Total Self-Erasure

[BD91]

Hey everybody,

 

I wanted to talk about self-erasure. Has anybody else had problems with this?

 

There's so many things I want to change/accomplish in my life, but for whatever reason I just refuse to actually commit myself to the actions I would need to take to achieve them. I'll sort of break two big ones down here:

 

1. Social & Relationships:

I have very few friends currently, and I'm starting to realize that the friends I do have may not be the best people for me. But when I think about trying new things, or going to meetup groups, or anything like that I feel a bit anxious and never will myself to do it. Then I get upset with myself for not making decisions to change, but that doesn't deter me from continuing to not change. 

 

 

2. My Own Business:

This honestly goes hand-in-hand with the social issues I face. I can build websites, and I want to run my own business doing freelance web design for local businesses. I KNOW I can build pretty good websites and that those websites would help the businesses generate more sales. But when it comes to SELLING the service I struggle motivating myself to make sales call.

 

I had been thinking out loud about these issues earlier and I had this train of thought:

 

Imagine that I had a product....let's say it's a pen. It's the best pen ever, it writes fluidly from full to dry, and it can hold twice as much ink as any other pen without taking up more space, etc... However, I don't make sales calls to sell the pen, I don't advertise the pen, I don't sell it to retailers, hell even half the people I know personally have no idea this pen exists. It's almost as if I don't want people to know it exists.

 

 

And then I realized that maybe that's it. Maybe, for whatever reason, I just don't want people to even know I exist? I don't know, but I'm very frustrated and this issue is really stagnating my entire life and I need help.

[neeeel]

I also have problems with this. Only just starting to realise how difficult I find it to have wants and needs, to express them, to know what I want to do, and do it. 

 

Its possible that you really just dont like the selling aspect, and arent able to do it well. Perhaps you could find someone who can do the selling for you, and build up the business together?

 

I cant give much advice, except, go back to therapy. I think that therapy is a great way to explore self erasure and heal.

[aviet]

First, on the business front the key is to keep at it. I was able to build a viable SEO business from zero in about six months. But I had quite a bit of prior experience; even with that it took time and I could have been doing a lot more if I had clients who knew what I could do.

On cold calling. It's difficult and something I would rather avoid. But my old company did it and the results were very low. You'd be lucky to get one client from a whole day of calling and that is with 'professional' cold callers doing it.

The best clients always came from word of mouth.You could try going to those business meetups that I think you've mentioned. One of my friends, who give no shits, had success with trying to sell businesses face to face by going round businesses. He built about half of his clients like this. Very forward. Once when cast out of reception, he climbed through a window into a meeting room where a meeting was in session and immediately began pitching.

Give it time. For both the businesses I started on my own, it took 6 months for the first one and maybe one year for the second one to get up to a decent to good income.

As fro going to meetups. Take advantage of living in The Pitt. I live in a really rural area and if there is anything relevant round here to me I'm pretty sure it would be mainly 60+ year old people there. You could also take the initiative to start an FDR or Proud Boys group.

Here's an idea I want to follow through on, when I have time to break from work:

Make a list of your positives and negatives,

e.g.

Positive:

I am pretty good looking
I have a good income

Negatives:

Low social interaction
Bad wardrobe
Bit flabby
Unorganised with my cleaning

Then come up with a game plan to get rid of the negatives.

[thecurrentyear]

I like aviet's suggestion to use referrals. You can think of it as a tree that branches out from one stem or trunk to grow into an entire book of business. Cold calls suck and it hardly ever works. But if you can get a foot in a door somewhere, then call on their neighbors and everyone you meet on the way (coffee shop, barber, mechanic, landlord, etc, etc) and make that one connection pay off.

 

Positive:

I am pretty good looking
I have a good income

Negatives:

Low social interaction
Bad wardrobe
Bit flabby
Unorganised with my cleaning

Then come up with a game plan to get rid of the negatives.

 

As a woman, if you care...I would want you to focus only on playing up masculine traits and skills. Organizing your cleaning and improving your wardrobe would be the last things I would want you to focus on, and would prefer to help with them myself once in a relationship. Maybe that's just me. Definitely work on ridding the flab and magnifying the positives. FWIW just my thoughts.

