Chapter 0

Later on in the book, you will get a better understanding of why I wrote Chapter Zero. The state you are in while reading this book highly influences how you experience and interpret it. This is the case for a lot of things in life. How efficiently you study, for example, is strongly dependent on how focused you are at that moment. Writing this book, I made everything very concise. If right now you are in a state where you find it easy to absorb and reflect upon new information, taking small breaks from reading on a regular basis can help maintain focus. If you aren’t fully ‘in the zone’, I would advise to pick up the book at a later time.

Chapter 01: Do We Speak The Same Language

When we speak, we subconsciously assume that the thoughts and emotions we evoke in others are similar to those that are unique to our own experience. This misunderstanding is exacerbated when we use loaded concepts such as God, love or truth. As a result, people often have endless conversations where they talk past each other and end up disagreeing on things they don’t disagree on at all and vice versa.

That is why I wanted to address this early on in the book. Depending on how good I am at writing, I can avoid miscommunication. But since English is not my native language, I wanted to explain the mechanisms so you can also be part of this process. The best way to understand what someone is trying to say is by first listening without bias and by trying to see things from the other person’s perspective. Being aware of this in conversations can also enable you to explain yourself more clearly, as you’ll tend to use the other person’s framework to get your ideas across. Applying this every day and always seeking to adapt and improve when it comes to putting thoughts into words can drastically impact your social and professional life as well as expand your self-knowledge. This is a skill that takes time and practice as thoughts always start off as vague and abstract. Being able to put thoughts into words defines how we present ideas and beliefs to others but also how we give structure to our own thinking. Sharing ideas by using relatable examples can help and is often one of the better ways to get your points across.

Chapter 02: Questioning Our Truth

It can be profoundly confusing to grasp the concept that there is no such a thing as an absolute truth. It is impossible to know whether your experience of reality is a simulation, a dream or a hallucination since seeing a 3rd party’s point of view as an objective truth is an assumption within your frame of reference. This can sound counter-intuitive at first but the world you experience would not exist without you. Fully understanding this concept can restructure the brain to be less attached and more capable of rationally evaluating different beliefs.

The problem with seeing even our own existence as an absolute truth is that we have to assume that time and space objectively exist. Surprisingly, this is a point of quite some debate in science and there are phenomena that violate our intuitive understandings of them. When there is strong evidence, scientists consider a theory to be true, but only within our current knowledge or understanding of it. You don’t have to to take my word for it, questioning everything I bring up in this book is a good mental exercise that will help you correct flaws within socially conditioned beliefs.

I try to be very empirical and construct logical arguments that are based on the assumptions I deem likely, such as what I read in reliable scientific papers. Emotionally, it is very appealing to believe in absolute truths and most people tend to avoid or reject confrontational ideas because their gut feeling tells them to do so. But erroneous certainties can hold people back or lock them into beliefs that may be illogical or even harmful. Unfortunately, these beliefs are most often created by rationalizing around conclusions and decisions after they’ve already been made. And even though these automatic mechanisms are natural, we also have the ability to override them with self-awareness. Some might wonder why that even matters if, either way, there are no certainties without absolute truths. But instead of thinking with certainties, it is more accurate to think in probabilities. This is perhaps the most important insight I have learned from how scientists approach the smallest building blocks of our world. Our entire universe is made of quanta such as electrons and photons that all behave probabilistically rather than deterministically. Ultimately, anything is possible and answering any yes or no question with “there is a chance” is actually factually correct. As much as we’d love to believe in absolute truths, real answers will always lie in probabilities and approximations.

Chapter 03: Conditioning How Deep Does The Rabbit Hole Go

When people think about conditioning, the overall perception is that it influences our actions but we are still in control. We have the tendency to ignore the impact of our environment when we look at ourselves and take many processes that have been fundamental to our development for granted. This ranges from the language we speak to how we define concepts or even the emotions we experience when we think about things. This then translates into our body language, our intonations and ultimately the culture we feel part of. All these processes are in one way or another conditioned and being aware of this can highly increase the control we have over ourselves.

