Chapter 10 Searching for the new

No matter who you are, what your purpose is, what your responsibilities are, or what you like or dislike, the search for the new element must be mandatory and constant. Throughout life, each person tends to seek comfort, eliminate what went wrong, and stick to activities they know and where they won't encounter unpleasant surprises. When something bad happens in a familiar activity, they simply throw it away with the other eliminated activities without taking anything into account. Do you find yourself here too? Do you know how many things you haven't done because of unpleasant situations?

Essentially, it's not a benefit, it's not a correction of an error, it's a punishment. You punished yourself in the formula now, you're never allowed to do that again. Okay, your expression was more elegant: rather than doing this, I'd rather do anything else. Who knows what could happen this time. If it happens the same way as last time…

It's time to forgive yourself. It's time to realize that every adventure is completely unrepeatable. It's time to trust yourself. I'll give you an example, but I ask you to do exactly as I ask you, because it's part of the treatment. Fill a bottle with boiling water. Tighten the cork tightly so it doesn't spill. Wrap the bottle in a towel and hold it on your abdomen for a few minutes. While it takes effect, we'll continue our reasoning about the new one. Be very careful not to burn yourself and still enjoy the warmth.

Let's get back to forgiveness. Forgiveness is within your reach and only you can grant it. Inner peace starts from here. From the balance between the forces existing within you, and this is done only through forgiveness and acceptance. Take a piece of paper, write on it the mistakes you've made over time and then burn it and accept yourself, love yourself and forgive yourself. When the paper has completely burned, don't even remember about past mistakes. Let it always be a closed subject.

After you have made peace with yourself, think about what you haven't done for the reasons you have established. Did you enjoy those forbidded activities? Did they have an element of novelty, of unpredictability? Any element of novelty makes new connections in your brain in the great learning process that should last a lifetime. After you have gone through a new situation and already gained an experience, you have completed the necessary tasks (for better or worse). The more intense the new experience was, the stronger you have registered a solution and an adaptation technique.

Repeat the new experience a few times or dozens of times and you will notice that things enter into a reflex and in slight monotony. Repeat it a few more times or dozens of times and you are already bored with the activity that was once new and enjoyable. You know that's true, right? Then why do you doubt that reliving a traumatic experience a few times or dozens of times will not follow the same path? To change from trauma to disgust, monotony and at some point boredom. Once you have gone through the experience you have already acquired the qualities to go through it. The second time you already know what to expect, there are no more surprises that appear and catch you off guard. Are you waiting for the right answer? In fact you are only thinking about the bad part of the trauma, you accentuate the suffering and diminish your patience. You accentuate the torment and diminish your power to fight and overcome. Yes, you could certainly have handled it better, you could have found a better solution. However, you handled it and now you can tell the story. If you hadn't handled as you did then, you wouldn't be reading these lines now. In fact, you don't trust yourself anymore, do you? You don't trust that you can handle it if that situation arises again. Since then and until now you have accumulated knowledge, reflexes, experience. So you know more, you have more experience and yet you think that the person back then was a better version than you are now. Do you understand where the error is?

Let's go back to the hot water bottle for a moment. You can look at it and be proud of yourself. Why? Because it's proof that you trust yourself. It's a bottle that contains a hot liquid that is dangerous for your body. You were always aware of the danger but you never doubted yourself while handling it. You knew you wouldn't pull the plug because you trusted yourself. You knew you would remove it if it burned you too much because you trusted yourself to protect yourself. So you only thought about the heat it was emitting and you didn't think: will I protect myself? You should be proud of yourself and you should understand that you have great confidence in yourself. There are so many things that you do because you trust in yourself and they seem easy. The scalded water bottle says so much. For example, your fears are actually preparation thoughts. You think about a situation to eliminate variables and elements that can surprise you. You can choose not to think and say – I can handle it when it happens, if it happens or you can charge yourself negatively thinking over and over again about future situations. The bottle glass is hot and will burn you if you put your hand on it, however, if it burns you too much you can raise your hand and stop the discomfort. If the glass were to break and you were burned, the pain would not compare to the slight burn you feel when you put your hand on the glass. When it breaks, you would no longer be able to stop the pain, suffering, discomfort. The same is with negative thoughts. It is useless to maintain a thought about suffering so that it does not shock you when it happens. The burning of the thought will never compare to the accomplished fact. So it is useless to prepare for a difficult situation that may happen. Nothing compares to reality, what you will feel then, the pain, the suffering. Thinking about what will happen is just a waste of time and energy and a negative charge.