[BD91]

Thanks for the responses everyone. But my issue is that I "erase" myself from those actions in the first place.

 

I'm really struggling to come up with the wording for what I'm trying to say. It's like I hate myself or something to the point that I completely hide or destroy myself by not taking actions in the first place.

[neeeel]

Thanks for the responses everyone. But my issue is that I "erase" myself from those actions in the first place.

 

I'm really struggling to come up with the wording for what I'm trying to say. It's like I hate myself or something to the point that I completely hide or destroy myself by not taking actions in the first place.

 

Right, and thats not something you are likely to be able to overcome on your own. Or quickly

[thecurrentyear]

Right, and thats not something you are likely to be able to overcome on your own. Or quickly

 

Hmmm...how do you know?

Changing your daily activities is a process. The habits that need to be built up require re-wiring in your brain, essentially. So it's best to add them gradually. If you get overwhelmed, you will condemn yourself and quit. If you look back at new habits you've added in the past 6 months or a year, you can probably see that you've already made a lot of progress. Probably more than you have in mind when you decide "I just refuse to actually commit myself to the actions I would need to take to achieve them"

I think that's actually not a true statement, but one you are using to justify coming here and dwelling on your "problem" as opposed to adding more things that are difficult to your activities and tasks for the week. Just a thought.

[neeeel]

Hmmm...how do you know?

Changing your daily activities is a process. The habits that need to be built up require re-wiring in your brain, essentially. So it's best to add them gradually. If you get overwhelmed, you will condemn yourself and quit. If you look back at new habits you've added in the past 6 months or a year, you can probably see that you've already made a lot of progress. Probably more than you have in mind when you decide "I just refuse to actually commit myself to the actions I would need to take to achieve them"

I think that's actually not a true statement, but one you are using to justify coming here and dwelling on your "problem" as opposed to adding more things that are difficult to your activities and tasks for the week. Just a thought.

 

You may be ( likely are) right. At the same time, if you are destroying yourself and your actions, without knowing why, its incredibly difficult to stop doing that, even a little bit, and having the support and guidance of a therapist is extremely helpful. 

 

I am not suggesting that you cant also do things in your own time, with your own efforts. 

[thecurrentyear]

I'm not suggesting you're wrong neeel, just asking how we could know for sure.

[neeeel]

I'm not suggesting you're wrong neeel, just asking how we could know for sure.

 

I was just talking from personal experience, and probability. Of course its possible that he triggers something somehow and self launches, but the number of those is pretty small, and its more likely that therapy will be needed IMO.

[Spenc]

I'm reminded of some older volumes of the FDR podcasts, when Stef would talk about his young daughter.  He would talk about responding to her emotions and desires to instill in her a sense of control over her environment and positive effects from experiencing her emotions. 

 

I'm also wondering what it was like as a child for you to be visible in the household?  Like in some families, if a child is hanging around the parent while s/he's busy with chores, they tell you to go play or go watch tv or whatever.  Your presence just becomes an opportunity for your parents to send you off and reject your desire to be with them.  Or maybe they even insist that you join in on a boring chore since you don't seem to have anything better to be doing.  Even without anything like blatant abuse, being present and visible to your family can seem negative.  Obviously, it's worse if you have sibling rivalries that escalate to violence or mental/emotional abuse, to the point where a child feels more secure hiding away in his or her room or somewhere else away from the others.

[Danske]

I'm guessing you were shamed a lot for the products of your efforts.

To others throwing business advice at the guy when it's an emotional issue - this is a philosophy forum and you are not getting to the root of anything. It's also an insult to the guy's intelligence. It reminds me of my first (terrible) counsellor who gave cooking advice when I told her I was binging on junk food. It doesn't resolve the issue and in my experience people who do this are trying to set themselves up as an authority over someone who has shown vulnerability and THAT is their main goal. Not to help or understand.

[thecurrentyear]

I'm guessing you were shamed a lot for the products of your efforts.

 

To others throwing business advice at the guy when it's an emotional issue - this is a philosophy forum and you are not getting to the root of anything. It's also an insult to the guy's intelligence. It reminds me of my first (terrible) counsellor who gave cooking advice when I told her I was binging on junk food. It doesn't resolve the issue and in my experience people who do this are trying to set themselves up as an authority over someone who has shown vulnerability and THAT is their main goal. Not to help or understand.