There is an endless number of examples that can be given in relation to this topic and many of these can sound mind-blowing and hard to believe at times. Yet, these dynamics define our everyday interactions and decisions more than our own perceived level of control. Most of our actions and thoughts happen subconsciously and conditioning lays down the foundation of these processes as we grow up. We accept them as part of our identity and personalize them so we feel unique and special. Our sense of self has little to do with how we perceive it and more with how we have been moulded by our environment. I found that neuroscience provides the best framework to master the self. Expanding on this, the following five chapters will be more scientific and less personal.

Chapter 04: The Brain & Neuroplasticity

The human brain is a network of approximately one hundred billion neurons. Different experiences create different neural connections and these bring about different emotions. Depending on which neurons get stimulated, certain connections will become stronger and more effective while others may become weaker. This is referred to as neuroplasticity. Someone who trains to be a musician will create stronger neural connections that link the two hemispheres of the brain in order to be musically creative. Virtually any sort of talent or skill can be created through training. Rüdiger Gamm for example, who was a self-admitted hopeless student, used to fail at basic math and went on to train his abilities to become a famous mental calculator, capable of performing extremely complex mathematics.

Rationality and emotional resilience work the same way, these are neural connections that can be strengthened. But this also applies to negative thinking. It's possible to have two elderly people who may have had similar lives, yet one person is perfectly happy while the other is very unhappy and has a negative view on the same things. Everything depends on which neurons they have been stimulating throughout their lives. Whatever you are doing at any time, you are physically modifying your brain to become better at it.

Since this is such a fundamental mechanism of the brain, being self-aware can greatly enrich our life experience.

Chapter 05: Social Neuroscience

Specific neurons and neurotransmitters such as nor-epinephrine, trigger a state that can be described as having an active ego when we feel that our own thoughts have to be protected from the influence of others. If we are then confronted with differences in opinion, the chemicals that are released in the brain are the same ones that try to ensure our survival in dangerous situations. Sometimes debates go on endlessly because people keep expressively resisting differences in opinion. When we're in a defensive state, the more primitive part of the brain interferes with our rational thinking and the limbic system can even knock out most of our working memory, physically causing narrow mindedness. We see this in the politics of fear, the strategy of poker players or simply when people feel defensive and stubborn in discussions. No matter how valuable an idea is, the brain has trouble processing it when it is in such a state. On a neural level, it reacts as if our life is being threatened, even if the threat comes from harmless opinions or even facts that we may otherwise find helpful and could rationally agree on.

But when we express ourselves and our views are appreciated, these defense chemicals decrease in the brain and dopamine neurotransmission activates the reward neurons, making us feel empowered and increasing our self-esteem. Our beliefs have a profound impact on our body chemistry, this is why placebos are so effective. Self-esteem or self-belief is closely linked to the neurotransmitter serotonin. A relative imbalance of it often leads to depression, self-destructive behaviour or even suicide. Social invalidation is the primary cause of this while validation has the opposite effect: Social validation increases the levels of dopamine and serotonin in the brain and allows us to let go of emotional fixations and become self-aware more easily.

Chapter 06: Mirror Neurons & Consciousness

Social psychology often looks at the basic human need to fit in and calls this the normative social influence. When we grow up, our moral and ethical compass is almost entirely forged by our environment, so our actions are often a result of the validation we get from society.

But new developments in neuroscience are giving us a better understanding of culture and identity. Recent neurological research has confirmed the existence of empathetic mirror neurons. When we experience an emotion or perform an action, specific neurons fire. But when we observe someone else performing this action or when we imagine it, many of the same neurons will fire again as if we were performing the action ourselves. These empathy neurons connect us to other people, allowing us to feel what others feel. Since these neurons respond to our imagination, we can experience emotional feedback from them as if it came from someone else. This system is what allows us to self-reflect.

