do we ignore patterns that are pointing us towards a better understanding of something real (especially when – if you read this site regularly – you know that real always works):

Well, the two biggest culprits are wishful thinking and ego:

Wishful thinking is seductive because it whispers that maybe, just maybe, this time will be different and so we cling to our illusions because reality can feel harsh and we have some underlying emotional ‘stuff’ that causes us to be avoidant of it.

This is why things like admitting that someone will never change or that a situation will always be the same takes away our fantasy of control and so we would rather resist in the face of evidence to the contrary (in the form of those repeating patterns).

Ego, on the other hand, tells us we’re special:

That our willpower or our effort will somehow bend reality to suit us – for example, “If I just try harder, they’ll respect me” (even though you have enough evidence that you’re dealing with somebody who doesn’t really even respect themselves deep down) or “If I keep showing up early, eventually the doctor will see me on time” (even though you’ve seen hundreds of times already that such a thing is never gonna happen).

In short, ego resists reality because reality doesn’t flatter it and flattery is what the ego needs to maintain its hold over us.

Both wishful thinking and ego set us up for frustration, resentment, and wasted time, and – even worse -they always disconnect us from the very thing that could actually help us grow more real:

The Truth.

Accept and Adapt: The Two-Step Strategy for Dealing With Psychological Patterns

When we notice a pattern, we have two things that we need to do about it:

Accept it
Adapt to it

The only other alternative is to keep rejecting reality and to keep bashing our heads against the wall (spoiler: the wall always wins).

Acceptance doesn’t mean defeat – it just means recognising things as they are.

Adaptation means adjusting our approach to make the best of the reality we’ve just accepted.

Together, they form a sane and sustainable way of dealing with life and the patterns that it presents us with.

Real-Life Examples of Pattern Recognition

To bring this down to earth, here are a few examples from my own life and coaching practice:

1. The Perpetually Late Hospital

I’ve got a regular hospital appointment that I have to attend weekly and, without fail, they’re late. Always. Not just once or twice every so often – literally always.

Despite me knowing this, against all the evidence, I’ve found myself for whatever reason telling myself that, “This time will be different. This time they’ll run on schedule“, and so I naively show up early thinking that something magical will have taken place and then…what happens?

I wait. And wait some more. And then I sit there wasting my time and kicking myself for ignoring the pattern.

The reality is revealed in the pattern: they are late.

The acceptance is: they will always be late – no matter what I do.

The adaptation is: I turn up later instead. Sanity restored.

2. The Self-Centred Friend

We all know someone who can talk about themselves until the cows come home and then maybe even talk a little more for good measure.

If we don’t recognise that pattern, then we’ll keep expecting a different kind of interaction and keep being disappointed because we’re living in fantasy over reality.

The real move is to accept that it is what it is and this is who they are (because people don’t change unless they want to).

The way that we can adapt is to either adjust expectations (don’t look for deep listening from them) or limit time with them because as the sacred mantra goes: “Gimme something real or GTFO“,

3. The Shadow Within

Patterns aren’t just external – they live inside us too:

Maybe you carry an image of yourself as unshakeably strong, because the ego doesn’t want to admit to vulnerability but if the pattern of your emotional life shows that you do feel deeply and often, then ignoring that truth only creates distance from yourself (which just leads to all kinds of problems and a life in the Void).

Acceptance here is about facing your shadow: admitting the ‘parts’ of you that don’t fit the polished self-image that your ego thinks you need to hold onto. Adaptation is using that self-knowledge to grow in realness instead of hiding from it.

Why Psychological Patterns and Pattern Recognition Matters

Ignoring patterns isn’t just inconvenient – it’s damaging because it creates unnecessary friction in our relationships, eats away at our time, and undermines our equanimity.

Every time we deny reality, we fragment ourselves a little more and become more distanced from the REAL life we could and should be living.

When we embrace patterns, on the other hand – when we actually believe what reality is showing us and work with it instead of against it – then we save ourselves energy, sanity, and disappointment and gain clarity about how to move forward.

If you want to change your life, it isn’t about controlling every detail or bending people to your will but about recognising patterns, accepting them, and adapting wisely.

If you want to go deep into realness and flow then Trust: A Manual in Becoming the Void, Building Flow, and Finding Peace will help you take yourself there.

Practical Steps: How to See, Accept, and Adapt to Patterns

Here are some practical steps to bring this into your daily life:

1. Spot the Psychological Pattern

Keep a journal of repeated experiences.
Ask yourself: Has this happened more than twice? If yes, it might be a pattern. If it’s more than three times then pretty much definitely.
Notice your emotional responses – frustration often points to ignored reality and opportunities to grow more real.

2. Question the Fantasy

When you expect something to be different, pause and gather yourself in your body instead of just your head and all of its illusions and expectations.
Ask: Is this expectation based on evidence or on wishful thinking?
Recognise when your ego is trying to ‘win’ against reality and ground yourself back in your realness.

3. Accept the Truth

Say it out loud: “This is how it is / It is what it is“.
Drop the judgement and remember that acceptance isn’t resignation but clarity.
Remember: reality doesn’t care about your preferences so they have zero effect on it.

4. Adapt Your Behaviour

If someone is always late, plan accordingly or decide if you even want to meet them in the first place.
If a friend is always self-absorbed, either adjust expectations or limit time with them.
If you notice a personal pattern (anger, fear, avoidance), face it honestly and use it as a guide for growth.

5. Build a Pattern-Positive Mindset

Instead of resisting reality, look for the opportunities within it.
Ask yourself: How can I move with this pattern instead of against it?
Treat adaptation as a skill: every adjustment you make is a victory over unnecessary suffering and aligns you more closely with reality so you can flow with life in a more real way.

Psychological patterns show you how to find reality.

Psychological Patterns: The Final Word

The point of all this is simple but powerful:

Consistent repeated patterns don’t lie.

If something keeps showing up in your life, pay attention and don’t waste your sanity trying to pretend it’s not there or fall into the trap of wishful thinking or letting your ego convince you that reality will bend to your will.

Instead, choose the healthier path:

Accept what is, adapt to it, and grow stronger into a stronger foundation of realness in the process.

In the end, fighting patterns means fighting reality and reality always wins.

Stay real out there,

P.S. If you’re ready to grow real and build a solid foundation for yourself and your life so you can take real action then book a free coaching call with me and I’ll help you get moving and keep you accountable.

Real Ones 101: How to Know and Find Your Real Tribe

Published on

Integration/Life Philosophy/Mental Health/Mindset/Nervous System/Relationships/Shadow Life/Trust/Yoga

You’ll Never Feel Unsafe Showing the Real Ones the Real Things About You

One of the deepest human cravings isn’t money, status, or recognition but to be ‘seen‘:

To be ‘seen’ means to be known in our wholeness and to be able to sit with someone and show them the raw, unpolished truth of who we are without fear of being judged, dismissed, or misunderstood.

The truth about human beings is that we’re tribal creatures at heart which means that we evolved in groups where intimacy, trust, and cooperation were essential for survival.

This also means that to be fully human we need to truly relate to others in a real way so that we can continue to grow and evolve into our realness in relationship instead of isolation.

Despite this natural need, in our modern and often empty age, many of us walk around with a hidden ache: the ache of not being fully ‘seen’ and living a life in the void.

The paradox is that although we long for intimacy and real connection, many of us are terrified of vulnerability when it counts:

We hold back the truth about ourselves; we bite our tongues when we could share what’s really going on; we water ourselves down to be acceptable, palatable, and ‘safe’ in the eyes of people that don’t even really know us.

But why?

The common assumption in our culture is that – if we can’t be ‘vulnerable’ like this – then there’s clearly something wrong with us and that our fear of opening up is a flaw.

