The more time you spend on the internet, the more you realize that almost everyone is seeking some kind of change. While some people focus on political change, others focus on personal change. Underlying both is a general dissatisfaction with the current state of things.
Social media is overflowing with advice aimed at helping people change. This advice taps into a deep feeling of discontent that is constantly lurking in the background of most people’s lives. Unfortunately, no amount of outside advice will ever bring about the kind of permanent change that most people deeply desire.
Actual change must come from within.
The Greek philosopher Aristotle argued that what separates living from non-living things is the possession of an internal principle of motion and change. The ability to move ourselves towards The Good is in our nature.
Sometimes the failure to change is blamed on a lack of motivation or willpower. This idea is problematic because it assumes that how we act is always connected to how we feel. Genuine change requires severing the connection between what we do and what we feel, at least temporarily.
How we feel is primarily a product of who we are now. What we like and dislike, what we believe, what we value. If you want to truly change who you are and what you do everyday, then you should expect how you feel and how you act to come out of alignment at some point.
When our actions and feelings come out of alignment, change becomes difficult. This is why most people never actually change. They can’t see the value in carrying on when something feels too difficult.
This is a real problem. It is a deep problem.
A lot of money is made from the existence of this problem — from the inability of millions of people to ever overcome this problem.
Is there a solution?
The solution is not to be found in inspiration, motivation, or willpower, but in knowledge. Anything other than knowledge is too unstable to generate lasting change.
Knowledge secures truth.
Truth provides clarity.
Clarity provides purpose.
Purpose is what allows us to push through life’s difficulties and continue acting even when we feel resistance and pain.
Without knowledge, we lack clarity. Without clarity, we lack purpose. Without purpose, we cannot overcome the falsehood of our feelings.
In order to make knowledge possible, we must first look inward. We must examine and reexamine our beliefs, our values, and our worldview.
We must question ourselves.
There is no greater resistance a human being can face than the resistance they face in questioning themselves.
I like a lot the logical flow of this piece, except one point. I got a bit lost in logic here: "If you want to truly change, then you should expect how you feel and how you act to come out of alignment. [...] When our actions and feelings come out of alignment, change becomes difficult"
I think these two sentences contradict each other...or not? Maybe rephrase, or explain?