I used to worry about everything. If I had an important conversation the next day, I couldn’t fall asleep until four in the morning.

Heal yourself first, then help others.

Here’s the core of my program: happiness isn’t out there, it’s inside. Stop suffering. It all just seems that way, and it always did. Love, be grateful, and see what happens. And do whatever you want.

For some reason, refusing to suffer drives everyone up the wall. How can you?! Children are dying! And then the horror of it dawned on me: I actually believe what I’m saying. I believe in refusing to suffer. In happiness while you’re alive. Heaven on earth.

So what’s the point of being, really? Same as on a trip: it’s just feeling good and not sweating it. Anya was just telling me how wonderful a calm life is. She never used to think so: wouldn’t it be boring? But calm is the absence of fear and everything that grows out of it.

You can live like that: just pleasant, no sweat. And for that, you have to stop! And not start again. So let’s go through the main sources of trouble.

Stop

Start by stopping the suffering you have right now: sort out everything that hurts. Karma isn’t a sentence handed down from above; karma means doing. So do: stop the cycle. Here are your three sources of suffering. The first is you: stop feeling guilty. The second is other people: stop blaming them. The third is the flaws in everything: stop hunting for them. See that all three are just you? The second arrow, with no first one. Why do you care that someone else is wrong?

xkcd: Duty Calls

Stop doing what you know you shouldn’t be doing. Start stopping now. — Jordan Peterson

Heal yourself

Then heal yourself. Look at what you feel and where the thoughts and feelings come from. Research, seek: it’s not what it seems. Meditate.

In yoga you notice there’s no pain, just sensations in the body. And you can’t really call them unpleasant, especially once you breathe into them and let the body get used to it. I don’t mean a broken bone. That pain signal is real.

Part of how I healed was simply avoiding stressful situations. And once I calmed down, I noticed they didn’t stress me out anymore.

Refuse

After that, refusing to suffer, to worry and to fret got a lot easier. You refuse the suffering still to come, everything that keeps piling on after that. You just swat it all away. Something happens, and I simply don’t believe I have to worry about it.

I just refuse to suffer. That covers everything. You simply don’t think about it, and you do what you want. Whatever I don’t like, I ignore by feel. Anxious? Unpleasant? That’s not what I’m here for. And the unpleasant stuff stopped showing up. Whatever happens, I’m fine. Not just okay: I’m happy. And I don’t put up with anything.

I’ve no problem because I don’t mind what happens. — J. Krishnamurti

Tell others

And tell others. That’s why I’m writing this book, and why I made tellothers.com.

All it took for me to get free of an addiction was not starting, once. Same with suffering: all it takes is not starting.

To feel love, you have to love.