 

Maybe you should show us how it's done.

[BD91]

I'm also wondering what it was like as a child for you to be visible in the household?  Like in some families, if a child is hanging around the parent while s/he's busy with chores, they tell you to go play or go watch tv or whatever.  Your presence just becomes an opportunity for your parents to send you off and reject your desire to be with them. 

 

Yeah most of the memories I have of childhood that involve me trying to assert myself or state my preference involve being scorned or made to feel that my preference was just an annoyance in general.

 

 

 

Obviously, it's worse if you have sibling rivalries that escalate to violence or mental/emotional abuse, to the point where a child feels more secure hiding away in his or her room or somewhere else away from the others.

 

Yeah I usually preferred being alone in my room or down in the basement and if somebody came into my room without knocking or asking I'd get very very angry with them.

[RichardY]

Maybe you could focus on one particular industry to sell websites to. I knew a guy in Austria who sold websites to restaurants and small businesses, perhaps if the owner of a business felt the website was good enough, they would hesitate at the possibility that you may sell to their competitors and be at a disadvantage. Perhaps you could show various prototypes, to help the client make an informed decision. 

 

Yeah I usually preferred being alone in my room or down in the basement and if somebody came into my room without knocking or asking I'd get very very angry with them.

Take heart in your anger.

[BD91]

Well as an update a guy who's been mentoring me through weekly skype calls said he'd be willing to hire me on as a designer for his web-development/design company. So I guess for now the stress and immediacy of needing to build the skillset of sales is lifted. But it's still something I feel I should tackle either way.

 

 

And what do you mean by "tale heart in your anger"?

[RichardY]

And what do you mean by "tale heart in your anger"?

Well if your angry at least you're expressing yourself, so not repressing, I don't think a person can ever willingly self erase. Anger may or may not be productive depending on who you are dealing with. Either that or the emotion becomes internalised and becomes resentment or contempt. All just an opinion, maybe others have a better understanding of emotion.

[themortalgod]

I totally here you in regards to an aversion to selling. For the longest time I actively chased a career in photography for the simple reason that I loved photography and actually was (am) quite good at it. Unfortunately, the closer and closer I got to becoming pro the more and more I realized that a career in photography is all about sales and marketing and actually very little about actually doing photography. I eventually just called it quits. I love photography, I hate selling and I was investing immensely towards a career as a salesman that got to use his camera from time to time. As a hobby I'm able to shoot more and always want I want. I'm able to keep it fun. (I also already had a stable career that was far more lucrative in the web app field anyway)

For you, I'd suggest that if you don't like selling look for jobs at digital agencies. Il be blunt with you that the money in selling small brochure style websites is on a big decline and will eventually dry up completely. There are too many services like square space now that actually are really good. Web designers aren't needed for simple little websites anymore. The money is in specializing and developing web development skills that can't be automated so easily. Those skills often come into strongest use when working for larger companies either as a contractor or salaried employee. (Or, if you have entrepreneurial spirit in developing something that has its own business value). Another option that might be worth exploring if you are really good at web design but hate selling and want to work for yourself is to build website themes that sell on marketplaces such as theme forest. You need to be damn good though, the people making good money in those marketplaces are creating world class templates, everyone else likely struggles to make a living and I imagine most fail to but hey, no salesmanship needed.

 

As for the friends thing, the best thing I could ever do for my social life was give up social media. I still use Facebook chat but I disabled my news feed and removed all the social apps from my phone (Instagram, Twitter, Facebook, etc). I found that social media not only dominates so much time that it can end up crippling your life but it also gives a false impression that you have a ton of friends when in reality you just have a ton of acquaintances. Since removing social media from my life I've been able to focus on, foster, and grow the friendships that matter to me while being able to completely forget all the false friends who only make an effort when they need something from me. 

[meetjoeblack]

Hey everybody,

 

I wanted to talk about self-erasure. Has anybody else had problems with this?

