My problems seem to be those shared by many others, and the downstream negative effects of them abound: Lack of purpose, not having the ability to get through basic challenges, lack of connection to friends and family, struggles of not meeting high expectations, the constant shifting from interest to interest leaving a wake of abandoned projects. The result is disappointment, hopelessness and feeling trapped in apathy. It’s sad how predictable this has all become.

When an interest strikes and is deep and bubbling with possibilities, life feels good. Life makes sense. I have a purpose, a focus, a distraction that nicely fills the holes in my life. But things inevitably start to falter and fray.

As soon as I sense struggle on the horizon, I start losing interest. I expect things to go easy breezy with whatever I do. So when things get a little tricky or I start to fumble in some way, real or imagined, I hear the sound of packing as my brain stuffs this feeling of interest in a bag and leaves.

Onto the next thing I guess.

But when a shiny new thing is not there to take over, when that slot is vacant – I’m vacant. Everything becomes a struggle. Life loses its charm and shine. Things I’d normally enjoy become hollow. I don’t even want to enjoy them – I need meaning, a superstructure to my life. Without that…yeah…it gets bleak real quick. Without that superstructure for my joy to hang on to, what’s the point?

My interests are the one legged stool my life rests on. Without it’s support I’m lost. Isolated and lost.

And so this pattern has repeated over the last 10+ years. I’m now in my 30s and I feel the need to seriously address these issues – get to their root.

My primary goals are to:

• Develop a growth mindset that doesn’t fear mistakes but learns to embrace them.

• Refactor my reward system to become effort focused instead of outcome focused.

• Establish the deeper whys to forge some kind of purpose to my life.

• Bring out a more authentic me that doesn’t mould to people’s perceptions and expectations.

Making my therapy journey open and transparent is to hopefully benefit others. The resources I’ve seen so far don’t really reveal what this process of transforming deeply ingrained behaviours looks like or feels like – it’s all too vague and opaque. Where are the tangible case studies where we can see these changes unfold? I hope sharing my journey can provide these types of insights – taking a deeper look into what this process feels like and what to expect. And most importantly to foster belief in the process when life feels the most hopeless and stuck.

I’ve given myself one year from today to see a substantial change. If no progress is made I’ll most likely commit myself.

I have no obligations in life right now and I’ve got enough savings to spend on therapy, I’m thinking twice per week. I’ll be making daily posts and videos, as well as streams when I find a therapist who’s happy to stream our sessions.

I have a short list of potential therapists but I’m not too hopeful about them being comfortable with this. If you’re in therapy with an effective therapist who’s helping you tackle these issues, I’d very much appreciate if could you ask them if they’d be interested in doing therapy on stream, or at least doing recorded sessions? Having these sessions online as a case study would be very beneficial.

So, if you get a yes or already know a therapist that would be happy to do this, please pass on their info to: beyond@oneyeardeadline.com Thank you.

Day 1 Over,

Beyond