The mirror neuron doesn't know the difference between it and others and is the reason why we are so dependent of social validation and want to fit in. We are in a constant duality between how we see ourselves and how others see us. This can result in low self-esteem or a craving for attention as well as feeling that no one understands us or the urge to act against our own intentions for the validation of others.

Scans show that we experience these negative emotions even before we are aware of them. But when we are self-aware, we can alter misplaced emotions because we control the thoughts that cause them. This is a neurochemical consequence of how memories become labile when retrieved and are restored through protein synthesis. Self-observing profoundly changes the way our brain works. It activates the self-regulating neocortical regions which give us an incredible amount of control over our feelings. Every time we do this, our rationality and emotional resilience are strengthened. But when we're not being self-aware, most of our thoughts and actions are impulsive and the idea that we are randomly reacting and not making conscious choices can be instinctively frustrating. The brain resolves this by creating explanations for our behaviour and physically rewriting it into our memories, making us believe that we were in control of our actions. This is called backward rationalization and it leaves most of our negative emotions unresolved and ready to be triggered at any time. They become a constant fuel to our confusion as our brain will keep trying to justify why we behaved irrationally.

All of this complex and almost schizophrenic subconscious behaviour is the result of a vastly parallel distributed system in our brain. There is no specific center of consciousness, the appearance of a unity is in fact each of these separate circuits being enabled and being expressed at one particular moment in time.

Our experiences are constantly changing our neural connections, physically altering the parallel system that is our consciousness. Direct modifications to this can have surreal consequences that bring into question what and where consciousness really is.

If your left cerebral hemisphere for example were to be disconnected from the right, as is the case in split brain patients, you would be able to speak, talk and think normally from the left hemisphere while your right hemisphere would have very limited cognitive capacities. Your left brain will not miss the right part, even though this profoundly changes your perception. One consequence of this is that you can no longer describe the right half of someone's face. But you’ll never mention it, you’ll never see it as a problem or even realize that something has changed. Since this affects more than just your perception of the real world and also applies to your mental images, it is not just a sensory problem but a fundamental change in your consciousness.

Chapter 07: Our Will is in The Neurons

Each neuron has a voltage, which can change when ions flow in or out of the cell. Once a neuron's voltage has reached a certain level, it will fire an electrical signal to other cells, repeating the process. When many neurons fire at the same time, we measure these changes in the form of a wave.

Brainwaves underpin almost everything going on in our minds, including memory, attention and even intelligence. As they oscillate at different frequencies, they get classified in bands called alpha, theta, beta and gamma, each associated with a different task. Brainwaves allow brain cells to tune in to the frequency corresponding to their particular task while ignoring irrelevant signals in a similar way as a radio homes in on different waves to pick up radio stations, since the transfer of information between neurons is enhanced when their activity is synchronized. These mechanisms also give rise to cognitive dissonance, the frustration caused by simultaneously holding two contradictory ideas. Our will is merely the drive to reduce dissonance between each of our active neural circuits.

Evolution can be seen as the same process, where nature tries to adapt or resonate with reality. By doing so, it evolved to a point where it became self-aware and started to question itself. When a person faces the paradox of wanting purpose while thinking that human existence is meaningless, cognitive dissonance occurs. Throughout history this has led many to reach for spiritual and religious guidance, challenging science as it failed to give answers to existential questions such as why or what am I?

Chapter 08: Who or What Am I

The left cerebral hemisphere is largely responsible for creating a coherent belief system in order to maintain a sense of continuity towards our own lives. New experiences get folded into the preexisting belief system. When they don't fit, they are simply denied.

To counterbalance this, the right cerebral hemisphere has the opposite tendency. Whereas the left hemisphere tries to preserve the model, the right hemisphere is constantly challenging the status quo. When the discrepant anomalies become too large, the right hemisphere forces a revision in our worldview or belief system. However, when our beliefs are too strong, the right hemisphere may not succeed in overriding our denial.

