Self-improvement is embracing your messy, imperfect life

In my experience, attempting to self-improve your 'personality' in social terms or trying improve your physical appearance is the field where you end up with alot of people unnecessarily suffering and thinking their natural quirks make them somehow an inferior human being compared to say, a non-neurotic 'normal' kid. Or they start by thinking that their current personality is "not them" so they fight against themselves to attempt to become someone charismatic or witty or better at social situations. This many times ends up in severe mental illness, self-hate, anxiety, etc. In these situations, something along the lines of full self-acceptance is imo the right path- it naturally comes to most people, usually not in your teens, but in your late 20s and 30s.

Also, your self-worth should never be based on your social skills or personality, and this is where many quiet/introverted nerdy/smart young folks end up suffering alot in middle/highschool/college. I'm sure many of us realize how artificial the societies of school are after we enter the adult 'real' world. Your popularity seems like everything in highschool, and it may very well be, but you learn real fast how little it matters when you leave school. PG puts it well here in his essay "Why Nerds are Unpopular": http://www.paulgraham.com/nerds.html

In terms of self-improvement for things like your habits and work ethic where your self-esteem/confidence/personality isn't at play, and isn't the 'thing' you are trying to fix, I generally think it's not that big of deal to dislike your current way of life and not embrace yourself. Accepting laziness or whatnot is probably too compassionate for your own good.

> Literally everyone I know has PTSD as a result of this pandemic.

That seems a bit… extreme? PTSD is pretty serious. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Post-traumatic_stress_disord...

I know the pandemic is stressful, but to the point of flashbacks, nightmares, intrusive thoughts, panic attacks, significant avoidance behavior, etc. That’s a pretty tall claim.

"you’re perfect the way you are" and "acceptance" are poorly phrased and easily misunderstood.

As the article tried to explain, this is about making peace with ourselves and handle feelings of self-rejection, guilt, shame and so no.

Then the healing begins.

One of the main learnings in a meditative practice circles around this, and actually even more so in MBSR (Mindfulness Based Stress Reduction), an 8-week evidence-backed programme of approaches to life stress / pain.

The common misconception is that you clear your mind of thought when meditating - the reality is that you "watch the thinker", noticing when you have become captured by thought, and then attempting to spot how these thoughts make you feel.

What has this got to do with embracing an imperfect life? Well, everything - the aim of the practice is to be more in the moment, less about what has happened or will happen, less about memory or projection, and instead being in the only thing which is actually real - which is this moment right now. Further down this path is then attempting to spend less time striving, which of course sits centrally to Buddhism.

As humans we spend so, so much time away from now. We're literally "lost in thought" - chewing through old issues and "what if's", or striving to be That Other Guy, or just down an endless rabbithole of internet. Rationally and based on past experience, we know that we won't actually be happier if we get that new job / salary / wife / house - or we might be briefly, but the pleasure goes so quickly.. But: emotionally we're caught up in it all the time, and it takes practice to be just here, content with what we have, ok with all the rough bits, the gnarly bits, the unfinished to-do's, the fat stomach, the imperfect fitness habit, whatever.

Where it gets even more intense is that literally everything we see out there in the "modern" world is built precisely to make us more unhappy and less content. Less contentment creates more consumers. My car is fine, but I saw that ad and man, that thing is SO spangly, maybe I NEED IT... Your feeds are rammed to the hilt full of people posting about their perfect lives, their perfect meals, their perfect pets. No-one posts anything when they're miserable, covered in vomit, feeling sad. Everyone is head-down on their phones looking at "perfection" and failing to see the beauty of the sun setting right in front of them. And so it goes on - feeding an already in-built tension into an endless pressure to Be That Perfect Person.

I've found that taking a mindful approach doesn't negate ambition or personal development. It's just that if you feel content in your heart, in your core (which is what you start to get from a solid, self-aware, centred meditative practice), then those things are just waves - you can catch them and ride them as much as you want but the "ocean" - a feeling of centre - is always there to support you.

This also doesn't suggest that everything is perfect - it isn't. Some things need to be changed. Sometimes jobs are crap, relationships aren't worth saving. Sometimes you have to move on, and need that tension to impel you in a direction. But as an endless life force, seeking perfection (particularly through endless consumerism) is clearly the path that fools take. If we spend time practicing - through meditation, prayer, or whatever your contemplative medicine is - we can become more aware of how little time we spend just being, here and now, and when you notice that you can gently start to remedy things.