We tell ourselves that if we were stronger, braver, or more self-assured, then we’d be able to share more openly but what if this assumption is completely off and the truth is often subtler and more nuanced:

What if, sometimes, our nervous system simply doesn’t feel safe in the presence of certain people?

Because if so that’s not weakness – it’s wisdom.

Let’s dig a little deeper:

The real ones will appreciate what's real about you and vice versa.

When the Nervous System Speaks You Better Listen

At a biological level, our nervous system is (literally) always scanning for cues of either ‘safety’ or ‘threat’ and if it senses a threat (in the form of ‘danger’) then it mobilises us into fight, flight, or freeze.

Often, the danger in question might be obvious – like a barking dog; other times, it might be more subtle, like a person whose energy is fragmented, inconsistent, or unpredictable and so something just feels…off.

At other times, it goes even deeper and we find that the nervous system is out-of-whack because of unresolved shame, guilt, or trauma (the Unholy Trinity):

In those moments, we see threats that aren’t really ‘there’ but, just as often, the nervous system is accurately picking up that the person we’re with isn’t a safe container for our realness.

We can boil all of this down by saying it like this:

If someone hasn’t done their own inner work – if they’re locked in the Shadow Dance between ego and the shadow self – then it actually makes perfect sense that our body doesn’t feel settled in their presence because their inner fragmentation signals danger and so our nervous system listens.

When this happens, your inability to be vulnerable isn’t a sign that there’s something ‘wrong’ with you -it’s just discernment of the unreal from the REAL.

The Trigger Effect of Realness: How REALITY Always ‘Triggers’ the Unreal

Here’s something important that you need to know:

When you are regulated, when you do have a vision for your life, and when you are walking the path of realness, your nervous system will feel generally calm because you’re living with a minimal amount of inner and outer friction.

In this state, you’ll feel a sense of flow…that is until you share something real with the ‘wrong’ crowd, and suddenly – bam! – you’re dismissed, laughed at, or subtly undermined.

“Why might this be?”, I hear you ask.

Because REAL always triggers UNREAL.

Unreal people – those still hiding behind their ego masks to continue resisting and avoiding their own shadow – will often respond defensively to whatever truth that you bring into their lives.

This isn’t because there’s something ‘wrong’ with you but because your presence shines a light on their unhealed parts and – instead of letting that light in – they deflect, dismiss, or attack.

A Story From My Life

For many years in my youth, I harboured the dream of writing a book – not just a vague fantasy, but a deep calling to express myself and my philosophy and bring it to life within the world.

When I shared this with some members of my family and friends, their reactions weren’t exactly supportive:

I was told I was being naïve; that writing books was unrealistic; that I should be more practical.

On the surface, they might even have seemed ‘right’ – after all, I’m just a regular guy by most standards so who did I even think I was to want to write anything at all?

Underneath it all, though, something deeper was going on:

Their dismissal wasn’t about me – it was about them and served as a projection of their own ‘stuff’.

What I slowly realised is that everybody who was doubting me had once held dreams of their own – dreams they’d long since abandoned and so seeing me pursue mine triggered their own buried disappointment. Rather than face that – and the unreal things that had caused them to give up in the first place – it was easier to project onto me so they could maintain the familiar status quo they’d created in their relationship with themselves.

The irony is that years down the line I’ve now written several books (because action is the best argument for what you ‘can’ or ‘can’t’ do): not because I was special, but because I kept showing up with discipline, focus, and consistency and what they said was “impossible” was simply a matter of putting in the work over time.

The real danger wasn’t in following my dream; the real danger would have been betraying it because I listened to an unreal world over what I knew could was real.

Dysregulation and the Ego Shell

A sad and unfortunate fact about life is that when people give up on their real path, their nervous system pays the price:

This is because the unexpressed parts of themselves – dreams, truths, shadows – don’t disappear but instead turn inward, becoming internal threats to the ego that cause guilt, shame, and fear rise up.

To cope, many people fight o protect their ego identities to keep those ‘threats’ at bay:

They cling to being “busy,” “successful,” or “fine” no matter what but this shell blocks genuine intimacy and becomes a mask through which no real communication can pass.

This means that when you bring your realness to them, their ego armour interprets it as an attack.

You’re not unsafe, though – they are. Within themselves.

The Hard Truth: Some People Can’t ‘See’ You Because They Can’t ‘See’ Themselves

Here’s a sobering truth that also has the potential to set you free if you truly grasp it:

People can only see in others as deeply as they’ve seen in themselves.

If someone hasn’t faced their own shadow, they don’t know their own realness and so they can’t honour yours.

If someone has abandoned their own real path, they’ll struggle to support yours.

If someone is terrified of their own vulnerability, they’ll dismiss yours as weakness or foolishness (when accepting our flaws etc. is always more ‘wise’ than foolish).

It’s not that they’re ‘bad’ people or anything like that – it’s just that they’re not equipped to handle life in a real way yet.

What this all means in practical terms is that you’ll never feel truly safe showing the real things about yourself to people who are disconnected from their own realness (and your nervous system will reflect this).

And that’s okay.

Because somewhere out there are your people – your real tribe. The REAL ONES who can see you and who won’t flinch at the truth because they’re trying to uncover it too in their own lives.

These are ones who will meet your vulnerability with presence, respect, and love (because you’ll be able to do the same in return).

Creating Containers of Realness

The invitation, then, is not to force unsafe people to try and ‘see’ you (which is basically impossible) – it’s to create and seek out relationships that can.

This is how tribes form:

Not through shared pretence, but through shared values

Not through performance, but through presence.

Not through ego, but through integration of realness.

When you find those people, your nervous system will tell you and you’ll feel calm, grounded, and energised in their presence.

You’ll feel ‘seen’ and when you show them your realness, you’ll never feel unsafe because they’ll be real enough to handle it.

(As an aside: if you keep trying to get an unreal person in your life to see you in a real way then ask yourself what UNREAL part of you is clinging to this illusion of needing this in the first place – normally, it will be shame, guilt, and/or trauma and those old patterns and conditioning).

My book Trust: A Manual in Becoming the Void, Building Flow, and Finding Peace will take you way deeper into your own realness and a sense of deep trust for yourself and life.

Practical Steps to Find the Real Ones and Build Your Real Tribe

So how do you actually live this out and make it practical?

Here are some steps you can take to align your nervous system, trust your discernment of the real vs. unreal, and connect with the real ones:

1. Regulate Yourself First

Commit to daily practices that bring your nervous system into balance: breathwork, meditation, grounding exercises, yoga, journaling.

(I do a free yin yoga class for dissolution approximately every three weeks online – sign up here to dissolve yourself: Dissolution Hour (Free Online Yoga)).
Notice when you’re calm and when you’re triggered and pay attention to your body’s signals. A simple exercise is to do a body check a few times each day: simply pause and ask yourself what sensations and emotions you’re experiencing – over time, this makes it easier to stay grounded when that nervous system kicks in and sees a ‘threat’.

2. Develop Real Awareness

Pay attention to how you feel in the presence of different people (train yourself to check in with yourself and pay attention in each interaction).
If your body feels tense, guarded, or small around someone, don’t dismiss it as “just you” – consider it data about their own nervous system state and levels of realness or unreality.

Before you spill your deepest truths with people, try small disclosures.
Notice how people respond: Do they listen? Dismiss? Change the subject? Etc. Etc. Etc.
The response tells you everything and you’re not obliged to share anything real with people who aren’t open to receiving it.

4. Look for Shared Values and Vision

Seek people who are growing more real instead of shrinking behind the weight of their unreality – who are willing to be raw instead of polished.
Build something with those who celebrate your ‘wins’ rather than compete with them (because they’re regulated so have an abundance mindset instead of being locked in the ego’s scarcity which is just fragmentation projected outwards).

5. Create Your Own Container

Start conversations that matter and bring depth into your interactions by leading the way:
Model the realness you want to receive because those who resonate will lean in and those who don’t will drift away naturally over time anyway.

