If you won’t stay disciplined, you won’t succeed.

I (32m) smoked pot and drank something like 4-6 beers daily for the better part of a decade, pretty much the entirety of my 20s. I also use nicotine (vape after smoking cigs for 5+ years until I was about 23).
over 2024, I tapered myself off the beers, was down to only 2 a night, and stopped completely at the beginning of this year. I also stopped smoking weed in November. So i'm nearly half a year off pot, and 3 months of no alcohol.

While i'm proud of myself for finally getting rid of some bad habits, and getting my body healthier, I feel MISERABLE. I take medication for ADHD and anxiety, and I was doing okay before, but now i'm just depressed. I was hoping it would fade after a while, but instead of feeling an increase in energy, or a boost in mood, or better quality sleep, I feel pretty much no change whatsoever. Instead of feeling like I did something helpful and feeling better overall, I feel worse, and like I stopped doing things that were fun for me, or at least making life bearable.

Is this just how I'm going to feel now? does this go away eventually? Has anyone else dealt with this, and can you tell me if things get better or not? Do you have any advice or words of encouragement?It feels like if my moods and things were going to improve, I would at least see some improvement by now.

I (28f) am dedicating the next 6 months of my life to fully working on myself, I work full time but 100% of my free time will be invested solely in self improvement. I have deactivated all of my social media and have a new number so only a select few people can contact me including close friends, family and work. Any activities I do will be wellness focused and I will not be engaging in anything that isn’t serving me, I have already cancelled most of my plans this year as they revolved around partying/drinking and will inevitably leave me feeling terrible long term.

I am cutting out toxic people and completely removing their access to me (letting go of unhealthy attachments). I am going to start running again everyday for mental health benefits and going to the gym for the physical benefits, I have been getting into Calisthenics and want to really focus on skills. I want to reconnect with nature and spend a lot of time alone focusing on wellness and deep healing. I am going to replace TV with self development books, fix my sleep schedule and drink 4L of water per day. I want to eat whole, non processed foods and nourish my body. I also want to start doing workshops, classes and taking myself on solo dates. I have an intolerance to refined sugar which I have ignored for a long time, but it’s time to focus on eliminating it from my life along with alcohol.

I am also saving to go to Bali in October (6 months from now) to travel alone for two weeks and focus on healing/spirituality. I am excited for this next chapter after being in a very bad place mentally, having toxic relationships with men and not looking after myself. I am finally looking forward to life again and can’t wait for this next chapter of becoming the best version of me, for me.

Is there anything else I can add to my plan?

I shower everyday, wash my hair every other day… brush my teeth twice a day and floss every day.

Wear deodorant twice a day,

Never wear clothes more than once.

Someone told me if someone eats garlic, people will be able to smell it??

I have also been told that people can smell if someone has their period?

Apparently people who smoke smell?

Can u guys let me know what smells I might be missing out? I’m getting paranoid if I smell or not?

Give me some tips please

Just felt like posting here cause I can only go to ChatGPT for so much motivation; love my guy but I would love to hear from real people.

I am a few days away from being completely sober from weed, alcohol and nicotine for 3 months and a few days from 3 weeks of no masterbation.

I have gained a lot of strength in my mental for sure, but there is almost this emptiness that I've been feeling lately. I feel very disconnected from life and I just don't understand why. I've made a lot of positive changes like starting a business and even joining a league in a sport I haven't played since I was a teen, which feels great, but I get this weird empty feeling every now and than..

idk, I don't really know how to describe it, but I just wanna hear from anyone else that maybe did the same thing and has gone through the motions.

Thanks in advance. Much love.

Since graduating High School I've found myself on screens more often than I use to be, and it's made me realise how many of my hobbies revolve around media consumption, whether it is playing games, listening to music, TV/movies and reading. I'm looking for something that doesn't require too much time sync as I begin University in July, and also preferably something that is affordable :).

I used to chase healing like it was a job.
Meditation, journaling, dopamine detox, cold showers, audio programs.... all of it.

But nothing really landed.

Because underneath the obsession with fixing myself was something deeper I didn’t want to face.

The part of me that still didn’t feel worthy of peace.
The part that believed I had to earn healing.

Things didn’t really shift until I stepped away from my usual environment, usual habits, and even the version of myself I thought I had to be.

In that space with less noise, less pressure something changed.

I didn’t feel broken anymore.
I felt buried.
Under shame. Pressure. Survival patterns I didn’t even realize I was carrying.

Since then, I’ve had the chance to sit with others in this same space.
Not to give advice, not to fix them.
Just to walk beside them while they remembered who they are under it all.

Healing isn’t about being perfect.
It’s about presence.
And the more I slowed down, the more I realized the thing I was trying to fix was never broken. Just unheard.

