so, you fell off... wanna know why?

Today is one of those days.

I’m getting back on track today. Getting it all together. Again.

Perhaps you’re familiar with this pattern.

Just yesterday, it had been 2 or 3 weeks of living in the “FALL OFF” stage of the LOCK IN / FALL OFF cycle.

This black and white, binary way of living, this rapid cycling between self improvement and self destruction has defined my personal mythology for the better part of my adult life. Or even since I was an adolescent. Over a decade now.

Sheesh.

Let’s review the cycle together.

get life on track, work out every day, pursue creative passion, get to bed on time, maintain perfect, rigid control over all aspects of my “healthy lifestyle,” in pursuit of becoming… oh god, don’t make me say it, please…

The best version of myself.

Vomit.

Yak.

Get me out of here.

This is only the introduction.

F***.

Let’s keep going.

something in the system breaks. i’m exposed to a trigger substance or simply have one single “off day.” i scroll. i eat something that isn’t part of the plan. i have a single bite of a single donut and my personal narrative of perfect living, locked in living, PURITY, adherence to the dogma of discipline, that whole sense of self starts to erode. then, entropy has her way with me. i take another bite/scroll/hit/cig because it couldn’t hurt, right?

Right?

Right?

The hyper-verbal inner self talk machine I’ve built and been forced to live with (for years) knows exactly how to weaponize itself against me.

It can convince me there’s nothing wrong with “one more,” or that I can just “get back on track on tomorrow,” or that “it’s fine, it’s fine, it’s fine, it’s fine, it’s fine, you’re fine, it’s fine.”

I’m well aware the self-talk machine is just me. I know it’s all me.

I know that.

Here’s what happens next.

I spiral deep into all the negative “substances,” and habits I avoided for the LOCK IN part of the cycle with an intensity most can only dream of.

I binge like it’s my job.

Like it’s my craft. Which, in a very real sense, it is.

I’ve practiced this shit for years. I’ve perfected it.

I become a professional consumer of comfort substances. Soothing agents. Low level, un-cinematic, pedestrian escape mechanisms.

I become proper DEVOTED to the lifestyle of full-blown, shameful, isolated degeneracy.

Interesting: I bring the same level of discipline to my OFF cycle as my ON.

These modes of living (ON/OFF) perfectly mirror each other.

They’re built on rituals.

Rituals with seriously religious significance in the personal mythology I’ve trapped myself in. Through years of obsessive, back-and-forth cycling.

OFF: smoke cig (or other nicotine delivery mechanism,) eat pastry, occasionally drink alcohol for the sole purpose of making the nicotine hit harder, scroll.

ON: wake up with in early morning with alarm, workout, eat only single-ingredient foods and black coffee, read book, don’t scroll don’t scroll DON’T SCROLL

Both ON and OFF constitute sets of rituals.

Rituals in service of a personal value.

ON = in service of holistic personal development

OFF = in service of immediate, short term gratification

I need you to understand: I am not condemning any one of these practices right now. At least not the ON rituals.

In my ideal life, I’ve built my days around these very things.

Training, writing, cooking and eating real food with real people, reading, walking outside, staying engaged and aware for all of it.

Here is the stuff of a beautiful, active, creative-athlete life.

But the only world where I stay proper consistent with these beautiful, engaged practices is a world where I’ve somehow let go of the fragile, obsessive attachment to my LOCKED IN rituals.

Somehow let go of the belief that if I don’t do them CONSISTENTLY OBSESSIVELY EVERY DAY NO DAYS OFF then I’m obviously a weak, undisciplined adolescent-minded civilian who simply, will not make it.

The black-and-white thinking, the ON/OFF pattern, the vicious cycle of LOCK IN / FALL OFF is exactly that.

A cycle.

A two-part system separated by a line in the sand.

A shadow-religion built on fragile rituals.

Both sides depend on each other.

The LOCKING IN is a desperate response to undo the damage of the FALLING OFF. And the FALLING OFF is inevitable when the LOCKING IN fails to do what it promised it would.

There’s a lot more we could say on this. I’m sure we will at some point.

Like I said, today is one of those “get back on track” days for me.

I got out of bed early with my alarm, went for a walk, did a few sets of pushups. I’m writing with a cup of black coffee. Focused. No distractions.

Are we seeing a pattern here ladies and gents.

Sounds like brother is getting back into his ON state.

Yes. That’s true. And if nothing changes, we can reasonably assume that it’s only a matter of time before my perfect system crumbles again (due to the personal mythology I’ve built and choose to maintain.)

I won’t pretend I have all this figured out.

I know the long-term solution to this pattern is unpacking the narratives and beliefs that perpetuate the cycle.

I guess that’s what I’m trying to do with this thing.

But for now I’m gonna get myself back on camera and talk about all this for a youtube video and then I’m going to edit that and post it and then go to the gym probably so that when I get home I can eat something like beef and rice and eggs or sweet potato instead of rice maybe and then I’ll take a walk outside to get the digestion started and then when I get home I’ll read a book for 20 minutes or 30 minutes or 60 minutes depending on how immersed I get and then I’ll find something else to work on like writing the movie I want to do with my friend who lives in europe and then when that’s done yeah you know what I should probably try to socialize a little bit because that’s probably what makes these so called “ON” cycles so short lived is the fact that i tend to kind of isolate into my own personal development, not unlike an addict’s isolated descent into consumption, funny enough, and yeah wow, isn’t that funny how it works like that, but so yeah, I’ll just reach out to some friends maybe and see if they want to get dinner or drinks or even just go for a walk because I’m not gonna drink because drinking is gonna increase the likelihood of wanting nicotine in some form or another and the best way to not do something is to not want it in the first place so no I won’t drink any alcohol but yeah we should still try to see each other because I don’t want to go insane and if I end up spending the whole day in this room writing and talking into a screen I think I might lose it and I mean that and no I’m not exaggerating and it’s fine it’s fine it’s fine it’s fine because this time is going to be different because this is the time I lock in and everything changes and as long as I can just manage my energy levels and hydration levels and all that then I’ll be able to sustain this forever and ever and ever like a machine, like something built to do it, and then I’ll be famous and seen and loved and maybe then I’ll be able to sleep.