6. Trust the Process

Don’t panic if you don’t find your tribe overnight – it takes time but it’s a process like anything else.
Trust that as you live in realness and the right people will appear to match your energy.

The real ones will help you to transform your life so it's more real (and vice versa).

Real Ones 101: The Final Word

The truth is simple, but it’s not always easy to embrace:

You’ll never feel unsafe showing the real ones the real things about you.

Your nervous system knows the difference between containers that can hold your realness and those that can’t so honour it and trust its wisdom.

You’re not “too much” and you’re not broken for wanting to be ‘seen’ – you’re simply waiting for the people who are capable of seeing and – when you find them – when you find your tribe – intimacy won’t feel like a risk. It’ll feel like coming home.

Stay real out there,

P.S. If you’re ready to grow real and start living your real life then book a free coaching call with me and I’ll help you get moving right away.

Three Pillars of Being a Real Man: Trust God, Be a Good Man, Love Your Partner

Published on

Integration/Life Philosophy/Men/Mindset/Relationships/Shadow Life/Spirituality/Trust

Three Pillars for Living Your Realest Life as A Man

Every man has two options in life:

He can either chase the illusions of ego or he can align himself with reality.

One path leads to force, frustration, and endless fragmentation; the other leads to flow, strength, and realness.

If you want to be the ‘best’ man you can be, you need to commit to the second path – the path of reality (because reality is the only place you can ever expect to get any results).

This isn’t just some abstract philosophy that feels good to think about – it’s a practical process of getting in touch with your own REALNESS and it’s something that can be lived and breathed every single day.

In my own life, I’ve found that growth as a man rests on three key pillars – these aren’t arbitrary ideas or borrowed self-help clichés but principles I’ve tested in my own life and in the lives of the men I work with:

What I’ve seen is that when I hold fast to these pillars, I grow stronger, more real, and more capable of meeting life with open eyes.

The three pillars are simple to say but powerful to live by:

Trust God
Be a good man
Love your partner

This article will help you to understand each ‘pillar’ in more detail and to show you how can apply these ideas to your own life.

Let’s dig a little deeper:

The three pillars of being a real man revolve around learning to trust yourself and life.

Pillar 1: Trust God

First things first:

When I say “Trust God”, I’m not talking about blindly following dogma, ticking boxes at a church, or imagining a bearded man in the sky pulling the strings of your life.

No, trusting God is deeper, simpler, and far more real than that because it’s about humility.

It’s about recognising that no matter how clever, strong, or capable you are, you’re never in total control of everything that happens in your life:

You can make decisions, take action, and move with purpose but – no matter how strong you might be – life will still throw you curveballs, challenges, and setbacks that you couldn’t possibly predict.

When you trust God, you learn to let go of the constant need to control the uncontrollable and, instead, you learn to ride through periods of uncertainty with the faith that you can handle whatever comes your way.

When you trust like this, you stop demanding that life bends to your will and instead move with the flow of reality, knowing that – even when you don’t quite understand it – life is constantly shaping you, burning away anything unreal, and pulling you back towards what’s actually real.

Trusting God doesn’t mean that you never feel doubt or fear – it simply means that you stop letting doubt or fear control you.

In this state, you’re able to finally stop resisting reality and start accepting it and this foundation of acceptance opens you up, deepens you, and allows you to grow stronger.

The uncomfortable truth is that every man who refuses to trust God ends up being controlled by his ego and so he clings, he forces, he panics, and he manipulates his way through life until – eventually – he burns himself out chasing illusions.

On the other hand, the man who trusts God becomes unshakeable because he’s not standing on the sand of ego but on the rock of reality and so he has a lasting foundation that can get him through this life until they day that he dies.

This is why “Trust God” is the most important of the three pillars – it’s the foundation on which everything else rests and gives you the strength of your own realness required to show up as the man you were born to really be.

Pillar 2: Be a Good Man

Once you’ve built your foundation by trusting God, the next step is to live by a code that’s aligned with your real values and vision for yourself and your life.

Being a good man doesn’t mean being ‘perfect’ (which doesn’t exist) – nor does it mean that you’re always smiling, always agreeable, or that you never make mistakes.

What it does mean is that you live with integrity, you know your values, you have a clear moral code, and you align your actions with that code – even when it’s difficult, even when it costs you, and even when your (temporary) feelings are pulling you back into old habits and ways of being.

Too many men today are lost in moral relativism:

They let their short-term emotions dictate their choices, or they let the culture around them define what’s ‘right ‘and ‘wrong’ instead of tapping into their own timeless wisdom but – if you want to grow as a real man – you need to take responsibility for knowing what you stand for and then standing for it.

Here’s another piece of the puzzle:

Being a good man also means doing the inner work.

You need to integrate your shadow – the ‘parts’ of yourself you’ve denied, suppressed, or hidden behind your ego in order to be acceptable in the eyes of the world:

Every man has this kind of darkness inside himself and, if you don’t face it, that darkness will control you – showing up as anger, projection, self-sabotage, or addiction – but if you’re willing to look it in the eye, to accept it, and to bring it into the light, that same energy can be transformed into strength.

Being a good man also means you don’t live for yourself alone, that you don’t make your ego the centre of the universe, and, instead, you orient your life around a sense of purpose:

Real purpose isn’t about chasing fame, money, or external validation (despite what social media might make you believe) – it’s about taking your values and making them valuable to others.

It’s about asking:

How can I serve? How can I create? How can I contribute something REAL?

When you live this way, your life stops being small and fuelled by self-obsession and you become a man who can be relied on, a man who makes things better, and a man who leaves a mark – that’s what it means to be a good man.

Pillar 3: Love Your Partner

The third pillar is ultimately about intimacy:

If you’re in a relationship, loving your partner isn’t just about buying flowers, date nights, or surface-level gestures – it’s about creating a container where both of you can face the truth together and grow in intimacy and realness.

To love your partner is to serve them – not in a weak, co-dependent or self-abandoning way, but in a strong, real way which means you’re not just taking, not just demanding, but actively creating a relationship where truth, respect, and growth are at the centre and you do what you can to support their growth and aspirations.

Here’s an important caveat, though:

You can only do this if your partner is aligned with the same vision – if they’re committed to serving you in return and to honouring truth in the relationship, then together you can build something extraordinary. Without this foundation, though, love will quickly become a battlefield of egos instead of a sanctuary of realness.

But what if you’re not in a relationship right now, I hear you ask?

Well, in the case of singlehood, then “loving your partner means preparing yourself for the relationship you’ll one day have (if you want one which you probably do if you’re on the path to integration and wholeness):

It means doing the inner work now – trusting God, integrating your shadow, and finding your purpose – so that when the time comes, you can bring your full, real self to the relationship instead of showing up half-built and desperate.

Real love doesn’t hurt (despite what the old saying says) – what does hurt is when two egos clash and try to control each other.

On the other hand, when two real people come together, love becomes a place of growth, intimacy, and truth.

That’s as REAL as it gets.

Three Pillars of Being a Real Man: Why Trust God Comes First

Of these three pillars, the first is the most important because Trusting God is the foundation for everything else:

Without trust, you’ll collapse into fear and this fear will poison your code, distort your purpose, and wreck your relationships.

When you trust God, it’s also much easier to let go of the ego’s endless craving for control:

Instead, you can stand tall in uncertainty, move forward with courage, and keep growing real no matter what life throws your way – this is truly the kind of trust that allows you to be a good man and to truly love your partner.

My book Trust: A Manual in Becoming the Void, Building Flow, and Finding Peace will help you to create a real and lasting foundation of trust in your life.

