How do I stop being an undisciplined coward?
How do I stop being an undisciplined coward?
I've been on a slow but steady decline for the past several years. I don't move at all, barely leaving my room let alone the house; I've taken to eating shit I order out instead of cooking meals myself; I don't get involved with any local orgs besides sending dues every month; I haven't read a book in months; I regularly fail to perform bare minimum hygiene. The only reason I'm able to keep alive at all is because I haven't moved out of my parents' house, burdening them with helping me. It would be understandable if I was living hand to mouth and had barely any free time, but I am one of the small percent of burgers who isn't a month away from destitution and I have more than enough free time. Not to mention I receive no shortage of help.
Since I can't blame my material circumstances, I can only conclude that I am this way because I always refuse to take personal responsibility. I know that changing myself so that I can be, at bare minimum, not a drain on society is going to take a lot of work, work that I always put off due to cowardice. Idealist as it is, I feel like I have some innate metaphysical trait that makes me this way, and the entirety of my failure to pick myself up is due to a moral failing on my part and nothing more.
How do I force myself to unfuck myself so that I can actually be useful for revolution instead of yet another useless first world lotus eater?
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I can very much relate. It was like this constant depression that felt endless even though there were short breaks of feeling okay. I felt alien and very different to “normal” functioning people and basically lived exactly how you described.
Eventually I stumbled upon someone talking about CPTSD or complex post traumatic stress disorder, it’s basically like ptsd but caused by chronic repeated traumatic events. A lightbulb went off as I learned more about it and I realized that I was in deep denial about being abused and neglected as a kid. I basically internalized what I was told growing up about being lazy, ungrateful, ect. There was also a lot of physical abuse for disappointing my parents so I became obsessed with all the ways I wasn’t good enough. In a fucked up way it kept me safe as a powerless kid. Criticizing myself viscously allowed me to get ahead of what my dangerous parents wanted and put energy into heading it off before things blew up. It was a survival mechanism that was killing me in adulthood.
Obviously I don’t know if you have similar experiences but the way you talk about yourself rings a bell for me, and as lame as it sounds learning to care about and love myself somewhat has been the only way I’ve made any progress towards being happier. When you start to have empathy for yourself you start to want to do all those things to take care of yourself.
All that being said even if you don’t relate to this at all therapy or some kind of mental health assistance is probably the way. Also sorry if this makes you uncomfortable or comes off as armchair diagnosis but I’m passionate about it because I wish the info was available to me before I spent my twenties in self hatred. As it turns out most people are not this hard on themselves and I had no clue. Wishing you well ❤️
While I wasn't neglected or abused per se, I did grow up in an environment with unusual stressors. I'll look into CPTSD.
My recommendation is to also look into NARM and IFS.