41
votes
What was the best change you ever made in your life?
I'm going to be a little bit more broad on my response. It wasn't a matter of just a one-time thing or action, but a philosophy. I have a personal rule of mine to change something major about myself at least once a year, and that could range from a job or to taking up a new hobby.
Since taking up on this idea, this thought, I've felt better as I can see changes happening, and looking back from exactly a year ago to the date there's a lot to be impressed by. By following this new tradition I feel better as I can see constant improvement, and self-motivation to adapt, and evolve as a person.
What was the best change you ever made in your life?
I finally gave up on my ex girlfriend. My life is in an entirely different place than it was a year ago. +
We were together 10 years, high school sweethearts, lived together for 6 years and we have a 4 year old son together.
I have been very loyal to her, never cheated, always taken care of her, made sure she wanted for nothing. I am 29 and she is 26, over the last couple of years she has been having a "mid twenties life crisis". She grew up really sheltered and didn't so much as have a drink until she got to college. In contrast, I grew up in a party town, was anything but sheltered and was basically done with drinking and such by the time I was in college. As a result of that she kinda feels like she missed out on the parting phase of teens and early twenties. She also feels like she missed out on getting to date around and experience other people.
Well, she had been going to a neighboring city on the weekends to spend time with her younger sister who still lived at her father's home. Turns out her and her sister were going clubbing every time she visited and had been hooking up with random guys. This went on for about 6 months before I found out, our homelife was normal, she would go do these things and crawl into bed with me like nothing was going on. The only reason I found out was because she put a password on her cell phone, for the first time in ten years and for some odd reason I was not allowed to know it. So, obviously that got me curious. Even after finding this out, I stuck around (child, ten years, "love", blind dipshit, ect, ect) and tried my best to get things stable again. The entire thing was shell shock for me, I thought we were in this amazing relationship, living in a great home and raising our son together. I seriously suspected nothing.
Her behavior got worse and she even got to the point where she was no longer even making an effort to hide it. She even had a consistent guy she was hooking up with for a few months, who knew she was in a long term relationship and didn't care. He even got my number at one point to text and mock me. I tried everything to save our relationship, every time she cheated she claimed it was somehow my fault. The relationship grew more and more toxic, I fought harder and harder to fix things. I spend months trying to figure out what i was doing wrong. I was (and in some ways am) a very broken person as a result of all of this.
I tried really hard to get her into couples counseling, she had no desire. So I went on my own, to a group therapy class once a week for about three months, it really helped me. I was on the verge of giving up on everything (in the most literal sense) and if it wasn't for that group I may not be around.
This summer, I was done. Backed by a lot of encouragement from my group, I moved out. I am now am living the single father life with my son. While she lives the "I think I am still 19 and party hard" life. She has no real desire to be a mother anymore, which is fine because I love my boy and my life is better because of him. Although he doesn't understand and I don't know how to explain it to him. I have made a commitment to my son, we are best friends and our life together is amazing. I have no intention of dating, I have never "been" with anyone else and honestly dont have the desire to.
I am a dad, a friend and a mentor. That is all I need and I am happy for the first time in a very long time.
EDIT: Shoot, sorry guys that was kind of a lot. Its really long and probably TMI, I just started typing and yea, sorry.
I stopped using my phone before bed. I go to sleep faster now because I’m more comfortable and wake up better. It’s also no longer right by my bed so if there’s something I want to do quickly it’s a much larger mental barrier having to get up and walk over to it
I also do that, I've essentially trained my brain to think that the bed is for sleeping and no longer use my phone on it. I can easily pass out within a minute just laying down on my bed now.
Ended a toxic relationship. They kept trying to change me and kept condescending to my hobbies. When it ended, they pointed to the handful of changes that I actually liked and said that part of me belonged to them, and how dare I keep those parts of myself.
Kept them anyway. Happier to this day.
Toxic relationships are awful, no one deserves to be treated like property. Glad you got out of that mess!
Thanks!
The kindest thing I can say is they let me see who I truely was both while we were together and after we weren’t.
Stopped orienting my life around video games. Really having a consumption activity as your main "hobby" is bad I think.
What do you do instead?
I quit smoking weed after 16 years of being high around the clock. I wouldn't recommend it for everyone but it was a very positive change for me.
I'm clean about 5 months. I feel amazing about it too. Cheers
Congrats! Keep it going!
Good for you! I was actually coming here to say the opposite LOL my husband has very very bad depressive anxiety and he stopped relying on medicine because he was afraid of the feeling when he stopped (very much like a detox. It was scary.)
When weed became legalized in California, that was the first time I ever really smoked, and I smoked with him. It has helped him tremendously and actually helped us get closer since he wasn't just a boiling pot of anger and anxiety all the time. But like you said, it's different for everyone.