Practical Steps to Implement the Three Pillars of Being a Real Man

Theory without practice is useless so here are some practical ways you can implement these three pillars in your daily life:

1. Trust God

Daily Surrender Practice: Each morning, take five minutes to sit quietly and remind yourself: “I’m not in control of everything and so today I’ll meet reality with openness and courage“.
Reframe Setbacks: Whenever something goes ‘wrong’, stop and ask yourself: “How is this an opportunity to grow more real?” Train yourself to see challenges as refinements in your character and growth, not punishments or failure.
Practice Letting Go: Notice where you’re forcing things in life – for example, clinging to control or obsessing over outcomes. Experiment with loosening your grip instead.

2. Be a Good Man

Write Your Code: Sit down and write out your values and principles. What do you stand for? What won’t you compromise on? Keep it simple but make it clear so you know how you need to show up in your life.
Shadow Work: Journal about the traits in others that trigger you. What might they reveal about your own hidden shadow? Explore, accept, and integrate.
Purpose Practice: Each week, ask yourself: “How can I make my values more valuable to others?” Then take one action that puts your answer into practice.

3. Love Your Partner

Truth First: Make truth the highest value in your relationship and always commit to being honest – even when it’s uncomfortable. Invite your partner to do the same and make it a basic agreement that holds your relationship together.
Serve Each Other: Look for daily ways to serve – not from weakness, but from strength. Ask: What does my partner need right now to grow and flourish and how can I help with this?
Prepare If You’re Single: Focus on building yourself into a man who can hold space for intimacy – in other words, do the inner work required so that when love arrives, you can meet it with realness instead of ego.

The three pillars of being a real man will help you find your humility so you can grow real and flow.

Three Pillars of Being a Real Man: The Final Word

Being a real man isn’t about chasing some Hollywood action movie caricature of masculinity but about living in alignment with reality, letting go of ego, and committing yourself to what’s true.

Trust God. Be a good man. Love your partner.

Work on these three things and you’ll not only grow stronger and deeper as a man but you’ll also create a life that’s rooted in realness, a life that flows, and a life that actually ‘works’.

Stay real out there,

P.S. If you’re ready to work on being the best man that you can be then book a free coaching call with me today and I’ll help you to start taking real action in your life.

Why You Keep Sabotaging Yourself (Actually)

Published on

Integration/Life Philosophy/Mental Health/Mindset/Psychology/Shadow Life

How to Finally Make the Changes You Want

You know the drill:

You decide that it’s time to eat better, go to the gym, finally write that business plan, or stop binge-scrolling at midnight; you’ve read the articles, understood the logic behind whatever it is that you want, and even feel motivated – at least for the first day or two – and, then…something happens (or, more accurately, something doesn’t happen).

It might look like this:

You avoid the gym; you order a takeaway instead of cooking, or you open up Netflix again instead of writing your plan until you eventually find yourself sitting there, frustrated with yourself and asking:

Why am I like this? Why can’t I just do the thing I know I want to do?

If that sounds familiar, then I want you to know that you’re not broken, lazy, or weak:

What’s actually happening is much deeper than just a lack of willpower because the problem you’re dealing with is almost always rooted in unresolved pain that drives unconscious intentions (which we can define as intentions that actively work against your conscious desires).

In this article, we’ll explore why you keep sabotaging yourself, how to identify the hidden forces behind your behaviour, and practical strategies to finally make the changes you consciously want.

Let’s dig a little deeper:

You sabotage yourself and kick yourself out of the life you want to be living (your real life)

The Core Problem: Conscious Desire vs. Unconscious Intention

At some level, you do want change and so you actually understand that eating better, exercising, or working on your goals is good for you:

You’ve read the books, watched the videos, and maybe even made detailed plans and so – at least on paper – it looks like you’re fully committed.

And yet… nothing happens.

The reason for this is that your unconscious mind often has a different agenda:

While your conscious mind believes it wants progress, your unconscious mind may be motivated by an entirely different, often hidden, benefit that outweighs this ‘belief’.

This is why we can say that the crux of self-sabotage:

Unconscious intentions can outweigh conscious desires.

In simpler terms this means that even if you consciously want to eat healthily, your unconscious mind might gain something from not doing so – examples might be security, avoidance, familiarity, or emotional numbing – and until you uncover and address this, no amount of planning, willpower, or motivation will make the change stick.

Let’s look at how you can unblock yourself and start moving forward:

Step 1: Identify the Hidden Benefits of Not Changing

The first step in overcoming self-sabotage is awareness – specifically, you need to discover the emotional payoff of your current behaviour.

You can start to do this by asking yourself:

“What do I get by NOT doing the thing I believe I want to do?”

It might feel counterintuitive at first, because our culture frames self-sabotage as failure or weakness but the unconscious mind isn’t interested in logic – it’s only focused on your survival, comfort, and avoiding pain.

Some common examples of hidden payoffs include:

Avoiding Vulnerability: Not starting your business or pursuing your dream keeps you safe from the possibility of failure, embarrassment, or criticism.
Emotional Numbing: Choosing junk food, social media, or TV over productive action can be a way of avoiding unresolved sadness, guilt, or shame.
Control and Familiarity: Staying in your current patterns – even if they’re unhealthy and go against your values – maintains a predictable emotional environment and uncertainty, even for positive change, triggers discomfort.
Unprocessed Trauma: Past experiences can create unconscious associations between effort, success, or pleasure and danger. For instance, someone who grew up being criticised for achievement might unconsciously sabotage success to avoid repeating painful patterns (almost always linked to the Unholy Trinity of shame, guilt, and/or trauma).

Here’s a practical exercise to uncover your unconscious intention so that you can become AWARE of it (‘Awareness’ is always the first step when it comes to changing your life):

Pick the area where you keep sabotaging yourself.
Ask: What do I get from NOT doing this?
List every possible emotional benefit, without judging yourself (but be brutally honest).
Notice any patterns tied to past experiences of shame, guilt, trauma, or fear.

The goal here isn’t to shame yourself but to shine a light on the invisible forces that have been quietly guiding your behaviour.

Once you see them, you gain power over them and can start to change them.

Step 2: Deal With the Emotional Payoff

Awareness alone isn’t enough and so, once you identify the hidden benefit, the next step is to address the unresolved emotions that keep this pattern alive and to work on ACCEPTANCE of it.

(Awareness, Acceptance, and Action are the three steps to transformation that I use in my coaching containers with clients and they always work).

Think of the unconscious intention as a locked door and the ‘key’ to unlocking and unblocking is to process the underlying feelings.

Here are practical strategies to start working with those emotions:

1. Name and Validate Your Feelings

Write down what comes up when you imagine taking the action you’ve been avoiding – notice any resistance, fear, guilt, or shame and, then, simply acknowledge it.

For example:

“I feel anxious about starting this project and that’s okay”.

“This fear has a purpose: it’s keeping me safe in a way I used to need”.

Validation reduces the unconscious mind’s need to sabotage you because you no longer resist and start shifting into acceptance.

2. Reframe the Emotional Payoff

Ask yourself the following question:

“Is there a way to meet the same emotional need in a healthier way?“

For example:

If procrastination protects you from failure, can you experiment with small, low-risk wins to train your brain to feel safe with success?
If comfort food numbs old shame, can you create healthier rituals that offer the same soothing effect, like a short walk, journaling, or mindful breathing?

In other words, you need to find a way to start dealing with these underlying emotions in a way that’s aligned with your real values and your real vision for who you want to become.

3. Release Unprocessed Pain

Unresolved trauma, guilt, or shame often fuels self-sabotage but and you can start to heal it via small, consistent practices done consistently over time:

Journaling: Write about past experiences that trigger your self-sabotage and explore the emotions without trying to fix them.
Mindfulness: Sit quietly and notice where tension or discomfort arises in your body when you think about change. Observe it without judgment.
Somatic release: Simple movements, stretching, or deep breathing can release emotional energy stored in your body and start to regulate your nervous system.

