From: 0:00 to 6:55
Wrong question...
Before you can learn how to improve yourself, you need to examine why...
If you don't "organize yourself" you'll find that you negatively affect yourself and those around you.
You may say "I don't care about that"; but that's not true. You do care... because if you're experiencing pain, you care about that pain - even if it's just in a negative way. claim
It's very rare to find someone in pain who would say "it wouldn't be any different if I was out of this situation"... so you care. evidence
So, if you do care about improvement in your life (removal of pain), or "getting your act together" - how do you go about doing that? conclusion
You may argue that "you don't care", but the nature of pain is that, by definition, you care about it or it wouldn't be a pain.
So, you do care, even if you don't want to admit it.
There's a desire to improve ones situation (one's self). claim
Summary of 'why should you bother improving yourself?' question.
So, you (a.) get get your act together...
... so there (b.) isn't more stupid pain than necessary.
Phenomenological idea...
Ask: "if I wanted to spend 10 minutes making this room better, what would I have to do?
you have to ask the question - it's part of the process.
It's something you can observe and experience the change - your observation powers will kick in and you'll start to notice things that can be improved. Allow yourself to consider the expanse you live in that moment, there will be all sort of things that can pop out that you can "fix".
Might seem like an oversimplification, simply cleaning up your space, would that be considered psychotherapy?
it depends on: how you conceive the limits of your being.
The principle is: Be observant for things that "announce" themselves as need of repair*. "if you fix 100, things like that, your life will be a lot different."
People tend to consider those [routine] things trivial...
the daily routine items like getting up, eating breakfast, brushing your teeth, etc. Claim : Those are the things that constitute 50% of your life.
... they think "well, they're mundane and I don't need to pay attention to them."
Exactly Wrong:
Evidence: - The math: "100 adjustments to your broader domain of being and there's a lot less rubbish and there's a lot less rubbish around and a lot fewer traps for you to step into."
Once you've got your mind and your emotions together, and once you're acting that out, then you can extend what you're willing to consider yourself [the limits of your being], and start fixing up the things that are part of your broader extent [external].
On the temptation to try and fix things you're not ready to fix...
Story 1... evidence
"Imagine you're walking down the street and there's this guy who's like alcoholic and schizophrenic and has been on the streets for 10 years, he sort of stumbled towards you. Now, that's a problem!"
It would be good if you could fix it, but you haven't got a clue about how to fix that.
You just walk around that... go find something that you could fix.
Why avoid trying to fix a problem like that...
If you muck about in that...
(1.) it is unlikely that you'll help that person. (You're unqualified.)
(2.) it's very likely that you'll get hurt yourself.
Deductions:
Analogy: "you don't walk up to a helicopter that isn't working and just start tinkering away with it. You have to stay within your domain of competence."
"Go back to where you live and sit down and think, Okay, I'm going to make this place better for half an hour. What should I do? You have to ask... and things will start to pop up like mad."
Why/How? "your mind is a very strange thing..."
Key: As soon as you give it [your mind] an aim, a genuine aim, it'll reconfigure the world in keeping with that aim. claim
On being genuine about "the aim": "you have to bring your thoughts and emotions together, and then you have to get them in your body so you're acting consistently."
[restated] Once you aim, the world will reconfigure itself around that aim, which is very strange. claim
"It's technically true." - Supporting Evidence
[Addressing Objection] - "I'm not trying to reduce everybody's problems to an improper aim, people get cut off at the knees for all sorts of reasons... they get sick, they have accidents, there's a random element to being that, for sure.
All suffering can't be pinned on "improper aim", random bad things DO happen to people. But it's still a great thing to ask. [are you aiming at the right thing?].
You want to bind the notion that having an improper aim invites negatives into your life with the reality that negative things can and do happen randomly.