Welcome to the Simple Human Strategy

The Simple Human Strategy is designed to assess and break down all the physical and spiritual practices that I apply in my life. I’ll also include hobbies or activities that I pick up and leave along the way because a spiritual life is all-inclusive.

I intend to show you the gains and benefits that can come from taking a very simple, slow approach to improvement.

If you’re the sort of person who likes to enrol in new courses, try the latest ultra-upgraded, high-tech yoga, and generally do things to ‘get better’, you’re in the right place.

But I’m going to turn the entire idea on its head first and tell you why self-improvement is a scam.

If you’re reading this you’ve probably read a book (or ten) on how to improve yourself, fix your habits, change your life, and generally become the radiant, shining yoga babe or chiselled, spartan warrior that sits on the cover.

But no matter how many rules for life you internalise from Jordan Peterson; no matter how often you pull yourself back to the power of now, as espoused by Eckhart Tolle; or even develop ‘atomic’ habits according to James Clear, you’re going to come up against the same thing.

Every single time.

Yourself.

If you start with ‘I want to improve myself’, you’re already saying I’m not good enough. You’re betting against yourself right out of the gates.

To be fair, let’s not dress it up in the opposite direction either: you’re definitely not perfect. That’s the beauty of being human.

But going against yourself to improve yourself is akin to the Sisyphus struggle. You’re trying to drag a version of yourself you’re not happy with up a hill. That’s a lot of weight to bear.

Here’s what you should be doing instead.

“There are only two mistakes one can make on the road to truth: not going all the way, and not starting” - Buddha

Trying to improve yourself is neither going all the way nor starting, it’s walking away from the truth.

Very often, people want to change themselves to be more like someone they’ve seen in magazines, on TV, or the internet, without ever really knowing who they are.

But what if the person that you truly are is the person you most want to be?

I’m not recommending specific techniques or practices here, I’m simply advocating this point before everything else: figure out what makes you, you.

How do you work? When are you productive? When are you introspective? How do you feel throughout the day?

Observe yourself to discover yourself. Maybe the improvements you’re seeking are less to do with trying to be like someone else, and more to do with not fighting who you are.

There’s a good chance you’re not all that bad, and it’ll make the next step that much easier.

You can repeat mantras, you can bend your body into weird shapes, and you can go and sit in a cave for months on end, but nothing surpasses the power of accepting who you are and how you are, right now.

Today you are how you are, and nothing you do today is going to change that.

See how you are. Accept how you are.

It removes the internal struggle, and that energy is free to move towards positive things.

Things that might… I dunno, improve you?

Once you’re no longer trying to improve yourself, things start to improve. Ironic, right?

Just like when you’re unable to sleep and you keep trying to sleep, it doesn’t happen, but the instant you give up the sandman swings by and hits you with his goods, and you’re out.

When you stop spending energy trying to be like this or that person, you take all that energy into being yourself.

With the understanding gained from self-discovery and the peace that comes with acceptance, free from resistance, you improve.

You become a better you. And you stop trying to become a low-level James Cleary or Marie Kondo. Let them be who they are, you’re much better at being you.

If I am 100% successful with my efforts in this line of work, coaching and motivation, I’ll put myself into unemployment.

Because the key to self-discovery and self-acceptance is not profitable, which is why most people don’t tell you about it.

I’m a firm believer in Via negativa, a process of developing understanding through the elimination of what something is not. This process can – and should – be applied to your life to enable you to see yourself.

You are not your job. You are not your behaviours. You are not your habits. You are not your material possessions.

Removing the distractions of these things brings you closer to whatever is left.

No, don’t sell all your stuff and quit your job. Yet…Unless it’s really what you want to do!

But that’s the cold, hard, unprofitable truth. Nine times out of 10, you need less, not more, to get to where you are going.

Good question. You shouldn’t.

If you are aware of who you are and how you work; if you accept it all and see yourself improving in all the ways that make you feel good, you don’t need another newsletter telling you what to do.

Do more with less. Share your wisdom with other people. Help them on their way.

But if that doesn’t sound like you, then maybe it’s worth it. I plan to share with you only that which I have done, and the benefits that I have reaped.

Included in that will be a lot of the things that I have NOT done and a lot of things that I have removed. Maybe that will be enough motivation for you to do the same.

I intend to drop you an email once a month with all the things I did and didn’t do, explaining what went well and what didn’t.

Maybe you read something and think, ‘Yes, that is something that I want to do for myself’, without any desire for improvement. Or maybe you think, ‘I don’t want that for myself’. Both are great outcomes as far as I’m concerned.

That’s that. I aim to be less wordy than I usually am as well, to practice what I preach.

I look forward to sending out January’s breakdown soon, and don’t hesitate to comment with your thoughts and questions!

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Best,

Nick