How to Turn Your Life Around - AskReddit

it's been two years since and i am proud to say that i'm actually in love with the way i look how did you turn your life around after being laid off from my last factory job i suddenly found myself on the streets of toronto in the early 1900s with a grade 9 education no money no friends no job references and not really any family so what did i do found an unbelievably dirty crappy crawl space basement apartment applied for a welfare stop drinking and smoking and anything else unhealthy got a gym membership and went four hours a day jogged five miles every morning weather permitting enrolled in an adult high school ignored everyone and everything that would be a distraction got my high school diploma with honors in two years applied for university got in moved to a different city and spent four years getting my ba han in philosophy because i like to think and solve problems applied to a graduate program and spent the next 10 years getting my ma and my phd then spent the next several years as a professor making good money and having lots of fun won't say how things are going now because i got cursed with poor health etc and so i'm no longer working i'll just say that i'm happy now and know that i would have ended up either dead or in jail if i hadn't done what i did all those years ago sooner or later everyone has got to take their life seriously i grew up in south florida during the beginning of the opioid craziness from 2006 to 2011 things got pretty bad in 2011 i sold my last possession my car for 800. packed two suitcases and bought a bus ticket to denver never been to denver didn't know anyone there but weed was starting to be legal and i didn't want to miss out i detoxed on the bus going from florida to colorado do not recommend i got lucky and ended up sitting next to a guy that was a grower and needed help in his garden i didn't know it at the time but on the greyhound he said i had an eight-hour job interview got to denver and he really helped me get established within two months i was sleeping on his couch and learning how to grow haven't touched a painkiller since i got on that bus almost nine and a half years ago and now i'm married homeowner decent car and working my dream job in the cannabis industry it's not for everyone but i literally went from homeless sticking needles in my arm to living a life better than i could have ever imagined paid off my debts slowly but surely and worked my butt off to buy a house took years but it was worth it dave ramsey is amazing his audiobook taught me the concept of the emergency fund and that every dollar has a name on it like one hundred dollars isn't just one hundred dollars sitting in your checkings it's twenty dollars for gas forty dollars for groceries forty dollars to put towards rent now you don't have 100 to spend on junk anymore he's a tried and true economic scientist not just some life hack book dude would recommend got a dui decided why else locked up for 12 hours that this was rock bottom decided that rather than trying to find a new job in the daily grind i would work for myself have spent the last eight months building up a business selling meteorites and meteorite jewelry it's not a success yet but things are definitely looking up i wasn't happy lost weight shaved head got tattoos travel more complain less everything i do is for myself i have a long way to go if it's me trying to impress someone it never sticks you have to want to do it yourself it takes time start today it will take x amount of days start tomorrow it takes x plus one find what makes you happy no matter how insignificant i never pictured today me a year ago self-reflection and self-awareness are key when i was a teenager i was homeless a lot of places wouldn't hire me because i had no experience or interview clothes i went to the board of education and begged the hr lady to give me a chance at any job i told her i'd scrub the school with a toothbrush if they paid me they made me a general sub for clerical i took a call for one of the bad neighborhood schools that some others turned down walked across town to get there every day i had to start walking at 4 30 a.m to be on time i wore dress clothes from a church mission that were way too big but i did my best after four months they gave me a long-term position then a permanent one with benefits i saved up enough for an apartment finding a landlord okay with renting to an 18 year old homeless girl was hard and started college i haven't been homeless a day since in the last 15 years i even have a house now i heavily reduced sugar when i was 21 and started resistance training two years later and i am feeling the best i have ever felt have so much energy and self-confidence because i actually like the way i look now clothes fit so much better as well i'm not going to lie it was really difficult for the first few months i wasn't obese or anything but i still had my baby fat that i wanted to be rid of i stopped eating normal chocolate as in milk chocolate muffins cookies anything with added refined sugar i think i did suffer a bit of sugar withdrawal got the shakes and pretty awful headaches but after a few months it just stopped and i didn't crave any of that rubbish anymore two years later and the baby fat i swear has melted off me and i only eat dark chocolate in the occasional cookie but only once in a blue moon and don't miss it at all i get the majority of my sugar from fructose now and feel so much better for it same goes for refined carbs stopped eating that as well i also have the muscle tone i always wanted to so i feel so much stronger quite recently i deleted facebook deleted instagram and snapchat i now only use twitter and reddit i stopped making an effort to those who don't for me i cut out the toxic people in my life and i surrounded myself with positivity and care if it's habit-based checking remove the icon from an easy to get to location to somewhere more difficult sometimes making things a little bit harder and more manual allows time for your brain to catch itself and say you don't need to do that you don't have to cut it all out right away just try and reduce the addiction maybe when you feel like digging for it put the phone down and walk or clean eventually you just don't bother to care unless it's something important for you to check say messaging a family member or wishing someone happy birthday [Music] went to therapy to learn why i wasn't taking care of myself i spent a lot of time trying to gain the courage to speak up about my needs it felt like the world would collapse and everyone would leave me if i did two years later i've managed to leave that one-sided relationship and have realized that my real friends actually respect me more once i finally made a decision i felt so much calmer and at peace with myself i've not met someone else but i know that when the time comes i'm ready to love them while also going for what i want in life it's going to be great i quit doing drugs and quit drinking started getting more stuff done and living way healthier that drugs actually help was a lie i just told myself drugs are a band-aid not the solution that is the harsh reality unfortunately you often have to hit rock bottom to come to that realization i hate stoner logic now what stoner didn't start off thinking weed made them some superhero that's how addiction starts the drug just makes everything more fun or makes you feel like the person you're supposed to be until it doesn't even if wheat has minimal negative effects on someone's life for a long time it will blur every day together and rob you of your time in very insidious ways you will look back at the past five years of your life and realize