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The purpose of these articles is to bring you into my mind, philosophies, and ways to navigate this chaotic world. For those of you who already know me a little bit, I think you’ll agree that generally the descriptive words for me are Chill, Calm, Stoic, or something of the sort. I want to start off by giving a little bit of context as to how I’ve stumbled upon this demeanor and outlook over the course of my life.
It honestly started when I was young, probably around six or seven years old. I grew up with a very normal childhood and had nothing to complain about, so this isn’t a woe-is-me story, but I downloaded an interesting perspective at a young age. You see - My entire mom’s side of the family is extremely religious, but my dad is the complete opposite and bases all of his beliefs on science and history. The difference never got in the way of anything, but it always caused me to have difficult internal conversations about my beliefs a lot younger than most people. How many seven year old’s do you know who are contemplating the vast scale of the universe, what that says for the importance of the human species, and whether or not an all-powerful being could have possibly created it all? It’s safe to say there were no other 2nd graders having these internal debates.
Now, I don’t want this to come across as my parents doing anything wrong - It’s quite the opposite. They handled the situation as best as they knew how, and quite frankly, I will probably follow the same method when my daughter starts having these questions as well. The thing I absolutely love about my parents is that they always promoted free thinking and coming to your own conclusion about things. I was never forced to go to church, but they were perfectly willing to let me go any time I wanted. My dad will never remember this, but I specifically remember him having a friendly smirk on his face when he said,
“I’ll take you to church if you want… I’m not going in, but you can.”
They always wanted me to be my own man as far as I can remember, and I’m forever grateful for that... So out of sheer curiosity, I probably went to church about 5-10 times over the years with family and friends, but I could never really get into it. It just wasn’t for me. Please know - I’ll never shame or judge anyone for their religion, so please don’t take this wrong, I’m simply trying to explain the beginning of this mindset.
A lot of you are probably thinking, “Who cares? A lot of kids grow up without religion or in an athiest household,” and I would absolutely agree with you. The only difference for me is that I hung onto the science/history/universe side of the coin. By the time I was 9, I was trying to figure out the meaning of life and what our purpose was on this planet. I slowly started to realize how microscopic we are when we are looking at the size and age of the universe. The estimated age of the universe is approximately 13 billion years old, which means that homo sapiens have only been around for about 0.003% of that time (500,000 years). If I try to calculate my nearly 30 years into the lifespan of the universe, the math doesn’t even make sense to me:
But here comes the morbid/depressing part of the story.
Before I ever hit puberty, I realized how insignificant our lives are in the grand scheme of things. From a scientific standpoint, we are such a little blimp on the radar that our individual lives legitimately will never even show up. Obviously, at first ponder, this is a very depressing thought and mindset, so how did I become such a goofy, free spirited adult? Well believe it or not, this became a positive thing in my life. I came to realize that, in my opinion, there is no after-life so we have to enjoy ourselves while we are here. I understand that that is one of the biggest clichés in the book, but my version is a little different. For me, living my life to the fullest also means not being stressed out about anything. And I mean ANYTHING. With all of that said, why would I care about paying a bill a few days late? Why would I care about somebody cutting me off in traffic or taking my parking spot? Why would I care if somebody doesn’t like me? To be honest, if these things bother you enough to the point of anger, your perspective needs adjusted. There are much worse things than having to walk another 30 feet into the store or getting to work one minute later than you expected. There were many many more reasons to give me this mindset that I’m sure we will get into in future articles, but these are some of the things that I took to heart immediately in my young life. That’s where this calm, idgaf demeanor came from.
This perspective has also made me constantly think of the macro scale and analyze anything and everything. Everything has a simple meaning, but there is usually more underneath the surface as well, and that’s where you get to understand people and the world that we live in. Once this becomes your automatic thought process, very little will bother you. I will say - It did take me about a decade of lashing out, anger, and depression to figure this out, but once all of that was over, I became one of the most mentally strong men you will ever meet.
This is an extremely long-winded way of saying - Relax. Don’t take life too seriously, and make sure you are living every day exactly like you want to. It shouldn’t matter what your parents think, what your friends think, or what your boss or strangers think - It only matters what you think. When you are living with your own happiness at the top of the priority list, you will notice how much better life gets. I see so many people living their lives based on who their parents expected them to be, and that is very sad to me. You are your own person, and anybody who loves you should respect that.
These articles are going to continue to dive into my mindset and how I approach and manage every day life. This is only the tip of the iceberg, so please make sure to subscribe so you don’t miss anything. Thank you so much for reading until the end, but I have one final question for you…
If You’re Being Honest With Yourself… Who Are You?