 

There's so many things I want to change/accomplish in my life, but for whatever reason I just refuse to actually commit myself to the actions I would need to take to achieve them. I'll sort of break two big ones down here:

 

1. Social & Relationships:

I have very few friends currently, and I'm starting to realize that the friends I do have may not be the best people for me. But when I think about trying new things, or going to meetup groups, or anything like that I feel a bit anxious and never will myself to do it. Then I get upset with myself for not making decisions to change, but that doesn't deter me from continuing to not change. 

 

 

2. My Own Business:

This honestly goes hand-in-hand with the social issues I face. I can build websites, and I want to run my own business doing freelance web design for local businesses. I KNOW I can build pretty good websites and that those websites would help the businesses generate more sales. But when it comes to SELLING the service I struggle motivating myself to make sales call.

 

I had been thinking out loud about these issues earlier and I had this train of thought:

 

 

And then I realized that maybe that's it. Maybe, for whatever reason, I just don't want people to even know I exist? I don't know, but I'm very frustrated and this issue is really stagnating my entire life and I need help.

 

Read some Anthony Robbins or watch some of his youtube videos. I like and find him very inspiring.

 

It gets beat to death but, you must make drastic fucking action in your life, learn, tweak, adjust, and come back at it again until you get the results you want in this life.

 

Basically, it sounds like the biggest problem is fear. You go into a new situation, you are afraid, you kick off that fight or flight mechanism, and you either fight (make the approach or sales call) or you run (disengage). For me, I have different levels of fears so, for starters, when that fight or flight mechanism kicks off, I take drastic action. Let me explain.

 

I fear being a employee forever so, I am doing everything I can to accumulate knowledge, self knowledge, education, explore my consciousness, and generate income so that I can be self employed. Also, when I work different jobs, I only take jobs whereby the skill sets I am acquiring are transferable else where in my own endeavors and thus makes me more marketable. Also, I am single. I fear being single forever so, when I see a beautiful woman, I approach. Needless to say, I get rejected and turned down quite a bit but, I also date a lot more, I have more sex, and hookups. It is still not easy. If I don't approach immediately, I will talk myself out or just bitch out. Furthermore, I am getting older too. Friends are getting married. People are having kids or busy with careers. Approaching people allows me the opportunity to network, to generate new leads, prospects, potential business partners, friends, and yes, dates. It is scary. Something I am learning to do is just embrace the fear and meet it head on.

 

If you look at successful businesses like airbnb and uber, these are disruptions, and they save people time. If you make a pen that is better, more efficient, more value offered, and added, this is going to sell well. It will add value. You make money. It is win win. I know your plan is not the pen but, you just need to start taking action. A good read, "Tools for Titans," by Tim Ferris is a great read. The forward includes Arnold talking about someone coming up to him saying how "self made" he is. Arnold corrects him saying, "I stood on the shoulders of titans."

 

We all get help. No idea is original. airbnb, uber, and fb, etc were all done before. The thing is we take ideas from everywhere and someone executes on the idea. They thread the needle and pull the trigger. you can too man.

 

 

Please keep me posted on how your journey goes my friend. I am excited to hear more.

[Spenc]

Many years ago, the only formal sales training program I ever participated in, the key element they proposed is product conviction.

 

In terms of your first part about your personal life and relationships, you achieve friendships and relationships by selling yourself to others.

 

Because you are professionally involved in providing services, where you have unique insight and talent to supply to your work, you are trying to sell yourself to potential customers.

 

You mentioned that you are confident in your abilities as a web designer (although you hedge this a bit by saying  "pretty good websites" instead of just saying 'good' or 'great').  You also create separation from your productivity.  You can create a 'pretty good website' for your customer.  Your customer's website will generate them more sales.   I know I'm nitpicking at the prose of your post here, but I'm always thinking that the way we frame a sentence and the words we choose have significance.  So I definitely want to draw to your attention how you kind of express limited conviction in yourself and accept limited responsibility for the benefits you provide your customers. It's YOU generating more sales, not "those websites".

