3 Thoughts That Will Ruin Your Life

Do you want to ruin your life?

Yes.

Probably not.

Well, it turns out I've been reading some books and this book I was reading was talking

about three thoughts that basically will ruin your life if you think them on a regular

basis.

So I figured, hey, let's discuss these thoughts.

Sue, we could come up with and that's what we're going to do in this episode of the

Extential Stove Podcast with me, Randy, and that Danny, what's up, Danny?

Yes.

Yeah.

I know.

Right?

Yeah.

So this is interesting because this is, I've been reading this book.

It's by Albert LSPHD called How to Make Yourself Happy and Remarkably Less Disturbable.

And this is, this is a guy who created R-E-B-T. So Rational Motive Behavioral Therapy,

which is a predecessor to CBT, which is probably the most effective treatment for depression

blows antidepressants and stuff out of the water.

And the guy that I talk about all the time, David Burns, who created Team CBT, he oftentimes

studied with this guy, Albert Ellis.

And I find it really interesting because both of them, both of them studied philosophy.

And so like, probably the best psychologists or in the world are philosophers, like go

figure.

It makes sense, right?

Because you know, it's funny, like Freud read a lot of philosophy, he read a lot of

Nietzsche and stuff, like he read Dostoevsky.

You know, they were very influenced by it and it cracks me up all the time because I

read contemporary psychologists and stuff.

I see those ideas and ideals like from philosophers directly in their work and it cracks me up

because I discovered this.

I'm like, no, you didn't.

That's been around for thousands of years, guys.

You didn't make it up.

At least these guys usually admit.

And like, hey, you know, this is from this or whatever, but yeah, it is funny because

they do talk about a lot of other people in like pop psychology and stuff.

They say they come up with stuff that they totally didn't.

Yeah, dude, they don't like it.

Just a bunch of narcissists.

But it makes sense.

Because philosophers, I mean, Nietzsche called himself a psychologist, right?

Because they were, they're thinking about the mind.

They human mind are well-being, you know, living a good life that's all basically psychology

stuff, right?

Yeah.

And so it's kind of like a, well, it could be a groundbreaking thought that you, you feel

how you think.

Like a lot of people aren't happy and they think, well, maybe I need to get on some drug

or something or maybe I need to change the externals in my life.

But could it be as simple as just changing your thinking?

And I think a lot of the studies that they've done recently with CBT and stuff says that,

yes, it actually will.

If you change your thinking, you can change your life.

Well, you know, it's interesting because I think that is true, like I thought so much

are the sort of determining factor of how we see the world, right?

And how we feel in the world.

And it's amazing how powerful are like our ability to interpret reality is and to change

our perspective.

Like you can literally flip your perspective on something by just interpreting it slightly

differently and seeing it differently.

And all you have to do is like, once you see that's possible, you see that there's another

avenue that you can wait a feel and wait a think about the world.

It's really cool.

Yeah.

Well, it goes back to the dichotomy of control, because what can we actually control?

Our judgments, our decisions, our actions, and that's pretty much it.

Like externals can't control any of them.

No, maybe we can influence them, maybe.

But like pretty much we can't, you know, well, this is like, you know, that's why

Cisipis, right?

Like in Camus and Cisipis, he was able to find happiness because he could reinterpret

his situation, take ownership of it.

And yeah, it's no longer a torture.

So yeah, anyway, sorry.

All right.

So this could be a short episode.

I don't know.

But we'll talk about these things.

Because I read it, I read it this morning and I was saying like, wow, this is really,

really interesting.

How about this?

So I never know.

No longer episodes are going to be.

Yeah, I know, right?

So basically there's, there's these three beliefs that if you have these beliefs, you're

just going to cause yourself a bunch of like pain and suffering throughout your life.

And I looked at them and I'm like, I have all three of those.

Those are like my three founding beliefs.

Those are my core beliefs, sir.

What do I need now?

It's pretty tricky.

Anyways, so first belief, okay?

And you have to tell me what you think of these.

Because we haven't, we haven't discussed this beforehand.

So it's fresh for Danny and for all the listeners.

I know.

So anticipation is feeling me.

Yeah.

First belief.

I must perform well and win approval or else I am an adequate person.

Oh, that's a tough one.

Yeah, I think a lot of people feel that though.

Absolutely, dude.

I used to feel that way a lot.

I gotten less of a burden now, but I can definitely say like that was a huge struggle for

me when I was like in high school, college, you know, grad school and stuff because like

that idea, I think we're taught that when we're young.