The key is always to face and integrate the pain, rather than suppress it.

When you do this the unconscious intention loses its grip as the associated emotional payoff starts to become acknowledged and processed.

Step 3: Align Your Intentions With Your Goals

Once you’ve identified the unconscious intention and addressed the emotional payoff, it’s time to align your intentions with your conscious desires.

Here’s how you can get started:

1. Set Tiny, Non-Threatening Goals

Change doesn’t happen overnight, and large goals can trigger the unconscious resistance you just uncovered.

Try this approach instead:

Break your goal into micro-actions that are manageable and totally achievable without stretching yourself too much (though you want to stretch yourself a little).
Make the first step so small that your unconscious mind can say ‘Yes’ without resistance.
Example: Instead of “I’m going to eat perfectly for the whole week”, start with: “I’ll prepare one healthy meal today”.

Braking it down into chunks means it’s less of a shock for your system and you’re more likely to build momentum without unconscious resistance blocking your path.

2. Pair Action With Emotional Rewards

Your unconscious mind responds to emotion more than logic so celebrate small wins and reward yourself in a way that doesn’t sabotage your progress.

For example:

Completed a 20-minute workout? Enjoy a hot shower, a favourite podcast, or a mindful cup of tea.
Cooked a healthy meal? Notice how good your body feels afterward, rather than focusing on what you “gave up”.

3. Track and Reflect

Another simple tool is to keep a simple log of actions and emotions.

Each evening, reflect on:

What action did I take today?
How did it feel before, during, and after?
Did any resistance arise? Where might it have come from?

Tracking makes unconscious patterns conscious, strengthening your ability to make deliberate choices and to make sure the unconscious intentions are pulling your strings without your awareness and acceptance.

Step 4: Understand That Change Is a Dialogue, Not a Battle

One of the reasons people keep sabotaging themselves is that they treat their unconscious mind like an enemy to be defeated but this approach rarely works because it just adds unnecessary layers of resistance (and what you resist persists).

Instead, see change as a dialogue between your conscious and unconscious selves.

For example:

Your conscious mind is saying “I want to go to the gym regularly“.

But:
Your unconscious mind is saying “I feel anxious and unworthy; exercise feels risky“.

Rather than pushing through with sheer willpower, ask:

“What does my unconscious mind need to feel safe while I make this change?”

When you honour the underlying need while gently guiding behaviour toward your goal, you create alignment and so lasting change becomes much easier.

Step 5: Practical Exercise to Tap Into and Rewire Intentions

To sum all this up, here’s a simple, repeatable process you can use whenever you find yourself sabotaging a change:

Stop and observe: Notice when you avoid the action you intended to take.
Ask why: “What am I getting from not doing this?” List all emotional benefits.
Validate: Accept that these feelings are real and understandable.
Reframe or release: Find healthier ways to meet the emotional need or process the underlying pain.
Take a micro-action: Do the smallest possible step that aligns with your conscious goal.
Celebrate: Reinforce the positive behaviour with a reward or acknowledgment.

Repeat daily and, over time, your unconscious mind will shift to support your conscious desires, rather than fight them.

My book Trust: A Manual in Becoming the Void, Building Flow, and Finding Peace will help you to understand your unconscious intentions even more so that you can free yourself to live your real life.

Stop Sabotaging Yourself: Why This Works

Self-sabotage feels frustrating because the conscious mind believes it’s in charge but until the unconscious mind is on board, nothing sticks.

This three steps will help you to gradually change the internal programming that has been keeping you stuck:

Identifying the hidden emotional payoff,
Processing unresolved pain, and
Creating small, emotionally aligned actions,

It’s not about willpower but about realignment which means bringing unconscious intentions into harmony with conscious goals.

Once this happens, what once felt impossible becomes inevitable because all ‘part’s of you are pointing in the same, real direction.

Sabotage Escape Plan: Some Key Takeaways

Conscious desire alone is rarely enough: Your unconscious mind often drives behaviour more powerfully than your rational goals.
Self-sabotage is a symptom of unresolved emotional pain: Understanding the hidden benefit of your resistance is the first step to change.
Emotions need to be acknowledged, validated, and processed: Only then can conscious action take root because you’re acting on a foundation of acceptance.
Micro-actions and emotional rewards build alignment: Small wins shift your unconscious intentions over time.
Change is a dialogue, not a battle: Honour the emotional needs behind your sabotage, rather than fighting them.

You sabotage yourself at every level when your unconscious intentions and conscious desires aren't aligned.

Stop Sabotaging Yourself (Actually): The Final Word

If you’ve been struggling with simple changes, then you’re not failing – you’re ‘just’ human:

Your unconscious mind is simply protecting you in ways that once made sense but no longer serve you.

By uncovering the hidden payoff, working with your emotions, and taking aligned action, you can finally break the cycle of self-sabotage once and for all in a REAL way.

Imagine what life would feel like if your conscious desires and unconscious intentions finally worked together instead of against each other:

The gym would no longer feel like a battlefield, your healthy meals would cook themselves in a way, and your goals would start moving forward naturally.

That alignment is what real change feels like and unlike ‘motivation’ – which comes and goes – real alignment lasts because it’s built from the inside out at the deepest level.

Stay real out there,

P.S. If you’re ready to get out of your own way and to start taking real action once and for all then book a free coaching session with me and I’ll help you become aware of how you’re blocking yourself.

Addiction 101: How to Actually Overcome Addiction

Published on

Health/Integration/Life Philosophy/Mental Health/Mindset/Nervous System/Psychology/Shadow Life

Why People Really Get Addicted & How to Break Free

Addiction is often portrayed as a moral failing, a lack of willpower, or a chemical imbalance and – though this may be true in some cases – it’s never the full story:

The truth is that popular culture loves these narratives because they’re simple, neat, and comforting but the reality and the deeper truth of addiction is far more profound, far more human, and far more hopeful:

What you need to know if you’re dealing with addictive tendencies is that addiction is never random and it’s never truly about the substance, the drink, the shopping spree, or the compulsive scrolling that might appear on the surface (or whatever else you might be ‘addicted’ to).

This is because – at its core – addiction is always about escaping the tension of being unreal.

When you strip it down, addiction is the symptom of a much deeper issue:

A disconnection from truth.

Until you understand this, any attempt to ‘fix’ an addiction is like trying to empty a flooded basement without turning off the tap.

Let’s dig a little deeper:

Overcoming addiction starts by understanding why you're addicted in the first place.

The Void: Where Addiction Lives

To understand addiction, we first need to understand the world where it originates – a place I call the Void:

The Void isn’t a physical location but a psychological and spiritual state that arises when we’ve become disconnected from the truth which basically means that shame has quietly whispered that who we are, in our rawest, most authentic form, isn’t acceptable.

Shame is always the original fracture and it’s the subtle – often hidden – sense that something about us is ‘wrong’:

When we pick up this kind of shame and become internally fragmented, we stop facing reality as it is and so we stop accepting ourselves. Instead, we start living as a character, an ego, playing unreal roles within the dreamworld of the Void.

The problem with playing a character is simple:

Reality resists and it’s where we need to root ourselves if we want to get real results in our lives (which is why I like to say that real always works).

In short, life doesn’t bend to the ego and so when we’re coming from this unreal place then our relationships, work lives, health, and even our own minds start to push back against us and attempt to course correct us back onto a real path.

This endless mismatch creates an inner tension – a kind of gnawing discomfort or sense of friction between the person we’re pretending to be and the truth of who we actually are.

The Tension That Drives Addiction

So many people live in the Void, unaware of the tension that courses beneath their day-to-day lives because of their attempts to treat the unreal as being real:

They wake up, go through the motions, distract themselves, and try to “be okay” with endless performances of ego but, underneath, the tension is always there and getting tighter – like a tight wire waiting to snap.