 

It's easy to say, 'yeah this company could benefit from a website'.  But you have to believe that this company would benefit from YOU.  Given that you are expressing concerns about your social skills, I'm wondering if you are a difficult person to deal with?  Not like, rude or unpleasant, but maybe you don't like to return calls or you don't give lengthy thoughtful answers, or whatever else.  Think about that caller from a couple weeks ago:  the most inert caller ever, I think he was called int he show title.  Speaking to him is just not pleasant, even if he is polite and reasonably intelligent and capable and so-on......  Is this how you think people experience building rapport or getting/giving feedback with you?  (obviously to a much less significant degree than with the most inert caller)

[meetjoeblack]

I totally here you in regards to an aversion to selling. For the longest time I actively chased a career in photography for the simple reason that I loved photography and actually was (am) quite good at it. Unfortunately, the closer and closer I got to becoming pro the more and more I realized that a career in photography is all about sales and marketing and actually very little about actually doing photography. I eventually just called it quits. I love photography, I hate selling and I was investing immensely towards a career as a salesman that got to use his camera from time to time. As a hobby I'm able to shoot more and always want I want. I'm able to keep it fun. (I also already had a stable career that was far more lucrative in the web app field anyway)

 

For you, I'd suggest that if you don't like selling look for jobs at digital agencies. Il be blunt with you that the money in selling small brochure style websites is on a big decline and will eventually dry up completely. There are too many services like square space now that actually are really good. Web designers aren't needed for simple little websites anymore. The money is in specializing and developing web development skills that can't be automated so easily. Those skills often come into strongest use when working for larger companies either as a contractor or salaried employee. (Or, if you have entrepreneurial spirit in developing something that has its own business value). Another option that might be worth exploring if you are really good at web design but hate selling and want to work for yourself is to build website themes that sell on marketplaces such as theme forest. You need to be damn good though, the people making good money in those marketplaces are creating world class templates, everyone else likely struggles to make a living and I imagine most fail to but hey, no salesmanship needed.

 

As for the friends thing, the best thing I could ever do for my social life was give up social media. I still use Facebook chat but I disabled my news feed and removed all the social apps from my phone (Instagram, Twitter, Facebook, etc). I found that social media not only dominates so much time that it can end up crippling your life but it also gives a false impression that you have a ton of friends when in reality you just have a ton of acquaintances. Since removing social media from my life I've been able to focus on, foster, and grow the friendships that matter to me while being able to completely forget all the false friends who only make an effort when they need something from me. 

 

What if the answer wasn't to quit? You could have hired a local college student or new grad marketing major to generate new leads, offer salary + commision on sales. Allows you to do more of what you love. Basically, the business world seems to snub and shun the sales man but, the sales man does all the heavy lifting. They make absurd amounts of money because of their unique gift. Some have a great tool for it and it is a gift.

[meetjoeblack]

First, on the business front the key is to keep at it. I was able to build a viable SEO business from zero in about six months. But I had quite a bit of prior experience; even with that it took time and I could have been doing a lot more if I had clients who knew what I could do.

 

On cold calling. It's difficult and something I would rather avoid. But my old company did it and the results were very low. You'd be lucky to get one client from a whole day of calling and that is with 'professional' cold callers doing it.

 

The best clients always came from word of mouth.You could try going to those business meetups that I think you've mentioned. One of my friends, who give no shits, had success with trying to sell businesses face to face by going round businesses. He built about half of his clients like this. Very forward. Once when cast out of reception, he climbed through a window into a meeting room where a meeting was in session and immediately began pitching.

 

Give it time. For both the businesses I started on my own, it took 6 months for the first one and maybe one year for the second one to get up to a decent to good income.

 

As fro going to meetups. Take advantage of living in The Pitt. I live in a really rural area and if there is anything relevant round here to me I'm pretty sure it would be mainly 60+ year old people there. You could also take the initiative to start an FDR or Proud Boys group.

 

Here's an idea I want to follow through on, when I have time to break from work:

 

Make a list of your positives and negatives,

 

e.g.

 

Positive:

 

I am pretty good looking

I have a good income

 

Negatives:

 

Low social interaction

Bad wardrobe

Bit flabby

Unorganised with my cleaning

 

Then come up with a game plan to get rid of the negatives.

 

Awesome post + 1

 

You still have responded to your inbox msg btw!

 

Yeah, there are tons of mastermind groups across the globe. I am skeptical in general that some weasel is looking to swagger jack your idea so, I feel like a nondisclosure agreement should be brought lol or keep mouth shut on agenda.