You know, you got to get AIDS, right?

You got to win the awards.

You got to excel.

Perfectionism.

Yeah.

And all these expectations placed on you from your parents from the outside, you know,

you're really smart, blah, blah.

This is whatever crap people tell you to not first your last.

Yeah.

And it makes you feel like you have to perform to the top.

And that's that.

I know how dangerous that is because perfectionism, one causes you to have a ton of stress

about doing any work, which makes it almost impossible to get shit done.

And two, you're making your whole, like your whole value as a person, contingent on what

other people think of you and circumstances that you've no control over, right?

Yeah.

I like how you just said that upon other people's opinion of you and circumstances, you

have no thing over because it says I must perform well, which is the first part of it.

And when approval, the second part, and if you don't do that, then you're an adequate

person.

Like a look, like, you know, President Trump was just inaugurated.

So he performed well, arguably became the president of the United States for a second term.

People would say arguably that's a pretty good achievement.

But even so, half of the people still hate him.

Yeah.

So like, you can't even, you can't even win under this.

Like it's a logical fallacy.

You can't win because even if you do win, other people won't approve because you have

no control over them.

And some people like you and some people who hate you no matter what, and so because of

that, you're an adequate person, you're never going to feel happy.

And you have no control over when their opinion is going to change or for the reasons that

it changes.

You know, but what you do, the first part of it, performing well, you know, I think there's

nothing wrong with that.

I think there's, that can be a great value to live by, right, that like, you know, what

I do I'm going to do is best to the best of my abilities, right?

So it might be that, you know, depending on your level, like, you know, if you're new

with something, it might be doing it poorly, but you're trying, right, and learning

or whatever.

You're not then adding to it this conditional statement about other people's view of you,

which is really the problem there because I think that makes it impossible to realize

just impossible.

Yeah.

And even performing well can be kind of a trap because how, how well, like, what does that

look like?

I mean, David Burns gives us analogy all the time, or it's like, how, how well is performing

well be specific?

And it's like, okay, you got to do like 80% and then you're performing well.

And it's like, okay, so 79%, you're not performing well.

You're in and out of quit person and all of a sudden, magically at 80%, you're a good

person.

What's the deal?

That is true, right?

Like putting it out and it doesn't give you room either for bad days and stuff because

you feel like this pressure to always perform.

And I think that is dangerous.

That feeling that you've performed for others or for yourself to be validated is really

dangerous.

Because it just puts you in a situation where it's impossible, right?

It's funny, you know, I remember eating, there was a, it might have been Moby, but it might

have been actually Moby who was on the spot.

Anyway, you know, the singer, right?

He was talking about how like, at the height of his career, he was super depressed.

He was like, he said, you know, it was like, it was during one of the MTV awards.

He's like, I had this amazing room, like in this suite, you know, beautiful room had just

gotten out of the party with people and all and he's like, and I was walking around this

room drinking and like, just thinking like, I want to throw myself out the window.

It's interesting because I think that's the same kind of trap, right?

That even at the height of your career, there's going to be people that hate you.

There's going to be people starting to do better than you because like, maybe their careers

are taking off, you know, whatever.

There's no way to always being in that position where you're the top kind of thing.

Yeah, there's a great, there's a great actual story, not a story, but like Mark Manson wrote

about that in the subtle art of not giving a fuck where he compared the dude who created

Mega Death and Pete Best from the Beatles, who was kicked out originally.

So they were both kicked out from the bands, the dude who created Mega Death was kicked

out of Metallica, right before the, right when they got signed.

And then Pete Best got kicked out of the Beatles sometime before they became famous.

And so, but like, you can see how the same thing happened to both of them, but they responded

completely differently.

So the dude went on to, who got kicked out of Metallica, went on to create Mega Death,

which is arguably the number two heavy metal band player, and has done insanely successful,

but he's still miserable because he never did as well as Metallica.

He's always comparing himself, right, and trying to be better than it, yeah.

Yeah, whereas Pete Best went on and he lived his life, he got a family life, whatever.

Yeah, he had a normal life, but he looks back at it, he's like, yeah, the Beatles would

have been nice, but I never would have been able to have this life that I love now had

I've done that.

That's it.

That is the hardest part of it too is I think when we focus on accomplishments and stuff

like that and achievements, it's easy to lose sight of what we actually want.

You know, because like, dude, everybody when they're young probably dreams of being famous,

right?

Because it looks nice.

Like, all these people have one attention.