Hope you continue to see positive changes!!
Thanks - I just had my five year anniversary of quitting a couple of months ago.
After all those years of smoking I KNOW it has plenty of positive effects on people. When I first started it definitely helped open my mind to new experiences and different ways of thinking about things. But I overdid it, and eventually it became something that was dragging me down instead of lifting me up. All the stereotypical stoner things you read about - paranoia, lethargy, mood swings, impaired memory, etc. I stopped hanging out with most of my friends (unless they also smoked) and became a pretty unpleasant person. When I finally quit, the positive changes started almost immediately. The depression cleared, mood swings became much less severe, I started having dreams again, started putting more effort into social and professional connections, among other things. After about six months I got into a long-term relationship that seems to be built to last, I'm doing better than ever in my career and I'm playing my instrument a lot better too (part-time jazz drummer). The only change I don't really like is getting my sense of smell back. Remember, I live in NYC and now I can smell every horrible nasty thing on the subway. Ugh.
So that's how it went for me, but I know that your mileage may vary. If you and your husband are seeing benefits from smoking, then keep it going. I wish they would legalize it here in New York and everywhere else. There is a lot of good that could come from that, even if I won't be smoking again any time soon.
homie ive been clean for 14 months*. The differenec between me now, and me then is staggering. Amazing. so worth it
i got high on 420, caving to peer pressure. Also its illegal where I live so the shit i would get varied ALOT. partially why i stopped aswell.
Leaving New York. It's just not worth the crazy cost of living if you're not rich.
I grew up in a mountain resort community in Colorado. I moved back to the area after college and worked my ass of to live there. Then one day I realised I was working so much I couldn't even enjoy the area or community because of how high the cost of living was. I find it really sad how a lot of major areas are becoming essentially unlivable unless you are in a higher class.
Started eating right and taking care of myself around 2010, I dropped over 200 pounds in a 1-2 year period by cleaning up my eating habits (ketogenic diet), getting more exercise, finding a long term relationship, getting a new job etc. It's amazing how different you feel when you cook your own food, cut out the processed crap and actually put effort into what you consume. It cured my depression, gave me bundles of excess energy each morning and taught me to care for myself better long term.
Well done. I wish I could do this.
Thank you! Anyone can do it, but I am also a realist and I make sure people know that not everything I did will work for them. I tried so many things over the years that worked for others, miserably, and it was finally keto that just "clicked" for me.
Serious question, how did you get started?
I am a Chef and have been very interested in a ketogenic diet. I am overweight (by at least 150 lbs if not more) and my weight clearly affects my quality of life. I want nothing more than to get healthy, but my lack of motivation is one of the most debilitating things in my life.
I think I relied on two tools primarily when I started, one was reddit /r/keto sub (It was ALOT smaller back in 2010... these days unfortunately it suffers from the "sub becoming too big quality loss" problem.) And I also used myfitnesspal.com to track all of my meals, everyday, meticulously.
Motivation was definitely my problem and for me it was accountability to my friends on /r/keto and myfitnesspal that helped push me. Everyone has to find their own motivation, but accountability to a buddy or a group is a huge help to me.
I do still have my evernote keto cookbook if you are interested in trying some "keto" recipes, this might be a help. https://www.evernote.com/pub/j_jay/ketorecipes
Feel free to send me a PM and i'd be happy to connect with you. I gained too much weight back the past four years and I am just getting started again myself to try and hit my original goals.
Yea, I am a lurker in /r/keto and it does seem like consistent post quality is an issue. Although it has been really motivating seeing progress posts and listening to the different ways people have custom fit the diet to their lifestyles.
That cookbook looks amazing, I definitely need to try some of those out. THANK YOU!
Yea, I have talked about it will a few friends, maybe I need to pursue that further. Its hard because I live rurally, am a single father and am pretty limited in my social interactions.
I have been battling carb and sugar addiction for a really long time, I am finally starting to get that under control. Which is one of the biggest reasons I think Keto would be good for me.
This is exactly what I was coming here to post - I started Keto this year and have really turned myself around in a heap of ways. I had always been pretty overweight, and while I knew I had an issue with depression and was diagnosed and started medication a few years ago, I don't think I quite knew how much of a problem I had with body image. Having lost a bunch of weight, in a controlled and meticulous, yet very quick manner has given me a bunch of confidence that I really thought I'd lost forever. I'm now playing more sport and really enjoying it, a bit more involved and active at University, and starting to actually put myself out there for graduate jobs instead of being comfortable clocking in and out of my part-time job.
