Reinventing Your Mind: Where to Start?

Self-reinvention is unending. That is the creative way of life. We always have to start from scratch.

But sometimes I can’t help wishing for the cycle to end because the transition from one world to another is often like a hellish wormhole. But the cycle of life goes on. One thing dies for a new life form to arise. Something is destroyed in place of what is being built.

Isn’t it the very hallmark of life? — change. And often it is hard to accept that each created thing has a life span. What we worked for so hard always has to be replaced and upgraded.

We had to change and build ourselves anew every moment from failures to success. And it is never easy. It takes effort and work to create order and go against the 2nd law of thermodynamics of increasing entropy.

They say it takes about 5 years to reinvent your career, financial and professional life — external. What more if it is your internal self you have to recreate?

When you are in the process reinventing yourself not just on the surface but at the core of your mind — the faith, philosophy, and religion or How-To of life you follow— seeing the framework and cornerstones of your world crumble could feel a lot devastating. It feels crazy to shift from one reality to another. And many would not even dare.

Most people rather stick with what their parents or community taught them and the traditions they grew up with. Only brave souls dare re-assess the box they live in, and have their own mind think freely. Often, it happens inevitably when circumstances forces us to search for answers after some tragic event leave us with a load of whys which religion fail to suffice.

But still, many succumb to the dreadful “reality” they experienced and never move forward to uncover a finer reality behind it. So I congratulate you for daring to ask, search, and break free beyond your boundaries to create yourself anew once again and breathe in the ever-freshness of life.

But where to start?

Reconstruction all starts with destruction — dismantling, demolition and clearing.

You have to completely dismantle, demolish and clear out your former mindset without adhering to anything new.

Be a free thinker, as open minded as possible. Forget everything you learned to weigh old and new views impartially. Take it as an opportunity to develop your logic and reasoning skills.

When a building has to be reconstructed from its foundations, it has to be completely destroyed, and the ground cleared of debris.

I watched a huge truck with a wrecking ball crushing down a tall building. At first, it looks so wasteful. It’s not so easy to determine to demolish the structures and forms we were already used to and for which we had invested so much.

Especially regarding beliefs that served as water and electric utilities to sustain our lifestyle, it almost tastes like death to disconnect from the breasts that gave us life.

So why demolition?

There are two main reasons why you have to let go:

1. The old structure was already damaged and non-functional.

Sometimes, there’s just no other way to proceed with life — like when it has already been hit by an explosive event. If we don’t choose to demolish, we remain in ruins and can’t ever build a new life on our ground. We can’t rebuild using rubble. Perhaps some parts may be recycled but has to be put aside first until the demolition is over.

2. We have to adapt to changing times and environment.

Change is what makes up life. And we have to go with its flow. We are likely to be left worse damaged unless we evolve. Life is like a rushing river that chips away the stones and carries its pieces to sail around the world.

Even when structures are still intact, reconstruction is necessary for safety reasons, before something bad happens as it may not be suitable to changing times and environments. Change is the only way to survive and thrive in life.

Action Steps:

1. Dismantle

Take down the parts that may still be useful. Put these aside so that these would not be buried and wasted in the demolition area.

Segregate the ideas and beliefs that are helping you from those that are useless. Examine your thought process, the causes and effects. Determine which to save and which to destroy. Archive the useful ones.

2. Demolish

The general process of demolition is to work from top to bottom, outer to inner, and weaker to stronger points. Start with the least you strongly believe in. Start with the most recently added to your system. Work backwards, downward, and inward until you reach your core dysfunctional philosophies. Crush every thought that would not be helpful in the new life structure you want to build for yourself.

3. Clearing

Clear the rubble to get ready to build anew. Shake it all off. Press that delete button in your head. If you know how to clear your mind through meditation or some other method, go ahead.

The Cost of Not Clearing

I have shifted from Christianity to Judaism to Mysticism to Buddhism. In every group, the teacher would emphasize always to newbies that they should unlearn first everything they believed before. I took it negatively at first, thinking that they were all self-righteous and closed minded towards other beliefs. But now I see the importance of that lesson.

I’ve left my Christianity and built new structures on top of the rubble I have not cleared. So foolish. Now I understand why I feel so unstable and stressed and wounded. Geez, it’s like standing and walking on piles of rubble. The ground is uneven with sharp objects lying around. It is impossible to make any firm structure on top. Everything crumbles on its own.

Clearing God

Since I found that my former approach of hoarding all the knowledge I could grapple and grab — was not working, i finally decided to work on to let go of it all first. Clear all the rubble. Unlearn all the different philosophical views, metaphysics and ethics. With that, I am left with just this plain Earth to digest, no more spirituality.

I came to choose to be an atheist, to not believe in, and clear all my conceptions of any God or god. I am choosing this path of the free thinker not because spirituality and religious philosophies were not good. They were to some extent useful and made sense to me. God is not totally an absurd or repulsive idea to me. But as a rabbi advised, it is impossible to know God truly, unless you first unlearn all your misconceptions of God. Get rid of all your gods, have no God. Go and be an atheist first. It is okay, even better than being an idolater, worshiping false images of God.

Learn to manage first your earthly and material things before trying to understand the heavenly things. That is the conclusion of my years of searching for God.

Having lived all my life in the spiritual plane (since after my childhood trauma), it was hard to let go of the bubble I wrapped around me to feel okay. But now, I am getting hold of it — to live the impossible: to live without God, at least to not pay so much attention. And it is when I stopped searching, seeking and needing Heaven, that I found life on Earth more likable and livable.