You know, they're all as attention.

I'll have all this money.

I'll be able to, everybody will know me.

But like, is that really what you want?

Is that really the life you want to live?

Because it comes with a lot of baggage that after fame comes oblivion.

Yeah, exactly.

Right?

I mean, can you, can you imagine it like being famous for a year when you're like, look

at it into these child stars, they're like famous for a year.

And then the rest of their life, they're just living in oblivion.

I would do so many that have problems too.

You know, I mean, like, it's like, because like, and then because of the money, sometimes

they have problems with their parents taking stuff and like, it's, you see depression

and all kinds of issues afterwards, and it makes sense because it's like, you want

all enough to make the decision for yourself, but that's what you wanted to do and you didn't

take it through.

Yeah.

All right.

So we got a good discussion off the first one.

Yeah.

That's cool.

Yeah.

On to number two.

This is another one that's like, that again, my core belief that I'm sure.

Yeah.

So number two, other people must treat me kindly and fairly or else they're utterly

rotten.

You know, I mean, this is like the story of my life where someone doesn't treat me

like, right?

Once.

Yeah.

And then I'm just, I just like, they're done for the world first.

That's right.

Yeah.

Yeah.

This is hard because it is, I think a lot of us probably fall into this trap, like with

little thing, you know, like you're driving and somebody like, isn't going at a red light

or something.

Like light turns green and these day stuff, right?

You know, like, you flip out, you know, you're blaming them.

It's like, they're fault.

But you don't know the person at all.

So I think that is, that is an interesting one because it's hard to, you know, and I

guess the mystery human's hard too.

But yeah, that everybody has to treat you in respect to you in a certain way, but it's

like, why do you demand that?

Right.

You have to demand that, you know?

Yeah, true.

Yeah.

I always think that, you know, I'm the king and everybody has to do everything my way,

but it's not true.

My way the highway.

I mean, I think every day, I think we should respect others and like treat them decently,

right?

Like we shouldn't be.

We should all be able to, we should all be able to accept that from other people.

I think that like, the interactions are going to be fair and all.

We don't have to agree though.

We don't have the, you know, there's a lot of things we don't have to do.

Well, remember when we talked about this a few times before, we're like, whenever we have

a flaw or something, it's always like situational, but when somebody else is their character.

Yeah.

So like, somebody could have been having a bad day or they just weren't paying attention

or whatever.

And they just act in really nasty, but all the sudden, that's their character and they're

like, this dastardly, whatever.

Yeah.

This evil person that's out to get you on this thing.

It is.

Yeah.

It's kind of funny how we put, I don't know, how can I say, how can I phrase that?

Uh, it'll come back to people in boxes.

It's just easy to classify that.

We do.

We classify people with people in boxes.

And then, but I think that also affects us a lot too, because we start to think that way

about ourselves and it makes it really hard to, to live a whole, because we're whole

people.

And like you said, everybody has bad days.

And we act like things matter so much more than they really do.

Do you know what I mean?

I guess like when, like, just a good example, I know when I was teaching, like, you know,

when people wouldn't turn it into Simon or something, if like, if they contact me beforehand,

I don't care what the reason is.

Really, I know.

It's like, dude, stuff happens.

I know.

I, everybody has things happen where it's hard to get something done on time.

Maybe procrastinated.

Maybe whatever, right?

Who cares?

It's, it's an assignment.

It's not the end of the world.

Like, then there's people who act like it's so and like, I can't believe they didn't

bring this on time.

It's like, dude, they have a whole life.

This is not it.

You know?

It's like, we do take stuff really, really seriously, like really, really seriously.

Like, I have a friend who went to a week long meditation retreat.

And before he went, he was just like up to his gills and work and just, you know, he,

he was just burnt out completely.

And then he went to this thing and came back from it.

And like literally like a changed person.

And I was like, I know.

And I was asking him, I was like, so would you get out of it?

And he's like, I just learned that like, nothing really matters.

No.

So I was, I was instantly jealous.

I was like, damn, I wish I could do that.

But it doesn't.

I mean, it really doesn't.

It's funny.

Like, it's, stuff matters to us because, you know, of our perspective of what we're doing

and all, but like in the grand scheme of things, not really matters.

And I think it's important to, it's important to take that perspective sometimes just to put

things to just take a step back and realize it like, maybe this isn't, maybe I don't need

to flip out about this.

Maybe I don't need to get angry or maybe I don't need to overpress myself to get this done

that it'll be okay.

You know, that's a good one though.