I have known people who were terrified of losing their loved ones. They tried to distance themselves from them so they wouldn't suffer so much then. I told them: why do you put the hand on the hot bottle every day? Do you think that you are preparing for the moment when the bottle breaks ? Are you giving up the memories that you can still build today with your loved ones for nothing? It's nothing because no matter what you do, you will suffer then and that suffering can't be compared to anything. Instead of living each day, you wait for the difficulties and problems. And guess what: they will come, you will suffer, you will fight, you will get up or you will fall. But only then and not now. A dear animated film said: yesterday is history, tomorrow is a mystery but today is a gift. That is why it is called present.

The bottle system can be applied to many negative thoughts. Maybe even to all of them if you consider that through your actions you tighten or loosen the cork. Do you smoke? With each cigarette you loosened the cork a little more. Do you exercise? Did the cork tighten a little more. Do you eat junk food? You loosened the cork again. You follow a preventive regimen – you tightened the cork again. Just remember that you can loosen the cork until it comes off the thread and then you scald yourself. And you can't know how much thread is left until it falls off…

Apply to fears of various diseases. If the cork fell off, it means you got sick. If you tightened the cork, it means that the chances of getting sick decrease. Say what worries you and see how you can tighten the cork and on the other hand what you do to loosen the cork.

The good part is that you trust yourself. You demonstrated this to me after going through the boiling water bottle experience. If you trust yourself, then you have to try new things. New things can be good or bad depending on the angle you look at them, but all, absolutely all, bring you benefits in learning, adaptation and knowledge.

Human being is like a piece of clay. The more you chew it, push it, press it, the more elastic and manageable it becomes. The proper definition : adaptable. On the contrary, if you don't expose it and hold it without doing anything, it becomes hard, rigid. Life has a habit of hitting you. You know this and if you don't know then you will find out. If you hit a piece of hardened clay, it will break into pieces. If you hit soft and elastic clay, it will only change its shape but will not break. What is important in life is how many hits you can absorb and get up after. If you break into pieces, it becomes impossible to get back.

This is the role of the new in your life. Only this prepares you for the shocks that come, only this makes you stronger. Because strength is in flexibility and adaptation. Seeking the new requires effort, requires trust in yourself and is in conflict with comfort. Comfort is the fear of losing what you have, extended through negative attempts at everything you have. You don't lose what you had, you change. You change yourself to a better version. To what extent? that is your choice in the great nature of creation. Do not hesitate to set out on the path that has been laid out for you. It is an unknown path because all your decisions change it every moment, but it is a beautiful path.

Facing the new requires courage, it requires taking risks. You can end up in good or bad situations, but if you don't try, you have no way of finding out. What does the new mean anyway? The experiences of the new are of two categories: the unique and unexplored new and the forgotten new. The forgotten new refers to what you were doing many years ago and over time you forgot, you refused to remember for various reasons. Giving up the recording of your memory is like giving up a part of yourself. Let's say a small part but still a part of you. Physically would you give up something of yourself? a finger or maybe a nail? I suppose the answer is no. Then why don't you make the choice to keep your whole mind too? Why give up a part of yourself? the advantage of the forgotten new is that not many new variables appear, you don't make many scenarios about what might happen. Because it is a known activity although forgotten. As a little parenthesis: when thinking about what can happen wrong in a activity did you ever tried to look for anything that could happen good in that activity ? I am sure you have tried to imagine everything that could happen badly but have you looked for the other option? Try, especially in the situation of the absolutely new and unexplored. Outside is a world full of opportunities, beauties and mysteries or outside is a world full of dangers, of misery, actually refers to the same thing the same world. In fact it is not a thing but a report. It is a report of the world seen through your eyes. You do not realize that you are negatively charged and that is why you see the dangers greater than the benefits. You see the glass empty instead of seeing that it is half full.

You need maybe positive energy balancing that we have discussed in previous chapters. You have to fight all the time against negativity. Other people will try to pull you into the darkness with them, but you must remain in the light. Light means balance between positive and negative. To do this, you must become aware of everything you experience and divide the negative into one side and the positive into the other. Separately, you must establish a set of positive things that charge you when you need, and here is where we find the true role of hobbies, of passions. What you like to do the most charges you positively and balances the negative-positive ratio. You will notice that I refer to the term balancing. This implies not only doing activities that you like because the imbalance can also be achieved by too much positive over negative. If it seems strange, let's continue the reasoning to clarify.