This can create a profound confusion when mirroring others. When the neural connections that physically define our belief system are not strongly developed or active, then our consciousness, the unity of all the separate active circuits at that moment, is going to consist mainly of activity related to our mirror neurons. Just as when we experience hunger, our consciousness consists mainly of other neural interactions for consuming food. This is not the result of a core self giving commands to different cerebral areas, all the different parts of the brain become active and inactive and interact without a core. Just as the pixels on a screen can express themselves as a recognizable image when in unity, the convergence of neural interaction expresses itself as consciousness. At every moment, we are in fact a different image, a different entity when mirroring, when hungry, when reading this text. Every second we become a different person as we go through different states. When we are mirroring, we may construct the idea of identity. But if we observe ourselves with our scientific understandings, we see something completely different.

The extent to which our neural activity brings about our consciousness, which creates our sense of reality, goes far beyond our current concept of the self. The separation we perceive between our environment and ourselves is only a conceptual practicality that we use to make sense of things. This is not a hypothetical philosophy, it’s a logical consequence of how everything we experience, external or internal, takes place within our consciousness from a neural activity point of view. Seeing the concept of the self as merely yourself excluding the environment is a misconception. This is even reflected in our super-organismal features through evolution, where our survival as individual primates relied on our collective abilities. Over time, the neocortical regions evolved to permit the modulation of primitive instincts and the overriding of hedonistic impulses for the benefit of the group. Our selfish genes have come to promote reciprocal social behaviours in super-organismal structures, discarding the notion of survival of the fittest. The brain’s neural activity resonates most coherently when there’s no dissonance between these advanced new cerebral regions and the more primitive ones. ‘Selfish tendencies’ is a narrow intellectual interpretation of what self-serving behaviour entails wherein human characteristics are perceived through the flawed paradigm of identity instead of what we are, a momentary expression of an ever-changing unity with no center.

The psychological consequences of this as a more objective belief system allow self-awareness without attachment to the imagined self and brings about dramatic increases in mental clarity, social conscience, self-regulation and what’s often described as being in the moment.

The common cultural belief has mostly been that we need a narrative to establish moral values. But with our current understandings of the empathic and social nature of the brain, we understand that a purely scientific view with no attachment to our identity or story yields a far more accurate, meaningful and ethical paradigm than our anecdotal values.

This is logical since our traditional tendency to define ourselves as imaginary individualistic constants neurally wires and designs the brain towards dysfunctional cognitive processes, such as labeling and the psychological need to impose expectations. Practical labeling underpins most forms of interaction in our daily lives. But by psychologically labeling the self as internal and the environment as external, we constrain our own neurochemical processes and experience a deluded disconnection. Growth and its evolutionary side-effects, such as happiness and fulfillment, are stimulated when we’re not being labeled in our interactions. We may have many different views and disagree with one another in practical terms, but interactions that accept us for who we are without judgment are neuropsychological catalysts that wire the human brain to acknowledge others and share ideas without dissonance.

Stimulating this type of neural activity and interaction alleviates the need for distraction or entertainment and creates cycles of socially constructive behaviour in our environment. Sociologists have established that phenomena such as obesity, smoking, emotions and ideas spread and ripple through society in much the same way that electric signals of neurons are transferred when their activity is synchronized. In a sense, we are a global network of neurochemical reactions and the self-amplifying cycle of acceptance and acknowledgment, sustained by the daily choices in our interactions, is a chain reaction that defines our collective ability to overcome imagined differences and look at life in the grand scheme of things.

Chapter 09: Free Will & Quantum Mechanics

Through quantum mechanics, I have learned to see reality differently and approach all things as probabilities instead of certainties. In a mathematical sense, anything is possible. As well as in science as in our daily lives, the extent to which we can calculate or figure out probabilities is determined by our intellectual ability to recognize patterns. The less biased we are, the clearer we can identify patterns and base our actions on reasonable probabilities. Since it’s in our nature to deny ideas that do not fit into our current paradigm, the more attached we are to our beliefs, the less able we are to make conscious choices for ourselves. By observing this process, we can expand our awareness and free will.