Cool.

All right.

So number three, conditions must be the way I want them to be or else the world is

impossible.

And I think you see this a lot now.

Like everybody has this one.

Right.

Right?

Yeah.

Because I was laughing when I read these things because I was like, oh my goodness, me,

me, me.

These are my core values.

I know.

My core beliefs.

Yeah.

This is the hardest.

It's crazy because we try so hard to make conditions be the way we want them to be.

Yeah.

And if they're not that way, then the world's just how, and it's so, it happens like,

it's automatic because it's like, I want this thing to be this way.

And I'm just going to be miserable until that happens because when this happens, then

I'll be happy.

But I'm just going to be miserable until that.

Yeah.

Every single child right down in a store because like they want something and it's like

in blue and they want a yellow or something.

Yeah.

It's like that, right?

Like, you know, and maybe it's because like, I, there is this, like, maybe it's because

everybody's rushed and you feel like the world's out of control.

So you want to control as much of it as you can.

And one way to do that is like, like, if the conditions aren't right, like, if they

can just know what you wanted, then you're just like, no, forget it.

Like, this is not, I'm not taking part.

Yeah.

It's, we don't give a lot of like wiggle room to ourselves or to others.

And we don't think that like, you know, there's already stuff happening out there that

we have to make our way within this larger system.

The system's not going to bend for us, right?

That's a, that's a very good point.

Yeah.

Like, that we are in this larger system because the universe has been going on forever.

Yeah.

And even, even the earth has been around for a long time.

And even the United States has been around for a long time, even though it's only like

200 years compared with these other places have been around for a lot longer.

But like, all this whole system has been going on before us and it'll be going on after

us.

And yet we think that like our lives matter so much and what we want to happen means

so much.

And it just causes us a lot of pain and suffering.

It is, it is funny.

Well, it's like, you know, it's like when you see people like, you know, lose it because

they're like, I can't believe it.

Like, brained on like a, you know, my graduation party or something.

It's like, well, rain happens.

It's not like within our control.

Like, it doesn't mean that something's ruined, you know?

But it's funny because it's that kind of idea, right?

That you, the second things aren't perfect.

They're awful.

And I think that kind of ties into that perfectionist thinking too, which is really bad.

Definitely.

I know, like perfectionism is dangerous because I think I was, I can't remember what

was today or yesterday, but I was actually thinking about this, like this concept of perfectionism.

Because like things have gotten to a point where stuff is like incredible.

Like computers, you look at them and you're like, oh, yeah, or like, or like a watch.

You look at that and you're like, whoa.

But like things weren't always that good.

Like, no, shoddy craftsmanship was pretty normal probably until like 50 years ago or even less.

I don't know.

Well, really, I mean, even like, yeah, before, I mean, it still exists, I guess, but like,

yeah, especially before like the industrial illusion, like before manufacturing,

stuff was like, everything's different, dude.

Like, you know, you know, you make stuff yourself.

So like you would have this wobbly old table that like you would make.

And that was just the norm.

So like, I don't think that the concept of perfectionism really exists or maybe it wasn't

as prevalent because nowadays, when you see stuff, it all looks perfect.

Yeah.

And so you're like, I could never do something like that.

That's incredible.

You know, that's a good point too.

It's also like this, it's like, that is also a way to trick ourselves into thinking that we are

unable or incapable of doing things.

Because it looks, because we're looking at a finished product.

So it looks so hard to imagine how you get from zero to there, right?

From nothing to that point, when in reality, it's doable.

Somebody else did it, right?

Like, it's totally possible.

I see that way about programming all the time.

And like, now I realize like, it's not that at all.

Anyway, like literally anybody could.

It just takes time.

Like everything else, it just takes learning time.

That's it.

Yeah, that was so funny.

It was like, do you remember the gateway 2000?

That completely.

Yes, that was popular.

That little like cow box at the handle.

Dude, that was like, I never in my life as a computer

been more perfect than that.

Like, I don't know why, but just like, when it was coming out,

the marketing that they did, the age that I was out in front of computers were,

it was just like, that was like the holy grail of computers.

And never in my life has another computer even come close.

Their market is absolutely what that was.

Yeah, because when you walked into the stores,

because their boxes were unique,

you could see them from like, all the way across the store.

Remember, and like, you knew exactly what they were.

Only ones that had that box, that shape.

Yeah, imagine you had one now that if I had like a 10 megabyte ram.

I know, right?