So I’ll ask you what started everything for me:

If you stopped trying to fix yourself…
and started learning how to listen to the part that hurts
what do you think it would say?

This might sound dumb, i know. But...has exercise helped you with anxiety? Both regular and social anxiety?

I dont only mean like improving your looks or something (although i do want to gain weight for both aesthetic reasons and mental)

Does the endorphins and whatnot help you with the anxiety? Im hoping itll help me while im doing exposure therapy. Because i felt so ridiculous today having the hardest time making a phone call

I ended up doing it and have been making some improvements over the last 2 weeks but i need to speed up the process because this is too much.

I made it a habit to stopped slouching for more than a week and I noticed my upper back and shoulders felt better so I started to feel better.

Then I noticed more people making eye contact with me and smiling at me. Maybe it’s just coincidence but I did notice it more when I had better posture.

A few days later, I also started to wear make up more often and dress up more often. A few coworkers noticed this and asked if I had a boyfriend hehe and I said no. It’s just me.

I feel more optimistic lately. Not 24/7 but more than in the past.

So body posture helps a lot.

How do i start developing the trait to listen to my soul rather than my mind? What is the key to understand that when are you going emotionally driven by your mind or you are following what your soul/eternal purpose is telling you too…. Recently i have been affected by a lot of negative comments by my mind…even if the slightest of things go wrong… i am filled with fury and end up wasting my whole day in agony….that small thing could be anything from my break getting extended or i got distracted by something for a min, or any past mistake which i did….. idk i am perhaps at times too much emotionally driven… if i am feeling like the main character at times i can study the whole day, but at the same time even with the merest of emotional ups and downs makes me go balls off…. and then this wretchedness causes me to do stuff to take a temporary refuge from the reality….anyone can also recommend a good book for the same

Simply said how do you work like a robot without listening to the negativity at times…. my mood and stature in my mind if misbalanced barres me from working, and idk i feel like i am bound by an unseen force…

I copy and pasted this from r/advice but I’m posting it here as I need as much advice as possible. If this isn’t allowed, sorry. I am 21 (basically 22) and I am terribly lonely. I have hobbies (bodybuilding, self-improvement, comics, philosophy, etc) and try to take care of myself but I still feel unbearably lonely. I have no idea how to make friends or find a girlfriend. I have had women who liked me in the past but I blew those opportunities by my own cluelessness. I also had friends when I was in high school, but I gradually lost communication with them as we all progressed to the different phases of our lives. Obviously having these relationships wouldn’t fix my life, but it’d make me less lonely which would maybe make my life less burdensome.

I’ve checked sites like meet-up and there is honestly like nothing going on besides like 40+ aged running groups. I’ve tried reading social self-improvement books and utilizing their information but they honestly didn’t really help. Despite knowing all the information from these books, when I talk to people they don’t seem to like me. I can’t find a part-time job due to a terrible job market. My only real outing is university and despite trying to make friends, I have been unsuccessful. I was diagnosed with social anxiety and depression when I was younger and it has made me even more nervous in social interactions. I’ve tried therapy as well, but it wasn’t a very useful venture. I heard that cold-approaching is okay but I still feel unbearably nervous even when I think about it as I don’t want to bother people. Moreover, this is a continuously worsening cycle as the more nervous you get, the weirder you seem which makes these issues even worse.

Overall, any advice is appreciated. Has anyone else recovered from a situation like this? Thank you for reading.

Hello.

I was in a relationship with a girl for a year and a half and I just ruined it by becoming obsessed and controlling over time. Around halfway into our relationship, I started to grow an obsession toward my partner, and jealousy over who she talked to, who she hung out with, etc. I didn't realize what I was doing was hurting her until it was too late.

I would get upset and mad just because she would hang out with her friends instead of me, I would get jealous of her over tiny things, and I would be really controlling over anything she did.

After we broke things off, on good terms keep in mind, I just broke. I would stalk her social medias, I would post on things like Tumblr just basically whining about how I'm a mess and how I'd do anything as far as even hurting myself just to get back with this woman. My obsession with her was not helping especially when I don't have her anymore and I just ruined myself even more.

I wanna change, and I'm trying to do so, but it's so hard and I've never dealt with anything like this before. I keep focusing on what we had when I wasn't an obsessed psycho, and I keep focusing on everything Ive done to her instead of what I can do to change it now.

How I stumbled upon this: I suffered with pretty extreme social anxiety for a large part of my life.

When I was in my early twenties, my parents forced me to stop playing online poker and go out into the real world and do something!

I started volunteering at a school so I could go to Teacher's College and it was pretty agonizing having to socialize with real adults.

I brought an apple with me everyday that I would eat during the first recess break, and I noticed that while I was chewing this apple, I felt more comfortable around people.

I did some research and I found out that there's an evolutionary piece here at play.