This tension is compounded when we try to control life in order to suppress our shadow self – the parts of us we’re not ready to face yet so that we can keep the ego in place and keep up the familiar act (even if we know deep down it’s not even what we really want).

In this state, we become perfectionists, micromanagers, or hyper-protective, constantly battling the very impulses and emotions we’re trying to avoid and so all of this friction intensifies the discomfort of being disconnected from truth.

Most people don’t realise that this tension isn’t just another case of “life sucks and then you die” – it isn’t the result of circumstance, luck, or bad upbringing, for example.

What it actually is is a projection of inner fragmentation – or, in simpler terms: the discomfort they feel isn’t external; it’s internal, and it comes from living out of alignment with reality and with themselves.

Substitutes for the Truth

Here’s where addiction enters the story:

When the tension of being unreal becomes unbearable, the ego searches for release (and so understanding cycles of tension and release is one way to start mastering addiction).

Unfortunately, it doesn’t go straight to the truth to deal with this tension – because facing the truth feels too painful and is a threat to the illusions of the ego anyway.

Instead, it finds a substitute for the truth, something that temporarily relieves the tension without really changing anything fundamental (i.e. the core shame that led to the void in the first place):

These substitutes can be literally anything: alcohol, drugs, porn, shopping, power, money, or even endless scrolling on social media – the specific substitute literally doesn’t matter. What matters is the dynamic: the ego finds something that mimics the feeling of connection, presence, or relief, and it latches onto it for short-term RELEASE from all that TENSION that the ego brings in the first place.

This is why the first few times (or so) that someone uses a substitute, there’s a buzz – which they might think is due to some power within the substitute itself but which is really just a release of tension.

What’s important when it comes to understanding addiction is that the sensation feels like solving a problem – almost like fixing the unfixable – and so it creates a powerful, deceptive association.

The brain essentially thinks: “Ah, this works…it’s helping me escape the void“.

(Though it might not phrase it like that exactly because it probably doesn’t even know what the ‘Void’ is).

This would be great if it wasn’t for the fact that this kind of relief is temporary because it comes from something EXTERNAL instead of a real, INTERANAL shift or transformation.

This means that the void is still there (because the fundamental problem of shame is still there) and so -over time – the buzz fades and we’re back to square one.

When this happens, the ego, desperate for relief, escalates intensity, frequency, or quantity and this is why in many cases, physical dependence develops.

This means that the person is no longer just trying to escape the void – they’re also fighting withdrawal and adding a second layer of tension to their experience.

Shame is Always the Core Problem

If you didn’t get the memo yet, then here’s the key insight:

The real issue is never the substance (or chosen substitute for the truth): the real issue is shame which is always a disconnection from truth.

Short version: shame is the hidden wound that fuels the tension that drives the ego to seek substitutes and that keeps people trapped in cycles of addiction.

Shame isn’t just guilt or embarrassment – it’s the sense that something about us is unacceptable at a core level:

It’s the whisper that we aren’t enough, that reality is too harsh, or that we must cover up our imperfection and -until shame is recognised and addressed – no amount of self-control, therapy, or detox will permanently solve the problem.

The ‘Gremlin’ Effect

Once the substitute takes a hold over somebody, then it often develops a life of its own:

When the unreal parts of us take on a life of their own like this, I call it a Gremlin:

A Gremlin in this case is the part of the mind that insists you need the addictive substance or behaviour, even when you don’t….it lies, deceives, and it generates anxiety, cravings, and rationalisations so that you keep up your dependency on whatever substitute for the truth you’re addicted to.

Understanding the Gremlin is essential to overcome your addiction and move forward because addiction isn’t weakness but the result of a survival strategy gone awry (as I like to say to my coaching clients: It’s a normal reaction to a F’d up situation).

In short, the ego used a substitute to temporarily relieve tension, the body adapted, and so a Gremlin was born. Now, the mind is caught between two forces: the underlying shame that wants release and the Gremlin that insists on the substitute.

This is why addiction can feel so conflicting and difficult to overcome: you’re not at war with whatever you’re addicted to – you’re at war with the different parts of yourself.

Addiction: The Path Forward

Breaking free from addiction in a real way essentially requires a two-step approach: starving the Gremlin and dissolving shame.

1. Starve the Gremlin

This is the first, practical step:

Stop feeding the addiction.

Remove the substitute that created the dependency in a structured and mindful way:

Identify the behaviours or substances that you’ve relied on for release.
Create clear boundaries or systems to remove access.
Prepare for cravings and urges and recognise them as the Gremlin speaking, not as truth about who you are or what you actually need.
Replace compulsive behaviours with neutral, stabilising habits that make you feel more REAL and grounded in yourself (e.g., walking, journaling, cold showers, exercise).

Starving the Gremlin weakens its influence, but it doesn’t address the root cause of shame – that comes next:

2. Dissolve Shame

Shame dissolves when we reconnect with truth which basically means that we return to a state of ACCEPTANCE about ourselves instead of JUDGEMENT (the ego is just a judgement against the self that prevents us from being who we are in our REALNESS):

This is not abstract but a practical, step-by-step process involving three main areas: your mind, your body, and your vision.

1) Manage Your Thoughts

Your mind is the arena where shame lives and so, to dissolve it, you can start to train yourself to notice and refocus your thinking patterns so you’re moving towards reality and not away from it:

Observe thoughts without judgment – for example, a thought like “I’m weak” is just a mental event, not a fact.
Use reframing techniques to replace judgment with curiosity – for example, “I’m struggling” becomes “I’m noticing a pattern and can learn from it“.
Practice gratitude and self-compassion to counteract self-condemnation.

By managing thoughts, you reduce the mental tension that fuels the ego’s craving for substitutes.

My free Thought Log tool can help you with this: Hamster Wheel Thought Log

2) Regulate Your Body and Nervous System

Shame is held not just in the mind but in the nervous system and so addiction often escalates when the body is stuck in chronic stress or sympathetic dominance (which means you’re stuck in fight-or-flight mode so can never feel SAFE).

Regulating the body restores balance:

Breathing Exercises: Slow, deep, diaphragmatic breathing to activate the parasympathetic nervous system can help and so can training yourself to nose breathe.
Movement: Yoga (especially yin yoga), resistance training, walking, or any activity that reconnects you with your physical presence will help you to become more embodied.
Somatic Awareness: Noticing tension in your muscles, posture, and breathing and releasing it consciously is a small thing you can do that can make a massive difference.

In short: when your body feels safe and regulated, the need for external release diminishes because you have less of inner tension driving you.

I do a free yin yoga class online every three weeks – you can get more information here: Dissolution Hour (Free Online Yoga)

3) Create a Real Vision for Growth

Finally, learning to fill the void with something real will change your life forever.

I don’t mean a fantasy or another substitute that’s just an extension of the ego but a vision grounded in reality and aligned with your true self:

Set meaningful goals that connect you with your values.
Take consistent, real action toward growth without aiming for perfection, just real progress.
Engage in activities that provide a sense of purpose and flow.

This step is essential because without a real vision, the Gremlin will just find another substitute.

With a vision, life itself becomes the release, and the tension of being unreal naturally dissolves.

My free 7-day course will get you on track to finding your real vision and acting on it: The 7-Day Personality Transplant System Shock for Realness & Life Purpose

My book Trust: A Manual in Becoming the Void, Building Flow, and Finding Peace has a chapter on addiction that will take you even deeper into understanding yourself and freeing yourself.

The Reward: From Tension to Flow

When you starve the Gremlin and dissolve shame, you return to truth and step out of the Void.

This means that you finally stop playing the character and start living as yourself and so the tension that once drove addiction begins to dissolve and life becomes less about escape and more about engagement.

This is what I call flow – being fully present, aligned with reality, and in harmony with yourself so that addiction no longer has a foothold because the underlying disconnection has been addressed.