It is said that wisdom comes with age, but with openness and skepticism, the key principles of the scientific method, we don’t need a lifetime of trial and error to sort out which of our convictions may be improbable. The question is not whether our beliefs are right or wrong, but whether or not being emotionally attached to them will benefit us.

It is hard to speak of a free choice when you are emotionally attached to a belief system. The moment we are self-aware enough to realize this, we can let go and calculate the real odds of what will benefit us the most.

Chapter 10: What Now

The insights in this book are based on current research and just as much as our understanding of the world has changed throughout time, these insights and understandings that determine our actions can also change through time. With the Internet, it is easy to scrutinize the information presented. This is important as it keeps you adjusted to reality and allows you to calibrate towards the better version of yourself. I like this metaphor, because having your best self as a framework is a very practical and realistic measuring tool to compare yourself with. It is unique to each person without having to generalize what is best for people to do. Ideally, you want to align your actions with the best version of yourself at any time. It is better to define this best version based on scientific findings rather than emotional attachments. For example, if you don’t mind smoking, yet you know it is better for you not to, then you could acknowledge that a better version of yourself wouldn’t smoke. The same would apply to other habits you would consider to be bad. The extent to which you can overcome these bad habits will greatly define your personal growth.

Chapter 11: Where Do I Start

Gaining control is a process that takes time and practice, just as getting in shape requires you to work out. Changing your state of mind to being more rational and present requires regular stimulation of the neural pathways responsible for bolstering reason.

How to go about it most effectively varies from person to person, so this list is more of a guideline. What is most effective is not always what works best on paper, but rather what works best for you. From my personal experience, the habits that require the least effort are the ones that are adopted the quickest. The easiest one I can think of is taking the right supplements. All it takes is ordering them and taking them regularly. Vitamin D3 at times when you don’t have a lot of exposure to sun can help a lot. Other supplements that are good to take include omega-3 and vitamin B-complex. This is what has worked best for me, but shouldn’t be seen as a universal example. The effect of supplements and food is different for each person. I also take noopept, a popular nootropic, in combination with citicoline, which has highly improved the quality of my sleep. Depending on your lifestyle, these supplements might be more or less effective. Drinking coffee on a regular basis for example can greatly diminish the effects you experience from stimulating supplements.

Next on the list is working out, probably the most important one when I base myself on the feedback of my viewers. I know that healthy eating habits and a well-balanced diet can have an even bigger impact, but I am mainly looking at the habits that have the best chances to ripple throughout all aspects of your life. Everyone for example knows that eating healthily is good for you, yet it isn’t something many people are aware of in their daily lives. Working out, on the other hand, has proven to be a great stepping stone towards an overall healthier lifestyle. That is why I mention it so early on, it helps you be more in control as it produces a better blood flow to the brain, resulting in mental clarity and increased self-confidence.

I know many might not have the will to go out and exercise even if they would want to. If you can’t find the energy to do so, finding a friend to do it together with can help. If you can’t think of anyone, my suggestion would be to use the Internet. If you live in the U.S. for example, you have websites like exercisefriends.com that allow people to connect for these types of activities. Working out is a big catalyst for a lot of other positive lifestyle changes and that is why, for people who don’t work out, the chances of taking up the advice is lower than for those who do.

Next up is surrounding yourself with people that inspire you rather than inhibit you. Not everyone has this choice, but the extent to which you are able to do so can have far-reaching consequences throughout your life. Some people go through the biggest life changes by just not hanging out with the wrong people anymore, which can be more impactful than any other advice I could give you. It is important to be aware and remind yourself that your environment is a big part of who you are. If you still live with your parents for example, becoming financially independent so you can live by yourself can be a big step towards intellectual independence. The majority of people grow the most the moment they have to make their own decisions and take responsibility for them. If you are still young and moving out is not possible yet, compromising in order to keep the peace while you are in this phase of your life would be my general advice.

