Your Head is a Houseboat: A Chaotic Guide to Mental Clarity

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Summary

A tour of how your mind works (and how to tame it) through a fun metaphor and great illustrations.

Notes and Quotes

Stop believing everything you think.

News, social media, administrative tasks - they all fill your head and build pressure inside you. You need to figure out a release it, and have mental clarity to figure out what is important to you.

It’s easier to adapt to thing you know are inefficient rather than change them. “Hard choices, easy life. Easy choices, hard life”.

CLEAN THE CLUTTER. Get things out of your head. This is like Getting Things Done --> into the Inbox so your head has room to think. This needs to happen with things that aren't todos as well and can be accomplish by journaling. Just write down thoughts until your brain has no more thoughts left. This should be done regularly so your brain can be clear to think.

KICKOUT THE FREELOADERS. Freeloaders are all the thoughts from your past where you felt embarrassed, confused. Ashamed. You can’t distract them away with external stimuli - you have to confront them and make them leave, screaming at you on the way out.

How do you find out the freeloaders? Meditate for 10 minutes. Sit straight up, then focus on your breath. Concentrate only on your breath. Afterwards, write down who your freeloaders are. Answer the following questions about your freeloaders: 1. When did they get in your head (the moment)? 2. What did you make that moment mean (subjective truth)? 3. What actually happened (objective truth)? 4. Where has this feeling shown up in your life (the pattern)? 5. What would happen if you could make it go away (the potential)? 6. Do you think it’s possible to live without them in your life (the possibility)?

JOURNALING FOR DIRECTION. Journal what you wanted 5 years ago. Or 10 years ago. Recognize that what we want changes over time.

Then journal what you want now in life. Some things we want grow, while others stay the same. It’s important to be aware of our desires.

FIVE BOSSES - our wants and needs 1. Selma the Sensible 2. Luka the Life Liver 3. Freda the Friendly 4. Aziz the Ambitious 5. Gilda the Giver These 5 bosses want to steer you away from your goals and desires. No one path you take will satisfy all 5 bosses - you need to pick and choose which will satisfy most. Sometimes we don’t hear opinions of all 5 bosses - need to make sure we do with journaling: - for each desire, ask what each boss wants you to do. Then ask yourself whose voice matters the most. Which boss matters most will change throughout life, there will rarely be a perfect path that pleases all bosses.

GRUMPY SOCK PUPPETS - our inner critics These guys are annoying and try to stop you from doing things. You need to reframe what they say though - essentially they are trying to protect you. It’s important to acknowledge the thoughts, but you don’t necessarily have to follow them. This boils down to being kind to yourself - if you reframe these thoughts kindly, you will gain reactive and feel better.

THE WACKY WINDSHIELD - our cognitive biases Cognitive biases stop us from seeing the world as it truly is. Like Snapchat filters on your world view. For opinions you hold, run them through the following questions to see if you have a bias: 1. What would be the truth if you were wrong? 2. What would it mean if you were wrong? 3. How have your cognitive biases shaped this opinion? 4. If you had zero cognitive biases, what might you believe instead? 5. Which do you believe is closer to the truth? 6. How can these varying beliefs serve you?

WELCOME TO THE ZOO - our subconscious and physiology Our subconscious urges (hunger, thirst, tiredness, etc…) are primal and not in our control. We should not feel guilty about them, but we should recognize them and meet our needs when noticing them. Sometimes it’s hard to do so, but instead of shaming ourselves we should attribute the shortcomings to the human condition “Humans get grumpy when they are hungry…and I love that.” We can only control our conscious reaction to these needs - better to do it with kindness.

KID YOU AND THE PHONE - your inner child. When having self-talk, make sure you are thinking of kid-you. You would never speak so negatively to a 6 year old - why beat yourself up now as an adult? When talking to yourself, or viewing what other people do, pretend you are talking to the younger version of yourself (or understanding the younger versions of what others are trying to do).