The chains of addiction are held in place by your fear of accepting yourself in a real way.

Addiction 101: A Practical Summary

If you’re struggling with addiction, the steps forward are deceptively simple but deeply transformative:

Recognise the Dynamics: Understand that addiction is a substitute for the truth and that the real problem is underlying shame.
Starve the Gremlin: Remove the addictive substance or behaviour, replace it with stabilising habits, and prepare for cravings (whilst knowing that they’re not ‘real’ – just old conditioning and dependency).
Dissolve Shame: Through thought management, nervous system regulation, and creating a real, grounded vision for growth.
Reconnect with Truth: Step into reality, engage with life, and allow flow to replace tension.

It’s not an easy journey because facing your shame, relinquishing the substitute, and embracing truth takes courage.

Nevertheless, it’s the only way to genuinely break free from addiction and reclaim your life.

Remember: the thing you’re addicted to was never the problem. It was a temporary release of the friction caused by disconnection and so the solution is always the same:

Return to truth, dissolve shame, and live as fully in reality as you possibly can.

Once you do, the Void loses its power, the Gremlin becomes silent, and life itself becomes your source of satisfaction, purpose, and joy instead of a blackhole that consumes you.

Stay real out there,

P.S. If you’re ready to starve your Gremlins and to find a sense of real vision then book a free coaching call with me and I’ll help you to take action and start reclaiming your life.

How to Do Shadow Work for Beginners: A Practical Guide to Integration

Published on

Integration/Life Philosophy/Mental Health/Psychology/Shadow Life

How To Get Started With Shadow Work So You Can Live Your REAL Life

Many of us go through life feeling like something’s missing – like there’s an endless ‘itch’ that can’t be scratched or a kind of Void that can never be filled no matter how hard we may try:

We might keep ourselves busy, chase achievement, numb out with distractions and escapism, or try to curate the ‘perfect’ image of who we are but, deep down, there’s a quiet whisper that keeps telling us the same thing:

“This isn’t the whole story. There must be ‘more'” (whatever that even means).

This whisper comes from the Shadow Self – the hidden ‘parts’ of ourselves that we’ve pushed away in order to survive and to feel acceptable in the eyes of our deepest fears about ourselves and the world and the people that we share it with.

If you’ve landed on this article (maybe because you’re searching “how to do shadow work for beginners” or something along those lines) then you’re already further along than the path than most because you’ve already started to raise AWARENESS, so you’re willing to look at yourself honestly and to cultivate a real sense of ACCEPTANCE…and that’s where all true growth begins so you can start taking real ACTION.

(Awareness, Acceptance, and Action is the transformational pathway I walk my coaching clients through and it works every time).

In this beginner’s guide to Shadow Work, we’ll explore what shadow work really is, why it’s so important, and how you can start doing it safely and effectively – even as a complete beginner. I’ll also give you three powerful exercises you can use right away to begin the process of integration.

Let’s dig a little deeper:

Shadow work for beginners starts by facing your own light and seeing what it reveals.

What Is Shadow Work?

Shadow work is the process of facing, accepting, and reintegrating the parts of yourself you’ve hidden away and sent into exile.

The Swiss psychiatrist Carl Jung first popularised the term “shadow” to describe the unconscious aspects of the psyche, but the idea is as old as humanity itself because it’s just a part of the human condition and it’s something that absolutely every human being past, present, or future will have to contend with at some stage in their lives.

Despite popular misconceptions, the shadow isn’t just the ‘bad’ stuff that you’d rather not admit to – like anger, envy, or selfishness – it also contains the ‘good‘ stuff you’ve been too scared to own: like your capacity to love, your spontaneous joy, your real creativity, and even your true strength.

These qualities may have been shut down because, at some point in your life, showing them wasn’t safe and so you disowned them and created a version of ‘You’ that had these parts (apparently) removed.

Maybe you were shamed for crying, so you learned to suppress sadness; maybe you were ridiculed for being too enthusiastic, so you turned down your joy; maybe you expressed anger and were punished, so you buried it deep down there in the Shadow Territory.

To survive, you built a mask which was supposed to be a substitute for the REAL version of yourself but without these ‘parts’ on display – the ego:

The ego is a kind of false identity you wear to stay acceptable in the eyes of others but, in doing so, you truncated the real you and then eventually forgot that you were wearing a mask in the first place (because you started to think you were the mask).

This is when the problems really started.

The Survival Strategy That Backfires

Of course, at the time of putting the mask on, the strategy works (which is why every body uses this strategy):

Children (and even adults) adapt by hiding what’s not welcome but the problem is that – in the long term – this self-exile backfires because, instead of being whole, we become fragmented and so the cost of hiding parts of ourselves is disconnection – first from our inner truth, then from others, and finally from life itself.

The symptoms of disconnection are all too familiar in modern life:

Restlessness
Anxiety
Depression
Rage and irritability
Frustration
A chronic sense of emptiness
Overthinking
Addiction
Relationship breakdowns
Perfectionism and self-sabotage
A feeling that you’re living someone else’s life

Sound familiar?

These aren’t random flaws:

They’re signals that you’re living in the Void because you became disconnected from the truth at some level and so the Shadow is calling out to you to invite you back home.

The Shadow Dance

The ego and the shadow are in constant interplay – a push and pull I like to call the Shadow Dance.

Essentially, it goes like this:

The Ego says: Don’t show this part of yourself. People won’t accept it.

The Shadow replies: But I am part of you. I want to be seen.

This back-and-forth creates inner tension, which plays out in your outer world:

For example, maybe you suppress your anger until it bursts out in destructive ways.

Maybe you hide your tenderness and then complain that no one understands you.

Maybe you bury your creative spark and wonder why life feels flat.

The Shadow Dance continues endlessly until you transcend the ego’s current version of reality and re-embrace what’s been hidden.

This means that Shadow Integration is always the best way to stop dancing in circles.

The Ego Is Just a Judgement

Here’s something that can be confusing at first but that will set you on the path to wholeness once you grasp it:

The ego isn’t real because it’s just a mental construct serving as a judgement against your realness.

It whispers lies like “You’re too much”, “You’re not enough” “You must be this certain specific way to be loved” and so – as long as you keep believing and buying into these judgements – you stay cut off from your realness.

Again, when you’re cut off from truth, you live in what I call the Void: that haunting sense that you’re going through the motions of life but never truly alive or connected to anything real at any level (because you’re not – you’re filtering reality through the ego and so always at least one-step removed).

Shadow work is the way out of the Void because it’s the process of peeling back the ego’s false judgements so you can remember who you really are and start taking real action (instead of sending yourself on wild goose chases to uphold the illusion).

Why Shadow Work Matters

So why go to all this trouble of doing the difficult work of facing the hidden ‘parts’ and owning the shadow self?

Basically, because if you want to feel fully alive, connected, and in flow with life, then you have no choice.

Shadow work isn’t just a spiritual hobby; it’s essential.

Most of the problems we face – whether personal, relational, or societal – stem from unintegrated shadows:

That restless feeling that nothing satisfies you? Shadow.
The pattern of sabotaging your own success? Shadow.
The inability to trust others or yourself? Shadow.
The endless chase for external validation? Shadow.
The fear of intimacy? Shadow.
Etc. Etc. Etc.

Until you integrate your shadow, you’re trying to live life with only half your self but integration brings wholeness and wholeness brings trust, vitality, and peace.

Shadow Work for Beginners: 3 Practical Exercises

If this all sounds heavy, but don’t worry – shadow work doesn’t have to be complicated.

In fact, the simplest practices are often the most powerful.

Here are three beginner-friendly exercises you can start today:

1. Journal Prompt: Meeting Your Shadow

Journalling is one of the safest ways to begin shadow work because it creates space between you and your thoughts.