Next up is eating habits. Avoiding consumption of refined sugar is one of the most impactful steps I can think of. This relates to soda, cookies, candy or even fruit juice. Drinking mainly water and avoiding alcohol, coffee and especially sugary drinks will be hard at first but as you get used to it, your quality of life will improve significantly. Same applies to the consumption of meat or dairy products. Most of this advice is supported by, among others, the World Health Organization and doing your own research into these topics can help you understand more of the dangers and benefits. Be aware that all gut flora is different and whether a specific diet is better or worse varies from person to person and the examples I have given so far are quite general. Eating food that is easy to digest can also help as well as preparing the food with fresh vegetables and taking your time when eating. I learned that proper posture and taking my time has taken care of many of my own stomach issues due to my high paced lifestyle. I do know this is not applicable to all settings but to me it was definitely worth it. Even if it required me to adapt my eating habits, it has made me more effective as it helps me feel better and think more clearly.

Next up is the importance of making time. I just mentioned it when it comes to diet but, when applied to all aspects of your life, it can clear up a lot of mental clutter. Self-reflection and meditation can also be useful in these regards. For many people I know, meditation has changed their lives. Apps like Buddhify, mainly the gratitude meditation in the sleeping category, set me at ease before falling asleep. These mental noise reduction habits add up in the long run when practiced regularly. They require already some level of awareness and that is why I haven’t mentioned them earlier.

Last but not least is ensuring quality of sleep. Although this one ends up falling into place when adopting all these other habits that lower stress.

There are many self-help books that explain how to motivate yourself in doing all of this and while they sometimes work, I decided to focus more on the underlying dynamics that give you control.

Chapter 12: Why Do You Want What You Want

We live in a heavily consumption-focused culture where having more and more is associated with success. So when people think about what they want, a lot of the time they want more than what they already have. You can wonder to which extent this is your own free choice if what you want is heavily conditioned by your environment. Analyzing the concept of freedom and evaluating how much it applies to us rather than letting it be defined by our conditioning allows us to reflect on our actions more consciously. But as long as we feel entitled, we have a hard time seeing our choices for what they are. We will more easily backwards rationalize to make it fit within our current paradigm since our will is mainly the drive to reduce the dissonance within our neural activity.

Depending on what neural networks are active, your needs change all the time. A good salesman for example knows exactly which parts in our brain he has to activate to make us want something we don’t want at all. This is just one example of how our perception of free choice is something we tend to rationalize afterwards. Self-awareness allows us to put our decisions in a larger context where our needs are perceived through a wider lens, allowing us to make more accurate decisions. This is probably one of the more powerful insights in this book. For example, there is no wealth in the world that you could want that would be more valuable than what you already have. Realizing this may make you value what you have a lot more.

This is quite present in spiritual beliefs such as eastern philosophy and can still be relevant in today's society. Not taking what you have for granted will benefit you more than the excitement from acquiring superficial things and will result in a more fulfilling and minimalist lifestyle. We still have more luxury than kings or queens a thousand years ago so it is just a matter of perspective. That is one reason why the gratitude meditation is so helpful to me. As times change and society gets more and more wealthy, the real richness comes from within.