 

I think with vigor, you can meet a ton of good people, business partners, prospects, leads, dates, etc. if you just put it out there. With respect to networking for either business or social, I have met models (male and female), body builders, fitness gurus, real estate agents, club promoters, etc.

 

There is no getting away from it. Recently, I networked with a young entrepreneur. She is pretty bad ass. Several years younger and she no doubt will be rich assuming she stays on course. There seems to be a ton of snake oil salesmen selling how to sell products whereas, someone like this who actually has the formula could put the product out but does not. Too busy selling her product. Quite frankly, I love it and I am learning a lot from her.

[BD91]

So, the title of the post was "total self-erasure", and idk if I phrased the message poorly or not.

 

 

I've noticed that I'm decent at getting myself to take actions when somebody else is depending on me to get them done, like I've been doing this internship for web design and can do work when the boss says X,Y, and Z need done. but when it comes to me doing things because I want them done there's just anxiety and no motivation.

[Pod]

So, the title of the post was "total self-erasure", and idk if I phrased the message poorly or not.

 

 

I've noticed that I'm decent at getting myself to take actions when somebody else is depending on me to get them done, like I've been doing this internship for web design and can do work when the boss says X,Y, and Z need done. but when it comes to me doing things because I want them done there's just anxiety and no motivation.

 

I think I get what you're talking about.  I too have a skill that I know I'm good at and can get better with but I feel an internal push-back when working on my own personal projects.

 

Tell me, say you're about to sit down and work on your own thing.  What is the train of thought that happens when you begin to work.  Like what does the voice actually say?

[BD91]

That it's pointless, that if I <ask out that girl, make that cold call to a potential client, whatever action> then it's just going to end in failure or rejection.

 

Another slightly strange thing, I find this issue most prominent when there's a judgement involved. Like when I want somebody's approval, that's what makes me most afraid. I'm not terrible in general social situations, and can have light, mostly meaningless conversation. However, if I were talking to someone whom I really wanted to do business with then I get nervous/choked up/anxious/stifled/etc...

[themortalgod]

That it's pointless, that if I <ask out that girl, make that cold call to a potential client, whatever action> then it's just going to end in failure or rejection.

 

Another slightly strange thing, I find this issue most prominent when there's a judgement involved. Like when I want somebody's approval, that's what makes me most afraid. I'm not terrible in general social situations, and can have light, mostly meaningless conversation. However, if I were talking to someone whom I really wanted to do business with then I get nervous/choked up/anxious/stifled/etc...

Yes, it will, that is until it doesn't. Professional salesmen average between 7 and 8 points of contact with a given prospect before they actually make a sale. Most people think you should try to make the sale once, if you fail, move on. Instead its about continually putting yourself in the mind of the customer. Naturally don't harass them but you develop a rapport over the course of months or even years where you check back in every once in a while. Professional salesmen work this like crazy and plan their strategies around it. Unfortunately, it takes a ton of time and effort. 

 

Its a little tougher with dating, but I'd assume that for anyone below the top 5% of men they will experience more rejection unless they get lucky and find a really good match right away. And playing the long game with trying to get a date is much less practical. Unfortunately my success in this arena is just as bad so I can't pretend to offer any real wisdom here. I think self doubt is a huge factor though. Women are so good at picking up on subtle hints of self doubt and they often reject based on that alone. 

[dysfunc_survivor]

@RC91 I can relate to your situation. A few months ago I talked with an acquaintance about my situation, which is somewhat similar. He didn't really say anything useful, but I realized that I in a way made him responsible for "fixing me". I was looking to get something.

 

Seeking help is a tricky thing because often people who like to be seen as supportive will want to do their thing and "help". The saying "if you want something done, ask someone busy" comes to mind. Voluntary help, as on forums, is sometimes given out of subconscious reasons.

 

I found your thread by searching for "resentment" so that tells you something about me.

I am unmotivated to take action, because I have resentment. Neither forgivness nor resentment, which I would say are related can be "willed". In a way, resentment comes from "selling at a too low price". You have been conditioned to lower your value.

 

You will not become motivated simply by getting more information. Information in and of itself is not your problem, I think. At least not on the surface level. You already have the information, like I realized talking to that acquaintance. It's more a question of structuring and re-evaluating the information you already have.