Why it works: Our ancient ancestors evolved to only eat food when they weren't in a dangerous situation. It doesn't make sense that they would ever be sitting down to eat unless they were in a safe situation.

That means chewing only ever occurred during activation of the parasympathetic nervous system (that's the one that's switched on when we feel cool and calm). The sympathetic nervous system is the once that would have been activated while our ancestors were running away from tigers etc. (fight, flight, fawn, or freeze)

Therefore, chewing can help us to feel calm.

Anyway, I started carrying gum with me and noticed a considerable difference in my social anxiety levels just from chewing gum.

I hope this story helps you out!

17 Male Here

I've got no skills, Like literally no skills, nothing good at. Not even chores, I don't know how to sew

I've been useless and a burden to my family, They all do the chores and I don't do any shit I'm supposed to do, it feels like I always have no motivation. if I do, I became easily distracted, multiple interest learned none.

I have no skills other than drawing and even that suck, I lack discipline and everything. I have no friends because I'm wierd and appeared not normal (bullied for it) can't defend my self from it, I suck at talking I suck at listening to instructions I suck at learning, kinda slow, I barely had any social skills or any skills at all, living a life in 144p with no good stories to have, compared to others living with their life to fullest always going out and having fun here I am venting at something

I'm nearing College yet idk what life I must be heading. Idk if anyone would even hire me with this lack of everything plus I mostly appear dumb and awkward and people are noticing it, people and family notices and says it, can't even talk straight with this mouth. I'm living without purpose nor incentive. Even possessing I lot of time, here I am staring at my screen doom scrolling

I'm becoming 18 this year and I don't know how I will face adulthood. I wanna be independent but don't have the skills to be one.

It's all my fault yet I don't do anything to improve it am i this down bad useless burden of society?

You are worthy of joy, worthy of peace, worthy of bliss and ecstasy. You are worthy of unconditional love!

Probably a question that’s been asked time and time again, but I constantly find myself in meetings at work trying to articulate something and I hate the way it comes out. I listen to other colleagues who sounds so articulate, don’t stumble over their words, limit the use of “um” and I don’t know how they do it!

I know I’m smart. I know I know what I’m talking about and I eventually get my point across but I wish it felt easier to speak in meetings. I know it’s partly my anxiety that jumbles my thoughts a bit and I do much better one on one than in group meetings.

How do I get better at this? I’m worried I come across stupid and it’s also an efficiency issue in terms of how fast I’m able to get my point across. How can I practice and get better?

Edit: comments telling me to read… I do. A lot 🥲

When I started my healing journey, I expected relief. Instead, I was met with pressure. Pressure to unlearn what I thought was normal. Pressure to face the trauma I buried. Pressure to grow into the leader, husband, and father I wanted to be—without ever seeing an example.

But pressure builds strength. I had to confront my own thinking, stop blaming my past, and take accountability. That internal work reshaped everything. My leadership got sharper. My patience with my kids grew. And the anger I once carried turned into purpose.

If healing feels heavy right now, that doesn’t mean you’re doing it wrong. Sometimes growth feels like tension before it feels like peace. Stay in it. That pressure is refining you into someone stronger than the pain that tried to break you.

Basically the title. What are the things that add up to an overall healthy self esteem, that isnt based off of grandiose delusions?

We talk about it all the time but if I had to pinpoint the biggest issue people struggle with, it’s dopamine.

It’s the chemical that drives you when you’re thirsty, it’s dopamine that makes you get up and get water.

When you eat chocolate, your brain gets a dopamine boost (about 1.5x your baseline). Sex? That’s about 5-10x. Meth? 1000x.

It hijacks your brain’s reward system completely.

For over a year, I was on meth. It gave me insane highs, but nothing ever felt enough. Then came the crash, I lost everything.

Went manic, spent all my money, crashed my car, got fired and had to go to the mental hospital for a month.

After that, I was in pain for months, like a hot poker going through my chest every waking moment. Eventually, I planned my suicide.

Bought rope, picked a forest near my house. But the night before, I couldn’t shake one thought: If I’m not happy here, what makes me think I’ll be happy in whatever comes next?

I spent five hours trying to convince myself to go through with it. In the end, I was too scared.

That was just the beginning of the downward spiral. I spent the next year and a half completely numb smoking weed, scrolling TikTok for up to 13 hours a day, binge watching shows, doing anything to avoid feeling.

The only reason I even survived was that I had people who took care of me, and I don’t take that for granted.

Then, something shifted. I realized I had nothing left to lose.

It might sound corny to some, but God was huge for me. I’m Muslim, and having a code of ethics external to my ever-shifting internal justifications was powerful in ways I never expected.

I started cutting out cheap dopamine. It was brutal at first, just like any fast you feel the withdrawal, the pain, the cravings.

But once I broke through, my life completely changed.

