you want to know how to paint a perfect painting? it’s easy. make yourself perfect and then just paint naturally. - Robert Pirsig

what

successful people are who they are because of their identity, not because of their doing

what does a strong identity mean?

a person with a strong identity is the person who:

1. has tremendous self esteem
2. who thinks abnormally highly of themselves
3. holds themselves accountable for everything they think and feel (internal locus of control)

badass mindset

in the face of all have (non prescriptive) hurdles(problems, fears, confusions, overwhelm),

• people with a weak sense of identity
  • think: “oh man this is hard, outside my control, so overwhelming. i should look for sure shot solutions online for this”
  • act: are on the lookout for what to do
• the ones with a strong sense of identity
  • think: “man fuck this shit this pesky little problem is nothing in front of me. i’m not gonna cower in the face of this hurdle, i’m tougher than this! i am the person that gets through this problem easily”
  • act: based on what their strong internal natural self tells them and execute

they realize, doing your best is already perfection the person with the high self esteem is also not scared of failing. he thinks of himself so highly that he thinks: “in case i fail, shame on nature and fate to give someone like me a defeat!” they have the phrase: karm karo parth fal ki chinta mat karo running in their blood because of their strong identity.

identity triggered action

the successful person or a “good at something” person that you see are there because who they are. who they are triggered what the did. and that identity driven doing caused the success.

because when you are doing something as a part of your being, you’re doing it naturally. it is coming from inside and it fully resonates with who you are. when you look for tips on the internet to do xyz, that doing isn’t really in resonance with who you internally truly are and your internal self isn’t truly sure about what you’re doing and therefore, you don’t get the requisite result!

they are passionate in a particular field in such a way that it triggers the right things to do automatically; yes it seems quiet mystical and it is! this is what is dubbed as the “law of attraction” (that’s just my thinking…)

real life examples

strong vs weak identity

exactly why startup ideas are worthless

the reason why startup ideas are worthless and only execution matters is that: only a very specific kind of individual can succeed in an idea space because of their unique personality. that person has an inexplicable obsession to that idea space, that no matter what the exact idea is, through his unique understanding and identity towards that idea space, he will make it no matter what. the proof for this is that: if the person was born in a different era, or during an era where a particular market was already saturated or monopolized by big players, he’d still make it.

how to build a strong identity

how it works

identity -> thoughts -> actions

a conducive identity triggers conducive thoughts, and conducive thoughts trigger conducive action.

how to build it

there are 3 ways primarily:

1. positive affirmations (cringe and dubious)
2. maintain a rapport with your brain (best)
3. intentional discomfort

positive affirmations

how it works: identity -> beliefs -> thoughts -> actions

first, find the identity you want to build. as yourself: “if money, status, approval didn’t matter who would you want to become?”

then build that identity.

your identity is built by your belief system. therefore, choose your beliefs that are conducive to building that identity. discard beliefs that society/government/media has conditioned you to believe.

say positive affirmations in your mind or out loud. basically repeat in your mind a line like: “i am someone who…” for example:

1. “i’m someone who gets the work done no matter how lazy i feel”
2. “i’m someone who goes to the gym no matter how reluctant i feel”

affirmations are powerful because they affirm the thought in your subconscious mind; that’s where your identity lies.

beliefs get hardwired into your brain by 2 ways:

1. repetition: repeatedly saying those “i’m someone who” type affirmations
2. emotion: you have to attach emotion to your affirmation because the subconscious brain only understands emotion, not words.

but i think there are 2 better ways

maintain a trustworthy rapport with brain / be a man of your word with your brain

a strong sense of identity comes from the rapport you have made with yourself; or rather your mind.

• every time you do things to yourself that make you feel guilty, you lose a trust point with your brain
  • examples: engaging in cheap dopamine(fapping/watching corn, eating junk regularly), procrastinating tasks, etc
• every time you do hard things, things you didn’t want to do but still did them, you gain one trust point
  • examples: going to the gym even when you’re not feeling like it, getting work done even when you were tired, etc

the more trust points you gain, the stronger your identity. your brain learns identity through evidence.

you can also repeat affirmations after to do that uncomfortable task to reinforce that identity.

this guy put is much better than me though:

Your dream life is six months away, but you keep resetting the timer. And the worst part is you don’t even realize you’re doing it. Every time you say, “I’ll start tomorrow, I’ll do it later, this can wait,” your brain starts to learn something dangerous. It learns that your words mean nothing. Your brain learns identity through evidence, not motivation, not anything else, evidence. Every action is a vote for who you are. Right now, your brain has a massive amount of evidence that says you quit. Every time you skip the gym, scroll instead of deep work, your brain records this as a data point, and your identity is just stacked data points. People think becoming their dream self requires massive change. It doesn’t. It requires consistent proof, ‘cause your brain updates its identity through repetition. If you wake up tomorrow and do one hard thing, your brain will record that as evidence, and then the next day, more evidence, and this compounds until your identity massively shifts. This is the snowball effect that no one’s talking about. After a while, instead of your brain believing, “Can I do this?” It’s, “This is a part of who I am.” That’s when discipline becomes easy, so you don’t need to require motivation, you require an identity

intentional discomfort (beats fear)

do something difficult, outside of your comfort zone regularly, ideally daily

this primes your subconscious telling it that: “yeah this dude has already tried these many risky things in the past and looks like they never lead to danger, so probably this time won’t be any different.”

for example, talking to a stranger every day, doing 5 cold calls every day, etc.

why are we living in an identity crisis?

kids are naturally high self esteem. but as we go through life, we are get conditioned by various factors that make us lose that identity. every scolding, every humiliation, every coercion, every self-righteous dogmatic parenting adds up to it.

this inevitably leads to lower self esteem, self confidence, imposter syndrome, etc.