Nov 2, 2020
25 Brutal Truths About Life No One Wants to Admit
Time is your most valuable asset — prioritize how you spend it.
The COVID-19 pandemic and corresponding civil unrest, economic uncertainty, and incompetent leadership has created a deep agitation in the collective psyche.
Every single person has been impacted, some harmed more than others. But no one will emerge from this experience unchanged. The events of 2020 mark a transition that will continue to impact us for decades to come.
It’s easy to get lost in the storm of uncertainty, working from home, and socio-political baggage. But to live a life based on your values, you must confront brutal truths you’d otherwise prefer to ignore during this difficult moment.
Now is not the time to hibernate, it’s time to wake up.
Here are 25 brutal truths every single person needs to hear.
1. You and everyone you love is going to die, and you have no idea when
Avoiding your mortality leads to complacency.
When you don’t confront that your time on this planet is limited, you make decisions to maximize comfort at the expense of growth.
2. It’s not what happens, it’s how you react to uncertainty that matters
Encountering an experience like COVID-19 reveals your true colors.
How you respond to adversity — not just in the moment itself, but over time — reveals a reflection of your inner being.
Don’t like what you see?
Do something about it.
3. Your desire to share your life on social media means that you end up missing the very moments you intend to capture
Every annoyed child sick of their parents’ insistence at documenting moments knows this. It’s self-evident. And yet, the majority of people seem not to notice.
To truly immerse yourself in the present, drop the phone, find your breath, connect to your feelings, and drink the nectar of the moment.
4. Your material wealth won’t make you a better or happier person
Despite your ego’s need to feel special, your preferred coping strategies are not “better” than another person’s just because they’re rewarded by society.
No matter how much success you attain, it will never heal the wounds that fuel your compensation.
5. Your obsession with finding happiness prevents its attainment
iPhones, Sonos, and Pelotons — you seek new products because you’re fueled by inner emptiness you don’t want to address.
You’re searching for something that you are actively divorcing yourself from.
6. All parents fuck up their kids, but it is the responsibility of that child, once grown, to work through their wounds
Many parents do the best they can. But that’s not an excuse to avoid working through your emotional conditioning.
It’s your responsibility as an adult to work through the issues you inherited so you don’t repeat the same patterns.
7. You can’t make everyone happy and if you do, you’ll lose yourself
People pleasing involves overlooking your own wants, needs, and desires to appease others.
This pattern is related to enmeshed family patterns in which you were made to feel responsible for your parents’ feelings.
If you don’t want to repeat it (and don’t want to lose yourself in that pursuit) then talk to someone who can help you change those patterns.
8. You can’t be perfect, and holding yourself to unrealistic standards amplifies distress
The neurotic solution of our time is seeking perfection to avoid confronting the imperfection of ourselves and the family members who let us down.
Your inner critic will continue to berate you until you discover how it developed, why it’s still present, and begin to heal that emotional pain.
9. No game, whether of wealth or status, is worth losing your values
If you’re unaware of what game you’re playing and your reasons for playing it, your unconscious will lead you to devastation when, after winning, you’re confronted by the wounds that never left but were merely covered in your pursuit.
Read that again.
10. Your achievements and successes won’t matter on your deathbed
If you spend your entire life building sandcastles without recognizing that the tide is coming in, you’re setting yourself up for disappointment.
Don’t lose track of what’s most important.
11. Your over-valuing of thoughts instead of feelings stunts your growth
Thoughts are your ego’s attempt to control the world and your position in it.
Focusing on productivity, mental models, and changing your thoughts are superficial solutions to an emotional problem remaining unacknowledged.
12. Actions speak louder than words — hold yourself accountable
Talking is easy, especially on the internet.
Action doesn’t need to be loud to be effective.
13. You will regret wasting time on the future and past instead of the present
If thinking were considered a disease, we’d all have cancer.
More presence = more fulfillment. It’s that simple.
14. No one cares how difficult your life is — you write your own narrative
Victor Frankl — a Holocaust survivor — once said that those who have a why to live can survive almost any how.
Find your why and take ownership over the story you’re telling yourself.
16. Investing in yourself is the most worthwhile investment you can make
Physical, mental, emotional, and spiritual health are paramount to living a meaningful life.
Without growing and learning as you move through this brief, limited existence, what’s the point?
17. Pleasure is temporary and fleeting—stop chasing fireworks and start building a constellation
Delayed gratification > temporary pleasure.
Don’t waste time trying to maximize comfort. That’s something you already have in abundance.
Instead, play your game to the fullest while fighting to maintain connection with yourself.
18. Your screen-based life increases the disconnection between your mind, body, and spirit
This will be a leading issue over the next century.
As our world makes it easier to live online instead of in our bodies, those who prioritize re-connecting with themselves will become far happier than those who fall in love with their avatar.
19. Your ambition and talent means nothing without execution — put in the work
Living in the etheric “idea” space is a lot of fun. It leads to energy, excitement, and motivation.
But if that momentum doesn’t translate into action, it’s meaningless.
20. You place your fears, insecurities, and limitations onto other people, which increases everyone’s suffering
Your projection becomes problematic when you don’t recognize it.
Unfortunately, almost no one does.
21. Denying your racist, sexist, and heteronormative biases perpetuates systemic inequality
When you disavow your own potential for violence, it’s then placed onto others whom you attack.
This attack is a tactic to alleviate the tension you would otherwise feel confronting your conditioning. It provokes others to attack you.
And that bipartisan bickering hides the monster — the one that thrives in silence and survives on misdirection. The silent killer that lives in legislation, funding, and policing.
That monster lives inside all of us.
Looking the other way only makes it grow stronger.
22. You become what you meditate on — where your focus goes, your conditioning grows
Therefore, focus on what you deem to be most important to your lifetime.
Don’t waste this opportunity.
23. Every single failure is an opportunity to build trust in that which is beyond your control
Mentally, you can learn from every failure.
Emotionally and spiritually, failure opens your heart to move beyond yourself.
24. Hopelessness is a requirement of discovering authentic hope
You can’t cheat the process.
You must become an active participant in your suffering and descend into your emotional depth.
It is there you will find the strength to move forward.
25. Time is your most valuable asset — prioritize how you spend it
If you take nothing else from this article, hear this: You only get one chance.
You don’t know how long you have or how long your loved ones have.
In the blink of an eye, it’s over.
Leverage that uncertainty to live a more fulfilling life while you still can.
When I first wrote the 2016 viral sensation, “20 Brutal Truths About Life No One Wants to Admit,” I had no idea it would resonate with the masses.
I was in an agitated mood on a cool, dreary September night in Chicago. Frustrated by the endless pit of my dissertation and the immaturity demonstrated in response to the reality TV star turned political candidate, I wanted to share truths that to me were both self-evident and not often discussed.
Overnight, the article reached 2 million views.
The unrest I distilled into 20 truths led millions of people to debate the merit of my thoughts.
Over time, my article provided me with ample opportunities to reflect on whether I agree or would like to revise them. As it turns out, some points needed to be modified and the list needed to expand.
