Life Is A Video Game (Play Accordingly)
How to create separation from your character
Over the last few years, I’ve sent out emails about:
Making $$$
Self actualizing yourself
Forming good habits
Beating bad habits
Learning copywriting
Building successful businesses
Choosing niches
Staying disciplined
And so on and so forth...
But if you’ve read a fair chunk of those emails (or anything related to self improvement) yet your life still remains the same, then it’s obvious that the #1 problem you’re suffering from is:
‘You know what to do, but you just can’t get yourself to do it.’
Maybe you can get yourself to do it for a day, week, month...
… but not consistently for the long haul.
And you’re starting to realize this too, aren’t you?
You’ve set goals, started building habits, eating right, sleeping better, working smarter…
… but then you fall off.
Is this how life is supposed to be?
Are we destined to get on the wagon, fall off the wagon, get on the wagon, fall off the wagon until we grow old with wrinkles and lines of defeat?
Maybe some people are. But not you, my friend.
Not you.
Why?
Because I’m going to let you in on a little-known secret that the world doesn’t want you to know for the world can only profit off you if you remain limited and powerless.
What’s the secret, Tej?
I’ll explain in just a moment, but first a quick mental exercise…
Imagine right now that you were the main character inside Grand Theft Auto and living fully in the GTA world (or any video game for that matter).
And now imagine you had BIG GOALS to build biz, lose weight/gain muscle, bring your dreams to life, overcome obstacles, take daily consistent action on your intentions, and so on and so forth.
Could you do it?
Maybe for a day, week, a couple of months…
… but what would soon happen?
Your preferences, resistance, past, thoughts, labels, stories and emotions would soon start coming to life and interfering with your ability to do what you needed to do day in and day out.
Instead of waking up early to build your dreams on day 39, the sound of the alarm clock would trigger thoughts of: “Hmm I didn’t get enough sleep last night, so let’s just hit snooze and sleep a little bit more…”
Instead of continuing in the face of rejection of day 72, moments of adversity would make you second guess yourself and lose faith.
Instead of putting on your running shoes and hitting the pavement on day 7, bad weather would make you “not feel like it” and skip your workout.
And on and on and on you would go.
Wanting x, but letting your thoughts, preferences, and resistance keep you from doing what is required to make x happen.
Following me so far?
Good.
Now imagine a glitch occurred in the video game and your character grew conscious of the fact that the character he was in the video game wasn’t all there was to him. He was also connected to a deeper, realer, and truer part of himself that was OUTSIDE the video game.
Who was this deeper part?
The one who held the video game controller and could push buttons to make the character do what he/she wanted him to do.
Imagine your character waking up to this and shifting his identity from being the character to the presence he was OUTSIDE the video game, the one holding the video game controller.
Now imagine your character having the same BIG goals of building a biz, losing weight/gaining muscle, bringing your dreams to life, overcoming obstacles, taking daily consistent action on your intentions.
AND ALSO:
The same limiting thoughts, preferences, resistance, labels, stories running through his/her head.
What would happen now? Would he still fall victim to the limitations?
Well let’s use your real life experience to answer that question.
Have you ever played a video game where you had to control the character to fulfill some type of mission inside the video game?
“Yeah”
And has the video game character ever been tired, frustrated, angry, low on sleep, powerless?
“Yeah”
Were you still able to get the video game character to take the right actions that were in his best interest to fulfill the mission?
“Yeah”
How?
“By pushing buttons on the video game controller.”
Okay, but how come the thoughts, preferences, resistance of your character didn’t get in the way and stop you from pushing the necessary buttons?
“Because although I could experience the thoughts, emotions, resistance, preferences of my character, I knew that wasn’t who I was. I was the one holding the video game controller so I could still hit x on the controller and make the character do what was in his/her best interests.”
Interesting, but why?
“I knew I (the one holding the controller) was immune to the preferences, resistance, labels, limitations running through the character’s mind. I was free from it and nothing could harm me.”
What power did this give you?
“The power to push my character to become all that he/she could be.”
Good shit.
“But what does this have to do with real life?” you say.
After all, you’re not in the GTA world. You’re in the ‘real’ world (or so you’ve been told lol).
And you’re right. You are.
But the thing is...
You’re treating Earth the same way the GTA character treats the GTA world. You think the character you’re playing is all that there is to you and so you’re extremely close to your character’s thoughts, resistance, preference, labels, and stories and letting them run your life.
In other words, you’re operating from the first person.
As a result:
If your character feels good, you take action on your dreams.
But the moment your character doesn’t feel good, you avoid taking action on your dreams and fall off the wagon.
This in return prevents you from fulfilling the missions you’ve set for yourself because it’s only a matter of time before your thoughts, emotions, preferences, resistance sabotage you.
Do you see this? This is why it’s SO hard for you to consistently put in the work and actually make strong progress.
So the question becomes…
How do you actually get yourself to do what you need to do?
Answer: The same way we illustrated in the GTA world.
Instead of being so attached and close to your character, create separation.
And start viewing yourself in the third person.
When you start viewing yourself in the third person, the you that you see in the mirror will start looking like a real life video game character.
And from that moment on…
You’ll still experience his thoughts, emotions, preferences and resistance, but you’ll also realize that you are beyond it since you’re operating from the third person (aka from presence).
Once you realize this, you’ll also realize that you have the full power to push the buttons on your character to get him to take action even if he doesn’t feel it…
… because you’re no longer a slave to his emotions, resistance, preferences, doubts, and fears. Instead, you recognize them for what they are and keep it pushing because you know they’re not you.
This, in return, gives you FULL freedom and power.
So to recap:
The reason you can’t get yourself to do what you need to do is because you’re operating from the limited first person.
To get yourself to consistently take action, you must start living from the third person and start viewing yourself like an independent 3rd party.
This way you’ll create separation between you and your character and stop taking the inner dialogue of your character personally. Instead, you’ll start ‘pushing his/her buttons’ like you do with a video game character and that’s when you’ll start flying higher than you ever thought possible.
Until you shift your identity from character to presence, you’ll never get here and will always remain victim to the thoughts, labels, emotions, preferences of your character.
Is that what you want?
If so, cool and keep at it (no judgments) :-)
But if not, take a deep breath, drop all your character’s BS stories and labels for 2-5 seconds, and get in touch with the presence that is you.
Now stay here and from this place mold and control your character like a video game character. After 60 minutes or so, you’ll slip up again and start identifying with your character again. It’s okay. Take another deep breath, drop all your character’s BS stories and labels, and repeat the process. Then do it again and again and again until you’ve created a permanent shift.
Once this happens, the world that you call Earth will become the greatest video game you’ve ever played…
… and making $$$ will become as easy as it is in the GTA world.
Sounds like a stretch?
I’ll let you experience the magic for yourself! :-)
Your friend,
/tej
This was amazing 🔥