This means that you get to witness the hidden parts of yourself without being overwhelmed by them and from a place of safety instead of threat (because the ego sees these hidden ‘parts’ as threats…which they are but only to the ego which is unreal as we have seen).

Try this prompt:

Think of a situation that triggered you recently (an argument, rejection, or moment of embarrassment).
Write down everything you felt and thought – even if it seems petty, irrational, or ugly.
Then ask: When have I felt this way before? Trace it back as far as you can and you’ll probably find that you’re just rehashing some old script or unresolved emotion rather than anything in present-day reality.
Finally, write: What part of me am I disowning here?

Don’t edit, don’t censor, and simply let the truth spill onto the page:

This simple act of self-honesty is integration in motion.

(If you want to understand the mechanics of your projections even more then check out this article: Projection: It Takes One to Know One).

2. Somatic Exercise: Befriending the Body

The shadow doesn’t just live in your mind; it lives in your body because all of your unfelt emotions get stored as tension, numbness, or tightness.

This is why shadow work must include the body and can never just be a thought experiment or cognitive exercise.

Try this practice:

Find a quiet place and sit or lie down comfortably.
Bring attention to your breath and slow it down (nose breathing is the best thing to do here as it activates the parasympathetic nervous system).
Scan your body for areas of tightness or discomfort.
Place your hand on that area and breathe into it. Imagine giving that part of your body permission to speak.
Ask gently: What are you holding on to? What do you need?

Sometimes you’ll get words, sometimes images, sometimes just a feeling – whatever it is, stay with it and just ‘listen’.

By listening to the body instead of shutting it down, you allow the shadow to release safely and start to experience those unresolved emotions and parts (etc) as minor discomfort instead of the actual threat the ego will try and tell you it is.

3. Visioning Exercise: Reclaiming Your Wholeness

Shadow work isn’t about dredging up pain for the sake of it – it’s about reclaiming the fullness of who you are.

A powerful way to do this is through visioning exercises like this simple one:

Try this exercise:

Close your eyes and imagine a version of yourself who is completely whole – nothing hidden, nothing fragmented.
Notice how they stand, how they breathe, how they interact with others.
Ask yourself: What qualities does this version of me embody that I’ve been hiding?
Write them down. Then, choose one quality to practise in a small, safe way today by taking the quality and figuring out how to ACT on it.

For example, maybe your whole self is joyful so you allow yourself to laugh loudly instead of holding back; maybe your whole self is assertive and so you speak up in a meeting instead of shrinking.

Each small act is a step back into realness and will put you back on the path of growing real.

(If you want even more Shadow Work exercises then check out this page: 100 Shadow Work Exercises: Making the Unconscious Conscious & Growing Real).

If you want to go even deeper into shadow work then read my book Shadow Life: Freedom From BS in an Unreal World which will hit your ego like a hammer and shatter the illusion.

How to Do Shadow Work for Beginners: Bringing It All Together

Shadow work isn’t about ‘fixing’ yourself because you were never truly broken – it’s about remembering the parts you hid away and welcoming them back home.

At first, this can feel daunting because you’re finally facing what you’ve avoided for years but as you practise – even with simple tools like journalling, somatic awareness, and visioning – you’ll notice something extraordinary:

The symptoms of disconnection start to ease.

You stop fighting yourself.

Life begins to flow again.

Integration is liberation from the unreal weight of the ego and, the more you integrate, the more real you become.

Shadow work for beginners is about embracing your own chaos and channelling it into a real order.

Shadow Work for Beginner’s: A Final Word

If you take nothing else from this article, let it be this:

Shadow work is not about becoming someone ‘new’ – it’s simply about becoming whole.

The ego will tell you stories, make judgements, and try to keep you safe inside the Void but you have the power to choose differently by choosing to stop the Shadow Dance by turning towards what you’ve hidden – not away from it.

Pick up your journal, tune into your body, and envision your wholeness and begin where you are, with whatever courage you can muster because even though shadow work is not always east, it is always worth it.

When you integrate the shadow, you don’t just find yourself…you find life itself.

Stay real out there,

P.S. If you’d like some guidance and accountability when it comes to facing yourself and shifting into your real life then book a free coaching call with me and I’ll help you get moving. Guaranteed.

Oli Anderson

Real Always Works So Tap Into Your Realness

The True Secret of Fulfilment: Be Real, Not Ideal

Growing Real & The Natural Drive Towards Wholeness

The Ego, the Shadow, and the Comfort Zone

Signs You’re Growing Real

1. Things Bother You Less

2. You Find Your Flow

3. You Get Real Results

Signs You’re Not Aligned or Growing Real

The Path Back Home: Awareness, Acceptance, Action

1. Awareness (Deconstruct Ego)

2. Acceptance (Integrate Shadow)

3. Action (Trust Yourself and Life)

Practical Steps to Grow Real

Growing Real Means Growing Whole

The Simplest Way to Start Being Respected is to Start Respecting Your Own Time

Why Respect Starts With Respecting Yourself First

Opportunity Cost: The Hidden Price of Every Choice

The Three Big Wastes: How to (Literally) Waste Your Life

1. Wasting Your Time

2. Wasting Your Energy

3. Wasting Your Attention

The Shift Back to Realness: Reclaiming What’s Yours

Respect Is Earned By Results

Practical Steps: How to Start Respecting Your Resources

1. Audit Your Time

2. Guard Your Energy

3. Master Your Attention

4. Create a Vision

5. Say “No” With Confidence

The Final Word On Gaining Respect: Stop Wasting Your Time

Wilderness Days Allow You to Face Yourself and Life Head-on & Make the Unconscious Conscious

The Trap of Being ‘Busy’: Real Work vs. Running Away

Yin and Yang: The Forgotten Balance

What Actually Is a Wilderness Day?

My Own Wilderness Practice

The Wilderness Within: Facing the Shadow

The Benefits of Solitude and Stillness

How to Take Your Own Wilderness Day

The Wilderness Sweet Spot: Once a Month (At Least)

The Real Point: Saying “Yes” to Wholeness

The Psychology of Eye Contact Anxiety & Your Real Path Forward

The Real Role of Eye Contact in the Human Condition

Why You Avoid Eye Contact: The Missing “I-Contact”

Eye Contact: The Psychology at Play

The Consequences of Avoiding Eye Contact

The Proven Benefits of Eye Contact

Rebuilding “I-Contact”: The Three Foundations

1. Regulate the Body

2. Regulate the Mind

3. Build a Real Vision

Eye Contact Exposure: Training the Eye

Caveats: Don’t Stare Like a Psychopath

Practical Steps: Your “I-Contact” Plan

Eye Contact: The Final World

Why Acceptance and Adaptation of Psychological Patterns Beat Wishful Thinking Every Time

The Beauty and the Burden of Psychological Patterns

When Ego and Wishful Thinking Get in the Way

Accept and Adapt: The Two-Step Strategy for Dealing With Psychological Patterns

Real-Life Examples of Pattern Recognition

1. The Perpetually Late Hospital

2. The Self-Centred Friend

3. The Shadow Within

Why Psychological Patterns and Pattern Recognition Matters

Practical Steps: How to See, Accept, and Adapt to Patterns

1. Spot the Psychological Pattern

2. Question the Fantasy

3. Accept the Truth

4. Adapt Your Behaviour

5. Build a Pattern-Positive Mindset

Psychological Patterns: The Final Word

You’ll Never Feel Unsafe Showing the Real Ones the Real Things About You

When the Nervous System Speaks You Better Listen

The Trigger Effect of Realness: How REALITY Always ‘Triggers’ the Unreal

A Story From My Life

Dysregulation and the Ego Shell

The Hard Truth: Some People Can’t ‘See’ You Because They Can’t ‘See’ Themselves

Creating Containers of Realness

Practical Steps to Find the Real Ones and Build Your Real Tribe