Chapter 13: What Do I Genuinely Want

When you strip your self from all the noise and replace your concept of identity with a clear view on your core self, you achieve a state of clarity with little conflict that I could best describe as a choiceless awareness. What matters at that point is merely what makes sense and becomes similar for everyone. It may express itself differently from person to person but as the laws of physics are the same for all of us, they also equally underpin the processes of our biology. This can be illustrated by how two individuals growing up together are able to learn the same language. We are very alike and that is why applying reason to shared knowledge brings about similar action. In the end, what we really want comes down to understanding what we are. And most of these answers can be deduced from our biology. The urge to reproduce, for example, evolved into our need to find a partner. Figuring out how to connect our biological purpose to our actions is what matters. And since there is a clear line to be drawn from stardust evolving to us we just need to follow up on that to understand our design. It explains why we are here and is wired into every single cell. These are the same patterns that allowed stardust to ultimately question itself. When looking at these existential questions such as the meaning of life, we do so through our own subjective lens. We come up with personalized answers just as we come up with rationalizations to understand our emotions. But it is only by having perspective and looking at ourselves from a bigger picture, a grander scheme, that we can really pinpoint the answers. Understanding this will bring about a clear and scientific moral compass with values that transcend esoteric and spiritual beliefs.

Chapter 14: Practical Application

If we apply logic and reason to our insights in order to determine our actions, choiceless awareness arises. You simply do what you have to do. This can sound confusing but when considering all the input that reality presents to us, determining the best course of action is a process that becomes very linear. Even when presented with different choices that are similar, choosing one rather than being stuck is more effective. These choiceless moments are omnipresent in our life but we don’t experience them as such because we take them for granted. A mother taking care of her child for example, or having to go to the store to buy food are things we do naturally every day. Your actions flow out of your mindset without being paralyzed by the abundance of choice. Because if we look at things rationally and efficiently, much of the choices fade away. Acting upon common sense and adjusting these actions based on reality is a very simple mechanism we have lost track of, due to the overwhelming presence of distractions. You can see this with people in remote villages for example, who experience very little distractions as life is very simple to them. This then translates to more mental clarity and being in the moment.

Understanding the brain has been a big leap forward for humanity, however it takes time to propagate through society and to shape our psychological understandings of who we are. A lot of the insights in this book are based on recent studies and if it wasn’t for these, I wouldn’t be the person I am today. Nurturing your brain to be able to put these insights into practice is vital. The mind-body relationship I talk about in Chapter XI is an important stepping stone and knowing the importance of this relationship brings about quite some activities that people can start with today. What is even more important than knowing what to do is whether or not you will act upon it. The distance between knowing and doing can be substantial and it can take time for people to get there. From here on I will be digging more into practical topics. Coming back to these chapters from time to time can be quite beneficial. Hope you enjoyed it.

The first two topics aren’t as relevant as the ones that follow but I included them since they have been the ones most asked about on my livestream. Feel free to skip them.

Chapter 15: The Right Mindset

While it might not be clearly defined, when we take a moment to think about it, we all have subconscious core values that we feel most connected to. Core values differ from person to person and can range from freedom and family to money or religion. Since these subconscious beliefs define our actions, having a foundation that is solid and accurate will automatically result in more mental stability.

That is why having logic as your core value is the essence of this book, since reason is what gives us control over our otherwise impulsive decisions. Logic originates from the mathematical patterns that govern our reality and gives rise to the complex neural structures required for our thoughts and feelings to exist. Aligning our beliefs with these mathematical patterns creates a paradigm with little contradiction. All we need to do to reduce our inner conflict is to find out how to make sense of it within the context of our present reality.

On a fundamental level, realizing that your beliefs are the ones that are flawed rather than you leads to a higher level of mental clarity and relief. All our fears and uncertainties suddenly become logical since we have the ability to explain them using neuroscience. Instead of creating dysfunctional beliefs or beating ourselves over our thoughts or emotions, we can come to acceptance or understand the causes behind the conflict.

This makes sense when we know that emotions emerge even before we are aware of them and only by applying reason to our knowledge we will be able to rewire neurally emotions in a more logical way, a process that takes time.

Defining the right mindset in a universal and accessible way has always been a big challenge for me. What has worked the best so far is boiling it down to four easy steps in which we adopt logic as our core value. This process must happen on a subconscious emotional level in order to replace the root of our current impulsive drive with an intuitive urge to be logical instead. This subconscious rewiring is within everyone’s ability and it has been the defining factor and common thread through all my achievements.