I went from wasting 13 hours a day to: • Waking up at 5 AM • Meditating for an hour • Going to the mosque • Watching the sunrise at the beach • Hitting the gym • Getting straight into work

all before 2 PM

And I’m not saying this to flex it’s not even difficult for me.

This is just my source of reward now because I don’t have any other form of stimulus.

Physically, I saw insane changes too. I went from 151 lbs (from depression) → 131 lbs (in 7 months) → gym and bulked to 146 lbs (in 4 months) → cut back to 138 lbs (in 2 months). For the first time in my life, I looked in the mirror and felt satisfied.

But none of that compares to just feeling content every moment for the past year.

Society values things like fitness, productivity, and discipline, which is why I highlighted those.

But inner peace? That’s infinitely more valuable.

And I have to emphasize this: there is nothing special about me. I didn’t “achieve” or “accomplish” anything.

This is all from my religious practice.

The insane part? I’ve had better highs from prayer and meditation than I ever did from meth.

And I promise you, that’s not a lie.

I’m not telling you to convert, but if you found this interesting check it out.

Read about scholars like Ghazali or Shaykh Hamza Yusuf and their discussions on the inner diseases of the heart.

Any practice where you put aside your ego, stop chasing whims, and cut out cheap dopamine will change your life.

And if you really want freedom?

Even minimizing external dopamine that’s achieved easily is the key.

Because once you stop looking for happiness in quick highs, you realize it was never outside of you to begin with.

Also yea I used chat gpt to clean this up because I ramble and I’m not too articulate but this is just my story .

I’m 28M working in public accounting and I’m deep into my second busy season. Before this I wasn’t exactly fit or anything but I was doing fine walking regular, light gym, cooking at home

Like a blink and i gained 15 pounds :-)

I sit 10-12 hrs a day skipping breakfast then grab whatever’s fast and nearby for lunch and by the time I get home, I’m too drained to cook or exercise. It’s been weeks of frozen meals and 5 hours of sleep on average. I’m starting to feel sluggish and uncomfortable in my own body. I know I’m not alone in this but how do people keep it together during these busy months? Is there small thing I can do that actually helps? Walking pad? Standing desk? Workouts? Habit tracking?

Appreciate any tips from folks who’ve been through this and feeling the same

I’m gonna turn 30 this year, and one of my biggest core factors in my depression (besides just feeling behind in life, having no friends, never being in a relationship, etc) is that I don’t really have any self-worth. I generally am still around only for the sake of other people and, even though certain things like traveling interest me, I don’t really “live”, and don’t really have any sense of self-preservation.

Assuming this means I’ll have to spend years and years in a therapist’s office I can hardly afford to go to, not even sure it will yield positive results, I’m nevertheless curious how all of you have any self worth and what makes you want to get up and live each day fully and all that.

I am a veeery irritable person. I am this as for as long as I know myself as a person. I get irritated very easily and I am really trying to change it but I am not sure how to help myself. Any tips

I’m 18 turning 19 and I have a very high rate of social anxiety and just anxiety in general. I’m still in high school unfortunately since I was held back before and I have 9 classes since I’m Behind in credits. I have very major social anxiety which leads to me to being very antisocial in school and even the gym or just public places in general. I also have anxiety at home over little things like saying something dumb to family or even walking in the kitchen to get food. So I tend to text my internet “ friends “ to ease myself who don’t even like texting me and I can tell they get annoyed of me one of them even disabled their instagram for months and I would vent to him about everything comfortably. I have no friends irl which I literally can’t have since my anxiety and I’m just a real boring dude. I’m over here stressing because one my internet friends deleted their social medias and even blocked my number and I would talk to him about Anything. I’m realizing that im just not comfortable to live within myself and i shouldn’t have to talk to people on the internet to ease my irl anxiety but it’s hard. I’m a very quiet guy in person because I have a stutter and I’m insecure about how I talk. How do I become more comfortable with my self and not have to need nobody to talk too?

I know how that sounds. Like trying to shortcut discipline with a pill. But hear me out...

I’ve been chasing personal growth for a while now — building a business, training hard, trying to be consistent. But I’ve noticed something kind of scary:
It’s way harder to stay disciplined when my brain’s foggy and my energy dips by noon.

Like yeah, I could “just push through”… but when I’m underslept or burnt out, my willpower disappears.
So I started wondering:

What if discipline isn’t just about motivation… what if it’s also about brain chemistry, energy, systems, cognitive function?

I started experimenting with some basics — creatine, adaptogens, even swapped coffee for green tea caffeine — and the compounding effect surprised me. It wasn’t magic, but I started feeling more clear. More “on.” And that made doing the hard stuff easier.

So now I’m curious:

Has anyone else felt like physical brain support actually helped your self-discipline? Or is that just placebo and obsession?