you can't tell one day from the next it was all a mindless blur and you've lost that time decided it's okay to put yourself first no matter what i don't mean that go ahead and cheat in life for your benefits for example i was seeing this toxic person for some time and i was the one always compromising when things finally ended i chose to cut off all contact from that person while they wanted to remain in touch for support or validation i felt bad and selfish while doing it but starting to feel better about myself now that that person is out of my life you need to be selfish if the other person is being selfish too lived in detroit skies are gray got laid off because management made an absolute mess out of the merger next door neighbor got murdered decided the city will be the death of me and my happiness sold the house bought a van moved to la went to school now i am doing some of the coolest stuff imaginable a number of publications trips to the jungle exploring uncharted caves meeting celebs jumping out of airplanes presenting at academic conferences now trying to get into a phd program in archaeology that's it in a nutshell went from just partying hard on the weekends to partying hard every day to losing my job from partying hard drug test failed for coke from there it turned to meth really low point one day i had an epiphany and realized that it wasn't what i wanted and that i've seen people go down similar paths actively seeked help changed friend groups stayed in got clean and am now doing okay can't say i'm doing great but my future is looking better every day even if it's only slightly the addiction is still affecting me even after all this time it's caused insomnia and depression along with anxiety things i didn't have before doing coke slash meth [Music] my old school was absolute bad my teachers were incompetent and were fueling my mental health issues rather than helping me with them ran away from home after a fight with my mom lived in a governmental institution for kids and teenagers for six months and changed schools i'm a student of a christian private school now not catholic though sounds worse than it is and i finished therapy my teachers here really care about their students and want them to be good and happy changed my grades from an average of 4.4 in germany one is the best and six is the worst to a 2.0 and i'm back at home with my mom never been happier in my life leaving tumblr i had been brainwashed into one of the most insufferable people boycotting everything tirades about inequality regardless of the appropriateness the hive mind mentality was making me a bad person who thought i was always right and just i'm happier now that i got out of there and people actually like being around me i have friends again most importantly though i'm enjoying the world without constantly spitting venom at anything that isn't the perfect utopia project quit my job in 2010 my job moved to a different city and i had to follow because the money was good or so i thought 12-hour swing shifts with 90-minute ride each way town was a total hellhole rents were crazy expensive if you didn't want to live in the hood ended up working for net zero after bills and expenses child support living in an apartment with no furniture after two years i had enough learn to invest put my savings into it doubled it in a bull market everyone's a genius now that my kids are out of college my bills are absurdly low learn to live cheap inherited a house sold it now my investments are under professional management drove a forklift for a while cool gig i know people don't like to hear this but money is important if your debt to income ratio is 100 it doesn't matter if you're earning 500 000 or working in the food court you're still broke people would say i wish i had those problems but you really don't but if you're earning five thousand dollars a month and your bills are only one thousand dollars a month you're doing better than the five hundred thousand dollars guy who is struggling to afford his lavish house and unnecessary cars he looks like a baller but trust me he's losing sleep if that job goes off louie he's in trouble presently i could throw a dart at the map and go live there provided it's a second-tier city with low taxes learn to cook don't buy extravagant cars i haven't gone on vacation in five years because i'm on permanent vacation all that stuff adds up and if i spend like a full i'll have to go back to working somewhere to earn money to pay on stuff i don't care to own more importantly being chained to a clock and selling my remaining hours which are finite or one morning i can just get up and call the realtor and put my place on the market and drive to idaho or salt lake or santa fe and look for something else that's the best happiness i ever found being unchained for many responsibilities and having realistic expectations for basic comforts my ex-wife and her current husband spend way over 100 dollars a year trying to a four day admittedly nice house and they're miserable always cash broke but trying to afford more stuff like expensive vacations bird baths and little windmills for the yard so they can brag to their co-workers how well they're doing then collapse on the couch and wait for the next workday and do it all over again in jobs they hate 270 days a year he's still gonna be paying on that house till he's 80. f that one of the best things that ever happened to me was when my life turned to hell the only true freedom that you find is when you realize and come to terms with the fact that you are completely and unapologetically messed up and then you are free to float around the system doug stanhope realized that i needed control of my life i was on a bad path to life in jail and was listening to a bad crowd jail or death were the paths in front of me one day while cleaning dishes it dawned on me that i had more worth i could do better than that i now run a tow truck and love it i get to help people and make smiles happen on so many faces it's not even funny i give them a little knowledge along the way cause i know a thing or two but tell them to take it with a grain of salt as i'm not a mechanic but it's a start to what may save the money was always chubby while growing up had been yo-yo dieting for almost a decade it eventually got to the point where the dieting wasn't effective i couldn't lose the weight and wasn't even eating much i decided enough was enough and i was going to beat that eating addiction i remember walking into the kitchen being fed up with the scale the food my body i thought to myself this is absurd i'm not eating much yet i still can't lose i'm done with this bs i stubborned up cut the junk food the snacks and the irregular eating within two weeks my body caught up it's been two years since and i am proud to say that i'm actually in love with the way i look and i don't even look perfect but i'm content i'm no longer addicted to food and do eat intuitively it's not just the food addiction though as soon as i got that under control every other aspect of my life has improved significantly i just feel happier overall thanks for listening to radio tts hit the subscribe 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Keywords: reddit, reddit stories, best of reddit, askreddit, reddit story, ask reddit, reddit cringe, askreddit funny, reddit funny, r/askreddit, top posts, reddit best, r/, reddit top posts, askreddit top posts, reddit top post, radio tts Turn life around, turn your life around, reddit life around, reddit turn life around, Turn life around, rags to riches, Turn things around, Better Life, self improvement, Motivation

Id: DKkIcvgrBQM

Length: 15min 20sec (920 seconds)

Published: Sun Aug 30 2020