I don't want to sound like I'm shilling it, because I get weird vibes from how pseudo-psychological or "religious" some other similar diets sound (specifically Paleo - here in Australia we have a celebrity chef Pete Evans who pushes paleo hard but often comes out with a lot of dangerous quack statements). I'm not going to say that it's a wonder diet, that it'll cure all your problems or make your hair stop falling out; the rigidity of the program isn't for everyone and weight loss really depends on how far you push yourself and how hard you track your diet. But it works for me, it's the best thing I've done in years and the weight loss is probably my biggest achievement ever.
It all stemmed from the military.
Mostly: Think positive, it'll work out, if it doesn't - I have complete confidence I can fix it.
This has been how I approach life, and it seems to work out pretty well for me. My wife used to stress over small things that really didn't matter. Her anxiety was through the roof and she would snap at the littlest things. Through therapy, she learned to stop focusing on the negative and it really helped. Then back in January, she had a bad accident and was in the hospital for a week. Her whole outlook on life changed and she decided that she would only focus on the good and no longer sweating the small stuff. She's much happier, the kids are happier and the overall stress in our household is much lower.
I botched it up haha I meant - Work hard when it matters and don't when it doesn't.
Good on your wife.
I broke my Chinese programing and no longer have to finish all food on my plate.
Still in the process of breaking mine!
Haha, it was so hard! It just clicked for me one day that literally no one was helped by me forcing the last bites down. Of course, I am careful not to order or take too much. Still don't want to be wasteful, but just didn't see a point in punishing myself if I misjudged.
Are leftovers not a thing in Chinese culture?
Oh it definitely is, though not everywhere or for all meals. We just have a culture where food is love, so family and friends will pile food onto your plate, in your bowl. And we're expected to clean our plates. Also if there's "a little bit left", it's not worth packing, so someone has to finish it.
Back to the leftovers thing, I tried to pack about a third of my meal once in Hong Kong and was told it's really unenvironmentally friendly to use a styrofoam container for it. So in case you're wondering what "a little bit left" is.
Ah I see, a similar culture (food equating to love, and not eating everything offered is rejecting love) exists in many if the American sub cultures, especially the South. It sounds like it's an even heavier ingrained norm for you though.
IIRC for some southern US cultures this has contributed to a high degree of obesity. In my personal bias, I do not associate Chinese culture with being overweight, quite the opposite. Is this just my perception, or is some other factor at play, such as the general diet? (Fried chicken vs fried rice?)
I think diet definitely has a lot to do with it. There is a bigger weight issue since fast food has become common. But the portion size differences is probably a bigger difference. I am in Canada, but I've noticed that the portion sizes are generally smaller in China or Taiwan than here in North America.
I stopped caring so much about what people think of me. It allowed me to gain some confidence, start pursuing the things I actually enjoyed, eventually find something I was passionate enough about to try to go to college for, switch gears to something that I was passionate enough to truly put effort into as a career, and get to the level of stability that I'm currently enjoying now.
It's a lot easier to fight depression and engage in your own life if you're not trying to fake it in a desperate attempt to fit in. It took me far too many years to figure that out, but I'm glad I did.
Daily mindfulness meditation. Currently on a 445 day streak.
15 minutes is 1% of a day (14.4 minutes, but close enough). For 1% of the day, every day, I turn off all external inputs and pay attention to only the internally generated thoughts / feelings / emotions.
Can you go into more detail about this? I've had times where I would do something similar with a float tank, and I've felt GREAT. As you do this as a daily thing however, do you turn off all distractions like lights, noise, and just close your eyes like a monk in a movie? Sorry if I sound condescending, as I'm not trying to be as that's the closest comparison I can think of.
What works for me is sitting cross-legged in a quiet room, eyes closed, with bluetooth earbuds in and connected to my phone. I use a meditation timer app that plays a gong when the time is up, and I also have it set to play simple background noise (a fireplace with crackling logs).
However, there's no wrong way to meditate. There's only meditating or not meditating. What I've described is just the combination of things that works for me.
There's also guided meditations which can be helpful if you're just starting out meditating. The app I use, Calm, has an introductory "7 Days of Mindfulness" that I really liked when I first started. Of course, not using an app or other timer device at all is an option. Just sit, close your eyes, and breathe. Sitting with eyes closed isn't required either. There are walking meditations consisting of walking purposefully and making an effort to notice the things around us that we often ignore as we hurry from point A to point B. Calm also has a guided body scan meditation that I use when I'm having trouble getting to sleep.
Personally, the biggest hurdle for me when I was starting out was that my mind would wander while meditating - what am I going to cook for dinner when I'm done, what TV show I should watch while I eat, what I'm going to do at work tomorrow. I'd notice those thoughts, and get frustrated with myself, thinking "I'm bad at meditating", and sometimes end the meditation session early out of frustration.