If you only do what you like and energize you, you will quickly or slowly transform the activity from energizing to monotonous, boring and neutral. Without the joy of waiting and always in the same state of mind, also by always repeating the activity you will ruin a wonderful and energetic thing. Maybe you remember with how much joy you used to wait for the vacation when you were at school. Do you know why the vacation was so beautiful? Because there was school. If there was no school, the vacation became something permanent in which you didn't have much to do and which bored you. Also, do you know how water taste when you are really thirsty? If you always have water to drink, it doesn't seem to have any taste, right? Try walking for a few hours and thinking that you don't have water with you - mental preparation is everything. You think about what you want and the longer the wait, the greater the taste when it finally comes true. All things follow the same circle. If you didn't see clear skies for a few days, you would appreciate the sun and the blue when it reappears. If you only had clear skies, you would look at it bored and uninterested. The truth is that without the negative you cannot accentuate the positive.

Let's get back to energetic activity. Now you understand why it is good to enjoy it in limited quantities and from time to time. It is also good to see the negative in order to appreciate the positive. You must constantly worry about this positive/negative balance, especially for the sad or pseudo-sad side that attracts you. I say pseudo-sad because in fact sadness is the moment of recovery after a suffering that made you stronger. Your subconscious knows this, which is why it understands it as a rebirth.

And the requirement for rebirth appears when you have closed a circle of activities and you no longer do new ones. When everything in your life is repeated and the activities no longer give you any satisfaction. Here is an important point for eliminating the depressive loop. If you add the fear of new activities to the indifference to all/old activities, then you will wonder why you are still living. As if you have actually experienced everything and done everything. But you have not experienced everything. On the contrary, here you lie about new activities as if in fact what could be different and that they are all the same. In fact, you avoid practicing it because you are afraid of losing and risk losing yourself. This negative state is still a state of intense consciousness in which you are as a human being searching for answers and objectives. The state of intense consciousness is achieved by your body in order to balance the spirit. As I said, you see better, hear better, feel better and yet you do not use your senses. You do not realize that emphasizing the senses changes everything. It makes the sky more colorful, more beautiful, the smells more intense or subtle, the sounds more playful. It is actually the new forgotten but in a different form. It is a kind of new recolored. It was always there but had other, more faded colors, a different scent and maybe a different shape.

However, it is easy to get out of this loop. You just have to try something really new. You choose and do it without thinking twice. You only have to think once because ultimately memories are created by your decisions. So it is recommended that you think once before you do it.

Another joy that is available to you to make the new forgotten is to learn. You learn something new about a tree you pass by. How it blooms, how it bears fruit, how it pollinates or if you can make a tea from its flowers, maybe the bark heals your wounds or if there are several trees you learn that if one is attacked then they all secrete defensive substances. And then you start to wonder if the tree is really alive and if it is alive can I talk to it? Ask it what it is like to be a tree? Is the wind whispering through the leaves or did the tree answer? You are not far from the truth, you can talk to a tree but it remains that the tree also wants to talk to you. Maybe it prefers to be silent and observe you for a while. Why? Because it does not know you. If a stranger comes to you and starts telling you a lot of things, do you start talking to him as if you knew him? The tree may also need time. Time to get to know you. Time to listen to you. After a while, it may want to talk to you. You can only find out all this if you try. So I found a new activity – talk to a tree every day. Maybe at some point it will answer you ….

If you are thinking about doing this but are holding back thinking about what your friends would say if they saw you doing this, maybe you don't have the right friends. Maybe you should evaluate them to see if they are your friends or acquaintances or just people you know. Because a friend cares about you, tries to help you and understand you. If you told them that you are going to talk to a tree, they would probably ask why? If you answered that talking to a tree calms you down, then that would be enough for a friend.

When doing a new activity, people usually prefer to go accompanied by someone they know. Out of fear but also out of sharing the experience. It's good but it's also bad. In fact, this is the perfect element that encompasses both negative and positive. So , take a friend with you to that activity but be careful that if you take the same friend to all the activities you are actually building walls against others. Walls also have two perspectives: they keep others away from you but if you look closely the walls are actually keeping you closed.

You still build a castle with high walls but don't forget to build doors and windows. Let your soul and heart be seen. It helps you to be free and to do what you feel and what you want. Because walls are made out of fear and for protection. If you allow access then you are not just letting them in but letting them out as well. This actually makes you the master of the castle and not its prisoner.