Well, I look at pictures of it because like,

there was just like, I don't know, I guess in your childhood,

you look back to these things and you,

they were just incredible.

And so like, I look at pictures online.

I'm like, that is a terrible looking computer.

But yeah, it was something.

Yeah, yeah.

But you know, it was one of the old ones.

See, the screen probably was terrible if you're going back.

You know, we take for granted how things have like,

progressed in that area.

I don't think we could deal with computers now.

Like, there's computers nowadays.

No, dude.

It takes five minutes to boot up.

Everything took forever.

A webpage loads like this.

But it felt fast then.

You remember when, oh yeah, because the images used to load like this.

Line by now, right?

You would wait around forever for an image.

It's sorry for the big image on the website.

It would like take 25 minutes to load, God.

Yeah.

And then you couldn't get phone calls when you were online or something.

That's the weird thing about our expectations and norms too.

And I think that goes back to these three beliefs, right?

Is like, it's hard because it's so easy to get caught up in like,

modern things and think that that's all and everything should be normalized

based on this, right?

Our experience now and like, but that's not a fair thing.

Like, technology moves very fast.

And like, our way of communicating, like, being able to like,

do things instantly online.

It doesn't necessarily translate to everyday life.

Because without that speed of, you know, that connection,

you're not going to have that speed, that ability to do this and that fast.

And like, but it makes us think that things should happen that quickly.

And then like, you know, you see all these things online, like,

you know, we talked about for like the overnight successes and stuff.

And everybody feels that they're a failure because they haven't made a billion dollars

when they're 18.

And it's like, well, you know, that was a lucky case.

Yeah.

Yeah, I think, I mean, I don't know because I'm just guessing like this.

But I would think that like, people who do make a ton of money early on,

they kind of miss out on some of the fun of life.

Like, I remember there was, there was a game Borderlands 2.

I used to play with my brother and his friend.

Great game.

Yeah, awesome, very fun game.

And we loved playing.

We would play it every night because it was like fun.

You could play with other people at the time.

And so we would be all chatting and playing.

And it was great.

And then one night we were playing.

And somebody gave us like 10 million dollars in the game.

Like enough money to where you go by anything.

You have to work from money.

Yeah, there's no, anything you're working towards now.

You just ruined it.

The game, the game lost all of its fun.

We stopped playing two days later.

And I just think like that example,

whenever somebody's like, yeah, I just want to be rich.

I'm like, I think about it.

And I'm like, but that's kind of like the stuff that you want in life

is only there because you can't have it right now.

It's a motivation right to get it.

And like, so if you have all this money and you can have anything you want right now

that money can buy, then all the sudden,

life other becomes disappointing because now there's other stuff that money can't buy

and you can't have it.

Or I don't know.

Well, I think that's why you see like people like Zuckerberg and stuff who look.

He could have, he could have gotten out of Facebook when he was 20, whatever.

And been set for life and done whatever the hell he wanted.

He could have explored different projects, you know, done anything else.

Instead he stayed with it.

And I think because part of it is like when that happens,

it's like they have this fear of like naive to hold on to it.

Power.

Having more money than other people.

Those all become your goals, not living your life.

And, you know, and then you end up doing shitty things to people and stuff.

You know, it's like all for that end.

Yeah, just to have it most crazy.

It's crazy.

So anyways, that is a three thoughts that'll mess up your life.

I do recommend this book.

If you want to check it out, it's called How to Make Yourself Happy

and Remarkably Less Disturable by Dr. Albert Ellis.

And yeah, I've been, I have a blast reading through.

This is a short book.

It's only like 150, 160 pages, something like that.

Oh, good.

See, it hasn't had it with the bunch of stuff.

Oh, no, no.

It's like, it's right to the point,

but it's, it's something where every time I pick it up,

I'm just like, wow, that's really great.

Well, that's like all this self-help books.

Where it's like, you get the whole books on the title.

And it's like, it's like 400 pages.

Like, dude, this is unnecessary.

You're just putting yourself to stories about the same thing.

Yeah.

It's like, oh my god.

Crazy.

So that's all for this episode.

If you did enjoy this, we are taking idea requests for episodes.

So you can either comment down in the YouTube comments

or you can email us in the show notes.

And let us know what you'd like to hear about

because this is the two-way street.

We make the episodes.

You can request whatever you want.

Yeah.

And we're happy to do for you.

We'll do the episode.

So anyway, until next time,

this is the Essentials Toad Podcast.

I'm Randy.

That's Danny.

See you later, Danny.

Later, Randy.