The way I look at it now, with the hindsight of more than a year of daily practice, is that the self-critical "I'm bad at meditating" thoughts are just part of the normal background noise of my brain. That's not me thinking I'm bad at it, it's a specific little corner of my mind that runs on autopilot and likes to play peanut gallery. That thought can arise, I can watch it go by, and then it can drift away. I don't have to allow it to convince my conscious mind that it's true.
Thank you!
That would have been me as well thinking I'm not doing it correctly! However you're right it seems that it is just the brain on autopilot mode.
Check out the free book mindfulness in plain English, it's a great introduction into this topic for western audiences.
Every time I try to meditate, very negative thoughts pop up. I have tried to redirect my attention, and I have tried to just observe my negative thoughts, but I can't help but still feel the pain they cause me.
Do you have any advice as to how I can get rid of them?
The practice will be to notice them and allow them pass on.
When you do this it will become easier not to dwell on negative thoughts.
I have tried this before, but it feels like they never pass. Somehow they have become associated with the peaceful place I think of. Every time I try to close my eyes to meditate, the negatives are the first to come out.
This may be a little uncommon, but for me it was removing the toxic family members from my life. After the last of my parents died (when I was at the ripe old age of 23), all I had left was a very narcissistic aunt and my mom's long term boyfriend. After a couple years I realized it was just constant negativity and all the feelings of "I don't LIKE you as a person, but you are my family so I HAVE to tolerate you" was all I was left with. After going to therapy, I realized it is OK to cut people out, even those who are family, for your own mental health.
The only one I miss is my step-dad (mom's long term boyfriend that basically helped raise me since I was 6). But he wasn't dealing with her death well, doing a lot of drugs, and started feeding into the drama of my aunt - probably because he was high all the time. I hope one day he finds peace and we can have a relationship again, but for my own anxiety I had to cut them out. I can't tell you the amount of relief and independence I finally felt when I didn't have an obligation to keep that type of relationship in my life.
Again, not for everyone, but for 25 year old me (at the time), it helped tremendously.
I cut a very very narcissistic mother out of my (and my young son's) life a few years ago. I struggled with the decision to do it for a very long time and ultimately it was an amazing choice.
I stopped playing video games obsessively. Like any addiction, you cannot do it cold turkey - and it's not simple. A matter of luck, really. Lucky enough to have people in your life willing to support you, lucky enough to have other interests to fill the time with - and lucky enough to have the free time to find those interests. I got into biking and rekindled my love of reading, and the results have been astounding. One forgets how much exercise matters to a human, and books are - for lack of a better term - spiritual.
Not sure it counts as the best change I ever made in my life, but I took up a high intensity sport at age 28 that I had always wanted to. I've had some minor aches and sprains, but I feel great every week I play and it's really helped me to have a physical outlet to de-stress.
Before going to medical school I had a good paying job in an awesome city. Everyone said I was crazy to slog through years of more school, and that the progress I could make in my career would outweigh any benefit of being a doctor. I did it anyway because I felt like it was the path that would make me happy. Not only do I love what I do now, but I'm damn good at it too. An additional bonus is that I met my wife in medical school. If I hadn't done that, I don't even know the kind of person I'd be now.
Joining the military. I was a college burnout sick of working retail and was scared and anxious about my future. I felt like I couldn't breath and was barely hanging on most of the time. I joined mainly for the stability that the military would provide and needed time to think about what I want to do with my future. Since joining I've made progress toward my degree that I've finally been able to settle on - completely paid for by the government, saved up thousands of dollars, met my beautiful wife, purchased a house and a dog with her, and am fully enjoying life.
Yes, there is plenty to gripe about when in the military but the benefits are more than worth it to me.
Started counting calories and exercising. Absolutely changed my entire life for the better. I was a lazy fat slob that spent all my time either working, playing video games, or going out with friends (read drinking). I got seriously motivated and lowered my daily calorie intake to around 12-1500 while exercising 5-6 days a week. Since the beginning, I've relaxed my calorie restriction a bit to both build muscle and maintain weight and now I usually only workout 3-4 days a week due to the type of training I'm doing.
After losing 50ish pounds (ish because I was afraid of the scale the first few months), every aspect of life is better. EVERY ASPECT! I'm happier, I feel better all the time, my relationships are better, I sleep better, I can think much faster and have better mental clarity, I poop better, I'm able to participate in spontaneous activities that would have exhausted me in 5 minutes before the change, I'm hungry when it's meal time but not tired and bloated after every meal, I still eat anything I want but in moderation. I have to repeat it, every single aspect of life is better.
Finally, just this last week I put up some new personal records in weight lifting with weights I never of being able to handle.
Life is simply better after losing weight.